You want your stories to matter, but you have the nagging sensation that they don’t. You know that you have a great message to share, but in the back of your head, you’re pretty sure that you come across as preachy instead of meaningful.
You may have heard before that the theme of your novel is important, that the theme is what causes stories to be memorable. But you may not even know what theme is or how it helps.
Or maybe you do know about writing theme. You may have attended conferences or read books. You’ve tried to learn all you can but still feel like the intricacies of the theme are totally beyond your grasp, and you end up feeling discouraged.
All the learning in the world doesn’t help unless you know how to implement it.
If any of this sounds like you, you have come to the right place! In this post, I will define theme (and its counterpart: the thematic question) for you and give you five relevant and straightforward tips you can write into your current novel project. Writing a theme in your fiction is deep and complex, but it is not impossible.
You, young writer, can write a profound and memorable theme.
Keep reading to find out how.
First, What is a Theme, And Why Does It Matter?
My favorite definition of theme that boils it down to its most concise form is K.M. Weiland’s definition from her fantastic book Writing Your Story’s Theme:
“Theme is a unifying idea or subject, explored via recurring patterns and expanded through comparisons and contrasts.”
According to this definition, a theme is a universal idea or principle that unifies the entirety of your book. A theme should not be too specific, relating only to your character’s situation.
For example, if your character learns that their magic powers are dangerous to others, it may be tempting to consider this the theme for your book. But it is essential to realize that while this may be interesting for the reader so far as the character goes, they will eventually forget it because it can’t be applied to their lives.
Secondly, theme unifies your book. A lot of writers discuss the importance of plot vs. character, but the truth is that the Big Three–plot, characters, and theme–working together are what makes a story run and work and become incredibly memorable.
Look at it this way: the plot is the outward action, the characters are the people the action happens to, and the theme is why these are happening. Every single one of your scenes should not only tie together in cohesive plot strings and help develop a character arc, but they should also have a thematic purpose by comparing and contrasting to the theme.
This definition should give you a general understanding of the theme, but what on earth does it look like to implement this in your writing? How do you even go about finding a theme?
I’m so glad you asked because there’s something that you need to do before you even begin writing your theme, and that is discovering it!
Develop a Thematic Question
If the theme is the answer to some problem in life, then there is an implicit question that the theme is answering. It’s easy to try to jump right into the thematic principle of your story, but dwelling on the question is what will really make the book memorable for your reader.
Think of it like this: if you answer your question right away in your story, the reader has no reason to read your book and little reason to remember it! You may also come across as preachy or over-simplistic because the answer came so quickly, when the topic you were discussing may have been painful and even tricky.
For example, say you are dealing with depression as your theme. If you jump right in the first chapter by saying that Jesus is the answer to depression, readers will be turned off because the answer came so quickly. But if you dwell on the difficulties of the question, then the readers will feel you have done justice to the weighty topic that depression is.
So you need to develop a thematic question for your story. For discovering your thematic question, according to the YWW program director, Josiah DeGraaf, it may be helpful to ask yourself what questions you personally are grappling with, what questions are struggles in current events, and what question your story may already be lending itself to be asking.
But it’s not enough to simply find a thematic question. You then take that question and make it a hard question. Don’t let it be one with a simple yes or no answer.
Make the reader need to know what the answer is, and then keep them wondering until the very end of your book.
The Promise of Jesse Woods is an excellent example of this. The book’s thematic question is, “Do we need to be the savior?” But Chris Fabry, the author, does not come straight out and tell us this.
Instead, he gives us a protagonist, Matt, who has moved to a new town and made some new friends who desperately need him. Matt wants to help, and in fact, he does help… until he comes face to face with a situation that he can’t seem to fix.
Now, years later, Matt is returning to that hometown because one of his friends is again in trouble, and he is the only one who can help, right?
Notice how the story’s plot plays right into the theme by setting the stage for the thematic events to unfold. As the story goes along, we realize that Matt, as a character, is already predisposed to grapple with this question. Chris Fabry gives us dozens of situations where Matt feels like he has to save people, animals, or even the baseball team’s records.
This weaves the plot, characters, and theme together masterfully until the end when the theme is revealed. The reader is left wondering why they had not seen it all along!
But of course, The Promise of Jesse Woods isn’t the only story that demonstrates sound thematic principles that you can implement. Read on to find five tips from some of my favorite stories about implementing your theme profoundly and subtly into your works.
Tip #1: Your Protagonist Is Key
I touched on this a little bit above with Matt from The Promise of Jesse Woods, but there is another excellent example in Serene Valentino’s retelling of Cruella DeVil’s story in her book Evil Thing.
In this story, the reader follows Cruella DeVil’s story, written in an autobiographical style with occasional diabolical laughter thrown in. We, as readers, get to see how Cruella grew up and what factors led to her becoming the “evil thing” that Roger’s song immortalized her as.
This book makes an interesting example because it is a negative character arc, meaning that Cruella comes about to embrace the opposite of the theme in the end. As C.S. Lewis knew and applied in his book Screwtape Letters, sometimes the best way to learn something is to study the opposite! Valentino does a superb job of that in this book.
