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Copywriting TipsDoes Your Story Have A Theme?
by:
Nick Vernon
It should.
A theme is a one-line explanation of your story.. Every story should have one because our stories are simply about something.
When I say should, I mean that this isn’t always the case. Especially so for beginner writers, who may not know, that the theme carries the story. Or even as those who’ve been writing for years may not be aware of the importance of a theme.
And a theme is important.
A theme is what wish support you on track as you write the story.
What happens if you write without a theme in mind? Two things…
1. You stray from the subject
or
2. You write more than one story.
Let me give you an example of a story written with a theme in mind…
The theme to a story I once wrote was, ‘Vanity Leads To Destruction.’
Very briefly, this story is simply about a female character that believed herself to be so beautiful, in the end she lost everything.
Writing this theme on a post-it note and projected it on my computer, I was always reminded that my story had to revolve about this theme. Having a theme helped me stick to the story I had intended on writing and not stray from it – not even as a little. It as well helped me to focus only on what was essential to my story.
So according to my theme, ‘Vanity Leads To Destruction’…
• Every action my character performed was to show her vanity
• Her goals sprung from her vanity
• What driven her was her vanity
• Her words (dialogue) showed her vanity
• How she handled situations showed her vanity
• The interaction with different characters showed her vanity
• The conflict was a result of her vanity
• The highest peak in my story, the climax, showed an intense moment of whether her goal would-be be met (whether her vanity would-be activity for, or against her)
• And the ending? The ending showed how she was led to destruction because of her vanity
By following my theme, everything in my story was precise.
If I showed my character not being vain in any instance, then I would’ve strayed from my theme.
Does your story have a theme?
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If you didn’t consciously write with a theme in mind, then your story won’t have one. Chances are, your story isn’t focused. But then once more there is the different possibility… At times we fluke things.
Perhaps without consciously knowing, a theme is running through your story.
Check your story to see if this is the case. If it is, are you projected to the theme?
If you find that several parts of your story are lost
from the theme, those parts wish need to be changed to accommodate the theme.
Now the different possibility…
You don’t have a theme and none is running through your story. That’s okay. We can still save it. See through your story and see what it’s about. Then move up with the most appropriate theme to it - A theme that does sense yet won’t mean too more activity to change the story.
Rewrite those parts that don’t accommodate the theme.
It is easier if we move up with a theme patch we are at the plotting stage. It saves all that editing but not to worry… You won’t do the same error once more in your next story!
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Does Your Theme Contain Character, Conflict, Resolution?
For a theme to activity and the story, which wish revolve about the theme, it has to contain three things…
1. Character
2. Conflict
3. Solution
What’s the reason for this?
If your theme doesn’t contain these three essential elements, then you won’t be writing a proper short story. It power turn out to be an essay instead.
Because without…
1) Characters
You can’t attain emotional depth. Readers become engrossed in stories because of the characters in them. They either become the character (sympathize), or see simply about an engrossing person (empathize).
Emotional depth is achieved once
readers use their imagination and senses and/or experiences to live the story through the characters.
2) Conflict
Your story wish be boring. Why? Without conflict, thing
to stir things up, nothing happens. And a story, in which nothing happens, is one not worth writing about.
Your characters don’t lead carefree lives. Well, not in the instance you are writing simply about them. In that part of their lives they are featured with a problem. They want thing
and can’t get it because of the conflict, which is preventing them to do so.
And it’s that conflict and the struggle the characters has to undergo that keeps us readers interested and in suspense. Wish the character succeed or won’t he? And once
is this all going to happen? And how is it all going to happen?
3) Solution
Something that starts has to finish, one way or another.
Once you have created great characters, which the reader wish move to care about, and you have placed them in conflict, that conflict at the end of your story has to be resolved. The characters wish attain their goals or they won’t.
That doesn’t matter.
You can end your story as you please and as it suits your story – but you have to end it. Ending the story means breakdown the conflict.
Does your theme contain character, conflict, resolution?
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Is The Theme Running Throughout The Story?
It’s no use coming up with a theme and not mistreatment it. Short stories are simply about a character or characters and simply about one situation or happening in those characters’ lives.
By concentrating on that one thing, our stories are focused. You wish need to focus to maintain a level of intensity and projected to the theme enables us to do that.
