Mrthfx

A friend and I are writing a story based on our characters. We brainstormed some ideas and now we know what the basic idea of our story is going to be. But I'm having a little trouble with the prologue, I was going to make it the backstory of the main character so that if someone reads it they'll understand what's going on with the character and why they're in the situation they're in now. So I'm just wondering does that make any sense? Can we use the prologue to give the backstory?

Prologues are usually boring, because they are almost inevitably history lessons that have no suspense or action and they feel like a history lesson, right after lunch, and a snooze fest.

You would be better off skipping it, and giving an actual origin story: Think, for example, of Spiderman. You start out in Peter Parker's normal world, before he is a superhero, learn about his family, him being in love with a girl he is NOT destined to get, etc. Then he gets bit by the spider, and transforms, and gains reasons to fight crime, and becomes a hero to the girl, etc, etc, etc.

Origin stories are interesting, the normal world for the character is interesting. Even if you already know Peter is going to BE Spiderman (Spiderman is on the cover), as a reader the origin story has conflict, and you wonder exactly what will happen, and you keep turning pages to find out what happens next.

"What happens next" is the essence of a good story, a "page turner" has readers literally turning pages! Why? To find out what happens next! Not to read yet more history lesson, and background, and how he felt in school, etc.

Show us the background, with scenes and conflicts, danger and heartbreak and elation and victories, don't give us a dry lecture about the past. Most of it, we just don't really need to know.

For example, if some incident X makes Joe terrified of dogs, we pretty much can infer that by seeing Joe terrified of dogs. We really don't need a reason, and the backstory can be one line from Joe to a friend, "A Rottweiler bit the hell out me when I was a kid, and I can't get over it, man, no matter how much I try." But ONLY when it actually happens in the story, and that should ONLY happen if it is important to the story.

Say it influences the plot by changing Joe's decisions, or it creates a personality difference in Joe that changes how other characters feel about him, or treat him, or sympathize with him. If this fear makes him (or others) change their plans. Or it makes Joe want to change and finally do something about it. If it doesn't move somebody in a different direction, or define their personality in a way that matters, it can be left out because it literally doesn't matter to the story.

In the event the backstory is too far in the past to show (but notice, the first scene in the first Harry Potter is shown in present tense, but then JK Rowling just starts the 2nd chapter "Nearly ten years had passed since [main event of the first chapter]".

But if you don't want to do that, you can have your character reveal elements of their backstory in dialogue with somebody important and new in their life; somebody they are saving, or are partnering up with, or seeking assistance from, a romantic interest, etc. In other words, you can introduce what is called a "foil", somebody that doesn't know the MC's past, so when the MC tells them, the reader learns it too. Just don't make this telling an alternative way to infodump. It is a conversation, not a speech or interview. The foil should never really say "tell me more" or "go on" or anything similar. Quite often, in real conversation, one person's story reminds a listener of their own story or some story they heard, and that is their reply. Sharing, not interviewing. But dialogue is a different art; we have posts here on this stack about how to do that.

It can, but there are other ways you might want to handle it. The risk of making a prologue a backstory is you might end up with an info dump. Sometimes they are useful, but take it too far and you risk alienating the reader.

There is the iceberg method where most of what you create never appears in your work and only exists to colour and inform what you write, making it more subtle.

I tend to sprinkle information throughout my piece, trying to minimize the info dumps.

One character of mine spent years infiltrating Columbian cartels and eventually destroying one responsible for the death of her brother. Knowing this influences how I write her, but the most that is revealed directly to the reader is that she once worked for a cartel, maybe one line about destroying those responsible for the death. Sometimes I have her compare her current situation with her previous, but I do not give more information than is required.

For my main character, you meet him before you learn a word about his history. He reflects a moment and the reader learns he and his sister are close and why. Much later, I have a character ask him directly about the incident, which he then describes.

Depending on the type of story you want to write, the prologue could work quite well. Just be careful, backstory can be like spice - you don’t want to overdo it but strike that balance.

Prologues are something that need to be handled carefully - otherwise, you may wind up giving too much information about a character/world that the reader doesn't care about yet.

If you have a lot of backstory and you feel like it's slowing down the plot later on, there's another approach you can try: make the backstory part of your plot. Instead of sneaking in a series of history lessons later on, start your story with your character's history being made. Aim for more than just a prologue - take an important part of your character's life and make it into its own episode, its own story arc. Show us the events that led your characters to become the people they are today. How did they react to that situation? How did it influence their decisions later on? If it's done well, the reader can easily understand your characters - instead of needing explanations later on.