What Is a Foil Character? | Definition & Examples
- Melchior Antoine
- 5 days ago
- 5 min read
Updated: 5 days ago
A foil character is a character who helps highlight the most interesting aspects of the protagonist or main character through juxtaposition and contrast. The central action of a story is typically driven by the protagonist and antagonist.
They determine the plot and the denouement (or how the story is revolved). However, the foil character plays a minor role in helping delineate certain aspects of the protagonist. The protagonist is the hero or the good guy (at least most of the time), whereas the antagonist is the one who stands in the way of the protagonist achieving their goal. Besides being the hero, the protagonist can also be the antihero, as Macbeth is in the play Macbeth.
An example of a foil character is in Lady Macduff in Macbeth. Lady Macbeth is a prominent character in the play, although not the protagonist. Lady MacDuff is used as a juxtaposition or foil against what Lady Macbeth stands for.
Lady Macbeth has no qualms about murdering King Duncan in order for her husband to seize the Scottish throne. Her tragedy lies in the eagerness with which she attempts to suppress her femininity and her inability to resolve the internal conflict between her own embedded sense of native morality and the evil act she and her husband commit.
Lady Macduff is the wife of Macduff, whom Macbeth quickly recognizes as a threat to his new position as king of Scotland based on a prophecy. Macduff himself can be seen as a foil character to Macbeth in a sense. However, his main role is that of antagonist. More on that later.
Lady Macduff, in contrast to Lady Macbeth, is portrayed as a woman who has a strong sense of Christian moral virtue that she embraces, and she would never even think of harming the innocent for personal gain. She is the embodiment of the feminine virtue that Lady Macbeth tries to suppress.
Let’s compare these two quotes from Lady Macbeth and Lady Macduff, respectively, to demonstrate this contrast:
Macbeth, Act 1, Scene 5:
Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full
Of direst cruelty!
Lady Macbeth is praying to be possessed by evil spirits to unsex her and make her something less or more than a woman to prepare for the task of murdering King Duncan. Compare this to Lady Macduff, who is introduced just before being killed alongside her son by assassins working for Macbeth in Act 4, Scene 2:
I have done no harm. But I remember now
I am in this earthly world; where to do harm
Is often laudable, to do good sometime
Accounted dangerous folly: why then, alas,
Do I put up that womanly defence,
To say I have done no harm?
Lady Macbeth declares her innocence, saying “I have done no harm” after receiving a warning about the possibility of being killed. She then acknowledges that in the world she lives in, innocence is no guarantee of defense or safety.
On the surface, she seems to agree with Lady Macbeth that softness or innocence is a "womanly defense." However, even in the face of death, she asserts her moral integrity and, by extension, that of her husband. When the assassin asks for her husband’s whereabouts, she answers: "I hope, in no place so unsanctified / Where such as thou mayst find him." In short, her household's integrity puts her husband on a moral high ground where he cannot be touched.
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Foil character vs. antagonist
Foil characters should not be mistaken for antagonists. An antagonist is typically the obstacle that the protagonist has to overcome to complete the story. In short, the major conflict of the story or plot involves a struggle between the protagonist and antagonist.
On the other hand, the foil character simply highlights the differences in values, character perspective, and worldview between them and the protagonist. In short, they help in crystallizing a proper character analysis of the protagonist. A good example of a foil character in literature is Ismene, the sister in the tragedy of Antigone. Here's an example of a conversation between the two sisters in Scene 1.
Antigone asks Ismene to help her bury her brother Polynices in defiance of King Creon's decree. Ismene refuses, and Antigone lets her have it:
ANTIGONE:
I’m not going to force you, but even if you change
Your mind, I won’t accept your help now.
Do what you think is right; I will bury him.
It’s a beautiful thing, to die in this act.
With him I will rest, beloved with beloved.
. . .
ISMENE:
I’m not dishonoring anyone! And even still, I’m just a woman!
Only men get a say in how the city’s run, you know that.
ANTIGONE: You can make that your excuse— I will bury my brother.
Here, the point of Ismene as a foil character is to contrast two very different versions of womanhood, just as in the case of Ladies Macbeth and Macduff. Antigone is willing to challenge a tyrannical male authority, such as Creon, whereas Ismene claims, "only men get a say in how the city is run." Ismene shows us just how unconventional and heroic the actions of Antigone are.
She represents a non-traditional kind of femininity, which is uncompromising in showing feminine compassion to the desecrated corpse of her brother to the point that she challenges power in a patriarchal society in a manner that no other man would dare to.
Ismene's foil character also reveals that Antigone is uncompromising and full of pride. This contrast prepares us for the final showdown between Antigone, the protagonist, and Creon, the antagonist. From her interaction with her sister, we see that Antigone is willing to defy Creon even if it means death.
In the case of Lady Macbeth vs. Lady Macduff, Lady Macduff appears in only one scene. And her appearance serves the purpose of juxtaposing her traditional take on femininity against Lady Macbeth’s unconventional womanhood.
In the play, the protagonist and antagonist are Macbeth and Macduff. To be clear, Macduff is antagonist to Macbeth. The play ends when Macduff defeats Macbeth in battle and cuts off his head. This is how it would always end, and the play lets us know with several hints. For example, after the murder of Duncan, Macbeth hears knocking in Act 2, Scene 2:
Whence is that knocking?
How is't with me, when every noise appals me?
The knocking is Macduff announcing himself. It’s as if he is unknowingly claiming that he will be the one to bring Macbeth to justice for his evil deed. More than that, Macbeth’s confidence as a tyrant king and warrior is spurred by the witch’s prophecy that he could never die of a man born from a woman.
This makes Macbeth feel that he is invincible, and he fights on like a supervillain even after his army is defeated. In his fight with Macduff, Macduff reveals to Macbeth that he was "from his mother's womb / Untimely ripp'd." In short, he was born via cesarean section, which means he wasn’t born of a woman. Well, technically speaking. It’s as if Macbeth’s unnatural, immoral acts can be corrected or cancelled out only by an antagonist born from unnaturalness.
So while an antagonist, like a foil character, may have contrasting world views and morals to the main character, the role that they play in comparison to the protagonist is much larger and more significant to the development and final resolution of the story. A foil character, on the other hand, contributes to highlighting the major themes of the story as opposed to advancing the plot.
Cite this EminentEdit article |
Antoine, M. (2025, July 12). What Is a Foil Character? | Definition & Examples. EminentEdit. https://www.eminentediting.com/post/foil-character |