Great writers have understood that if you create a fresh, individual character or a vivid, moving experience you suggest all human experience—all that has gone before and that is yet to come. The more specific and individuated a character is—like Flaubert’s Emma Bovary or Joyce’s Stephen Dedalus or Twain’s Huck Finn—the more universal and archetypal the character can be. If you’re afraid that specificity of detail limits the significance of your characters, you’ll cut yourself off from your most original and vital material.