Let me give you an example…
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Scenario One
Let’s say your story is simply about a young man (main character) who is being harried (one situation) by the school bully (secondary character.) Let’s place the setting in grade school.
Now if we focus on that single happening and in our story say….
• What started the bullying
• What the main character felt, confronted with this problem
• What the main character did to overcome this problem
• If the main character won or lost against the bully…
Then we’ll be focusing only on that incident which is what our story is about.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Scenario Two
Now if we took that situation further and in our story aforementioned that this character grew up and was afraid in high school and then later by a colleague…
That wish be listing three incidences, which wish weaken our story because we are not focusing.
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Remember a short story is short.
We don’t have too more leeway to develop too many a things so we have to be selective with what we choose to concentrate on. Short stories activity better once
they span over a short period of time.
Like in scenario one, this incident power span over a couple of days or a week, wherever
in the second scenario, it spans over a number of years. The shorter the time span the more intense the story.
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Your theme should begin at the beginning, run through the middle and conclude in the end. So let’s put a theme to the 1st scenario…
‘Strength Comes From Inside
And In The End Prevails.’
How can I have this theme running throughout my story?
Initially I wish portray my main character as a weak individual. But I wish excuse his weakness, by language maybe that…
“He comes from a closely knit, adoring family and at first doesn’t cognize how to deal with such a conflict.”
As my story progresses, I wish step by step
show his inner strength and I wish do this through incidences, which wish show his maturity, like…
• He helps out by caring for his younger siblings and contributes with the housework.
And
• I can show him cutting the neighbors’ lawns or delivering newspapers before school to show that he contributes economically too.
If I do this, my ending (when he wins against the bully) wish be likely because I have developed his inner strength. My theme would-be have run its course.
Is your theme running throughout the story?
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Have You Tested Your Theme Against Your Plot?
How we commonly begin the preparation stage in the writing process is…
We think of an idea for a story
We think of a suitable theme
We plot
Once we move up with a theme and we begin plotting, we have to see how the theme and the plot match up. Sometimes as we plot we find that the theme we had at first chosen won’t do.
For example…
‘Winning The Lottery Does Your Life Easier’
Plotting with this theme in mind, we have our characters pay off all their debts, go on endless purchasing
sprees, go on holidays, etc. We find tho'
that this won’t do a really engrossing story. So we spice it up, adding to the theme or coming up with a several one.
“Winning The Lottery Does Your Life Easier But Everything Has Its Price.”
We can show the characters living the life of the rich for a patch before they realize that being flush has its problems too...
• They now fear for their security
• Their friends and relatives are perpetually
harping at their door asking for assistance
• Etc
This second scenario creates more problems for the characters, so it’s more engrossing for us readers.
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The preparation stage is there to prepare before you write. It’s our bench wherever
we numbers everything out. We test our theme, we test our plot and once everything passes the test, then we begin writing.
You can change the theme as many a times as you feel it necessarily changing, patch you are in the preparation stage.
The main thing is to do your story interesting.
It’s not a nice idea to support dynamic the theme once
writing the story because then you wish have to support dynamic the story. This means rewriting.
Figure everything out then write.
Have you tested your theme against your plot?
_____________
Does Each Element of Your Story Further The Theme?
Whichever theme you choose, all the elements, which do up your story, dialogue, conflict, scenes, etc should be written with the theme in mind.
Your theme should progress the story.
If you find that thing
in your story doesn’t progress it, it should be cut once
you are in the piece of writing stage.
Before we see an example of elements written with a theme in mind, let’s think of a theme and a story….
The theme is…
‘Arrogance Leads To Humiliation’
Very briefly, this story is simply about a character that believes he is better than his colleagues.
His goal is to get promoted to a social control
position. What wish prevent him from reaching his goal, is the fact that management are aware of his hauteur and they don’t believe, with his attitude, he is the right person to manage the staff.
To meet his goal, the character wish take on more activity than he can handle. He wish do this to prove to management, that he is the right man for the job. But in the end, he wish do a grave error and his hauteur wish lead him to humiliation.
Now let’s take a look at the elements of this story…
Dialogue
The character’s dialogue wish show his arrogance, by the tone of his voice and the words he chooses to express himself.
