How a book is like a theme party
I love a good theme. I had a girls night years back and had a California theme. California wine and California foods. Both my kids had Bar/Bat Mitzvah parties themed to perfection. My son’s party theme was White Sox – so everything was black and white and baseball. My daughter’s party theme was Rock Around The Clock. The center pieces were clocks, of course and 50′s kitsch filled our Temple’s social hall and foyer. I even schedule themed meals for my eye-rolling teenagers. Actually this Sunday night is Irish night in this Jewish home where we’ll have corned beef and cabbage and potatoes and yes, we will all be required to wear green. They don’t know yet that I have decor, including hats. Oh how happy they will be (NOT).
But ask me about a theme for a story I might write or read, and it often eludes me. I surely don’t know it before I start writing — unlike party or meal planning when themes don’t emerge, they are crafted and created. I think you can write with a theme in mind – but what you end up with may not be what you planned. If that happens with a party, not so good. If it happens with a story it just be phenomenal because, to me, it means that the theme developed because of the characters and the plot and the dialogue, that it wasn’t contrived, that it was organic to the inner core of the story.
But like Erica says over at Jon’s blog – where everyone is chiming in about theme – “if you finish it and nothing resonates thematically, and it was all plot and dialogue and you don’t end with a sense of wonder of . . . ah ha, this was really powerful . . . then I think sometimes it’s a meh.”
And the same thing is true for a theme party.
Keeping the intended theme in the back of your mind when you write OR plan a party helps you carry it through to the end, so that it stands out, yet is tactful. So it does create a sense of satisfaction and not a sense of wondering “what was that supposed to be?”
Do you start or end with theme when you’re writing or planning a gathering? Do those techniques have anything to do with one another or the way you approach just about anything?
Hi Amy!
I did have one further thought (what? another?) on this subject … It was actually Sex Scenes at Starbucks that got me thinking about it. For me, planning makes sense because, ideally, the whole book should explore your theme. Thus, in a book about, say, addiction, some characters may be recovering addicts, some may be addicts, some may be cops and some may be drug dealers. Each character will represent their portion of the whole. Each is a real person, yes, but also an archetype. I’m thinking specifically of a book like The Corrections (in case we didn’t know what the theme was, the title helpfully supplied it). Those characters are superbly drawn, but each is also undeniably a different version of the same wound.
I don’t really have an “answer” for anybody else. For me, it’s essential to plan in advance so I can make sure it is consistent, across all the characters.
But it does help to explore these things with other writers, no?
Oftentimes I really don’t know what my theme is in the story until I’m done writing the first draft. It emerges while I’m writing. And then when I go back and do my rewriting, I can make the theme stronger.
Absolutely, Jon!
For me, I started writing my book thinking it was about one thing and realized it was about another. For me the theme emerged with the story. I always have a theme in mind — like for my story that’s yet to be written (the new one), the theme is in every one of my notes — but I don’t stick to it like glue, I just write and if and when something else comes out of the pages, that’s OK. I think if I planned it too much then the story would suffer. I have always had trouble with identifying theme anyway — its no different with my own writing because although some of crystal clear there are always underlying currents as well and depending on the person/reader, some are more powerful than others. Make sense?
Melissa, that’s how it is for me. And like I said to Jon, I allow myself to remain open to any and all permissibilities. Sometimes the thoughts and/or themes of our subconscious are the strongest of all.
Amy, If by theme you mean underlying purpose of the book, I think it’s important to have that from the start. As you know, I’m not one to plan in advance and have everything all figured out before I begin writing. I prefer for my characters to tell me where they want to take the story. That said, I do think it’s important to have an overall theme in mind. Additional themes may appear as your characters develop, and that’s great. They’ll just make the story more interesting. There you have it, my two cents. That and a buck fifty will get you a coffee at WaWa.
Debbie,
First of all – whatcha doin’ teasin’ me with a mention of WaWa? You KNOW they don’t have WaWa in Chicago don’t you? Geez, girlfriend!
As for theme, for me, trying to intentionally weave a theme through a story — for me — ended up divisive. I needed to let it go and just write and allow the theme to be there naturally…and to evolve. My theme began as one of change and became a theme of trust in oneself.
That’s why we each write our own stuff!!
Hi Amy:
I think for me, the theme is easy, because it’s always the same one. I can’t NOT write with that theme because I have a philosophical true north that dictates every word I write, every moment of my life, every prayer, most of my thoughts, etc. My true north, as I put in the comments section of my blog, is (i’m cutting and pasting it here from my comments):
Life is about one long good-bye. In the Buddhist sense, it is suffering. It is loss and grief. Every person you or I will ever love will either leave us by dying first, or we will leave them with the grieving task. And thus you must claw for and find the core humanity and grace that makes this life worth bearing and living joyfully, find those people worth grieving, and never give it or them up at any price. That’s it. My theme. Over and over and over and over again.
That makes whatever else . . . just fall into place. I don’t consciously overthink this theme. It’s my life. Which makes the writing easier somehow. If that makes any sense.
I believe even the most joyful moments of life are punctuated with a bittersweet sense of life’s fleeting nature. It makes me live each day, I hope, as if it’s a gift.
E
Erica, I can see that as both peaceful and cumbersome. Thinking about life as one big good-bye is how I lived for a few years and it stifled me. Now while it may have the same undertones, I live each day to the fullest so there will be no regrets, hopefully for anyone. I am true to myself first and always, which allows me to be the best mom I can be. I think that last line is my life theme – and possibly the very underlying theme of my now famous (to me) FD. I think you’re very in tune and at peace with yourself, that in itself allows you to write and for it all to be authentic. Readers can pick that up, absolutely.
Amy
I’m like Amy…started first book without a real solid theme and then went back and wove it in. For second book, I was more like Debbie, with more of a theme established beforehand.
Am I the only writer person who doesn’t go for a theme per se? Maybe it’s just the term that makes me grind my teeth. Sorta like branding and all that where we’re supposed to hit readers over the head with a brick so they never ever forget us or our story. But, what Debbie S. says. I DO have plot threads running through my ms from start to finish, and it was in place as I began writing. Maybe it’s a tomaytoe/tuhmahta thing.
I don’t really think about theme, but I think that the stories I’m drawn to tend to touch on humanity in general. How we treat each other and react to that treatment.