The theme is one of the most discussed topics in the literary world. The reason why themes are very important is that they deal with the wisdom, the lessons, and the moral of stories. Surprisingly, some writers don’t believe in themes and they don’t like to spend time thinking about how to theme their stories. These writers prefer to concentrate their energies on giving great stories without worrying about whether or not to give stories profound messages.
No matter how much an author might try to avoid giving his story a theme, their stories often end up having themes because they are difficult to avoid completely. A writer’s opinions, biases, attitudes, and interests eventually give his story a theme, whether or not he consciously knows about it. Authors should pay attention to themes because failure to do so might cause many unintended results. For example:
The theme might sound old-fashioned. Case-in-point, the qualities of heroes in books and films change over time. An author writing a story about a hero might unknowingly give his hero some characteristics that are considered dated. This could be avoided if the author pays more attention to the information he is putting in his book. He should step back and think about the overall message rather than writing an entire novel without thinking about how the different scenes relate to each other.
A story could impart messages which, upon reflection by the author, could have negative influence on readers. For instance, the main character of the book could make people believe that vigilantism is good for the society. Another example is an inspirational book which ends up promoting racial intolerance. All sorts of things can go wrong if an author fails to consider the messages in his book.
Basic component of a theme: the premise
According to the author of The Art of Dramatic Writing, Lajos Egri, every writer should work from a premise. This is the overriding message that an author wants his book to convey. It is an opinion or judgment that a certain belief, quality, or attitude will give certain results. An author should therefore have a premise like “experience is the best teacher,” or “pride comes before a fall.” By having such a premise, the author can easily determine his story’s main character, conflicts, climax, and resolution.
Issues and counterpoints
Instead of working on a simple premise like “love conquers all,” an author should talk about the relative values of certain options. For instance, he could talk about the relative benefits of self-interest vs. caring for other people. This will further enable the author to come up with ideas about how to develop his plot. For instance, he could include scenes where:
1. Characters get good outcomes when they care for others
2. Characters pursuing self-interest consistently have to contend with failures
3. People eventually learn that it is better to help others than to try to fulfill their own wishes.
If an author wants his readers to agree with the best choices in his story, he has to give them many examples where people fail if they don’t make these choices.