Characterization
I wish show my character is proud by the way I describe him and from how different characters see him.
Motivations
I wish explain what does him think he is better than everyone else.
Goal
I wish state his goal and show how it arises from the fact that he believes himself better than everyone else.
Setting
The setting is going to be in an office environment. I can show his hauteur through the setting by maybe describing the contents of his table
(trophies) and his table
area in general (diplomas on the walls.) etc.
Conflict
The conflict wish move from himself. He is the one that creates it by doing and language things, which create dislike.
Climax
The climax is the highest point in my story wherever
the conflict and his hauteur wish move to their peak. Here we wish see how he tries to overcome the conflict and reach his goal by taking on more work.
Ending
I wish end my story with my character’s humiliation. He takes on more activity and does an error in judgement. Which not only prevents his promotion but as well gets him fired.
My theme here would-be have run its course.
Does each element of your story further your theme?
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Can Your Theme Be Evidenced In Your Story?
Your theme has to be thing
you can prove in your story - It doesn’t have to be a universal truth. This means that your theme doesn’t have to be thing
that happens in real life all the time (providing our logic can accept it, in order for us to believe it).
Whatever story you choose to write, be it a contemporary or a story which requires elements of fantasy such as in horror, science fiction etc… the events of that story have to appear logical.
What is not logical and consequently not likely is…
A character that has no noesis of computers and long
becomes a computer whiz
A car that goes over a cliff, bursts into flames and the character manages to escape unscratched
Etc
These are not likely because they can’t and don’t happen in real life and our logic doesn’t accept them.
Your theme wish be believed once
you prove it (providing of course you can.) Let’s see how you can do that.
We’ll start with a theme…
“Hard activity leads to success.’
Our story is simply about a character whose goal is to reach a social control
position inside
the institution that he works. For the reader to see how the character wish reach his goal I wish show him…
Working hard
Working long hours
Mistreatment his initiative
Being responsible
And all those qualities, in the end, wish secure him the promotion he has been aiming for.
So my theme here wish be evidenced that ‘Hard activity leads to success’ because my character succeeds in the end.
From the examples I have given so far, you may have detected
that my stories end on a happy note. Yours don’t have to. The ending wish depend on the story you are writing and how you, the writer, prefers to end it.
I could have done the reverse with this theme. I could have said,
“Hard activity doesn’t lead to success.”
My story wish be the same but in the end I wish have the character missing out on the promotion. Some
themes wish be evidenced because I have evidenced them in my story.
Any theme can activity in a story providing you can prove it.
Have you evidenced your theme?
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Is The Theme Reinforced In The Ending?
By now you should have an idea that your theme has to reach its conclusion simply as your story does. But our theme has to do more than reach its conclusion – it has to be reinforced in the end and by doing this, it wish strengthen all that we have aforementioned in our story.
So if we took a theme…
‘Persist and in the end you wish succeed’
And I showed my character working hard to attain his goals, persisting, even as if at times those goals seemed unreachable, then I would’ve showed that all his hard activity did pay off in the end. By having him succeed, it would-be reinforce the theme that had been running throughout the story.
Let me further illustrate this point by giving you a more careful example.
The theme is…
‘Persistence pays off’
The story is simply about a writer, who has been writing short stories for years, but has not succeeded in deed publicised yet.
In your story you wish show his persistence with…
• How he does time to write, even as once
his day is already full by his full time job and different responsibilities
• How his every thought is consumed by his writing
• Showing him causation
story after story to publishers
• How he doesn’t let the fact that his family believe he’s wasting his time, distract him from his intention
Simultaneously I wish place him in win and lose situations - Losing once
his stories are rejected - Winning once
he receives encouraging notes from publishers.
And in those instances wherever
he is winning, I wish show step by step
that resistance is starting to pay off, till I reach the end of my story wherever
I wish have one of his stories accepted for publication and thus bring my theme of ‘Persistence pays off’ to its conclusion.
By showing the reader how persistence is paying off, I would-be have reinforced the theme in my ending.
Is your theme reinforced in the end of your story?
Just simply about the author:
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Besides his passion for writing, Nick Vernon runs an online gift site wherever
you wish find gift information, articles and readers funny stories. Visit http://www.we-recommend.com
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