Remember that we as authors explore themes through comparisons and contrasts. That means that your book must have the Truth (meaning the Theme) and the Lie (that the main character believes at the beginning of the book and/or, as in this case, comes to believe at the end). Thus, your main character is your opportunity to fully express the theme through the contrast between the Truth and the Lie.
For example, Valentino’s thematic question is: “What does love really mean?” But she brings this home to us as the readers by giving Cruella mistaken ideas about love. Cruella believes the lie that love means being given gifts.
We see this play out in the plot because from Cruella’s childhood on, her mother gives her gifts but nothing of her time, but her father and servants pour out love in abundance by spending time with her and caring about her as a person.
The reader clearly sees Valentino’s message: love is about time spent sacrificing for the other person rather than gifts. But Cruella does not see it, and the reader is horrified as Cruella continues to spiral down deeper and deeper into the lie until she finally commits her atrocious act:
Buying and stealing dalmatian puppies to be skinned for a fur coat.
Think about your own story now. What Lie does your protagonist believe about the world? If there isn’t one, start there.
Consider your protagonist’s goals. What is he willing to forfeit to get what he wants? Why is she willing to do so?
At the root of it, there should be a Lie the protagonist believes. In this example, we see that Cruella is willing to give up her best friend, her fortune, and even her sanity to acquire her mother’s love… because she believes that love is given only because and through gifts.
Figuring out the Lie your protagonist believes and then contrasting it throughout the story with the Truth is one of the most effective ways to write a compelling theme into your story!
Tip #2- Your Side Characters Matter
There seem to me to be two extremes of writers when it comes to side characters. We have the writers who love their side characters and spend time on them to the exclusion of their protagonist, and then we have writers who throw in side characters as needed and don’t spend much time thinking about them.
The truth is that though the protagonist should be your main focus, you do need to spend a reasonable amount of time on your side characters, and here is why:
You can’t explore all areas of the thematic question simply with your protagonist. There is no way your protagonist can believe multiple lies that the same truth will solve. If you try, the reader may come away feeling like the character was unrealistic.
So here’s the way around it – a technique that can bring your theme home to your readers in ways that few others can. It is amply demonstrated in Andrew Peterson’s The Wingfeather Saga: use your side characters to explore the different aspects of your theme.
In The Wingfeather Saga (spoiler alert!), the thematic question is “What is identity?” The main character, Janner Igiby, has lived his whole life in a small town as an unimportant person, except, of course, to his loving family. He lives in a place where it is valuable to stay out of sight and avoid the evil Fangs who dominate the people of Skree.
But it turns out that Janner isn’t who he thought he was. Blood from the mysterious nation of Anniera pumps in his veins, and not only that but the blood of Anniera’s kings. Throughout the saga, Janner grapples with all that this new identity means and the responsibilities that it carries.
But the other characters dive into other areas of this question.
We have a character with a dark secret whose identity is not what it seems.
We have a character who grapples with his identity because of guilt over past mistakes.
And we even have a character who does not want his identity and tries to run from it.
Are you intrigued yet? Andrew Peterson masterfully gives us a comprehensive look at the concept of identity by using his side characters to provide us with different perspectives.
Think of it as a diamond on display. The protagonist should be the primary side that is visible as you walk in through the book’s covers, giving us a beautiful look at the thematic question shining in the diamond. But as the reader moves through the book, they should be able to get different glimpses of the theme through the other facets of the diamond: your side characters.
Take a look at your own side characters. Why have you chosen to include them? Are there any that need to be changed to better fit your theme?
Tip #3- Use Metaphors To Bring Depth
Writers have often heard the writer’s rule: show, don’t tell. Some of you may even have been taught the use of metaphors to demonstrate this. But are you aware that the metaphors you choose may help bring about the character’s theme?
For example, say that your theme is on fear. When your main character sees the ocean, they may think of bobbing out on the sea like a helpless cork before the mighty waves. Or, if the theme is on cowardice, the metaphor could be that the character sees the waves shrinking back from the shore as if they had given up trying to reach it.
Do you see the difference? Two completely different metaphors demonstrate how the character (and thus the reader) view the sea and give another glimpse at the theme.
You can take this a step further by repeating metaphors throughout your story. Going back to Andrew Peterson’s The Wingfeather Saga (spoiler alert), this is accomplished through the characters of the “bad guys”: the Fangs.
As we work our way through the series, we see that the Fangs are actually a metaphor for people who have lost sight of their true identity and embraced something darker. While playing important plot roles, the Fangs are also an extended metaphor throughout the story that ties everything together and continues to explore the question of identity.
Take a look at your own story. What metaphors are you currently using? How could those change and/or be extended in light of your current theme?
Tip #4: Use Your Plot as a Metaphor
Ok, we’re getting a little metaphor heavy here, but bear with me. This next one is going to blow your mind.
We’ve already discussed how plot, character, and theme all weave together in inextricable ways to form a stunning book. But throughout this post, we’ve talked a lot about using characters as ways to demonstrate your theme. It’s time to move in the other direction and discuss how the plot can make writing theme memorable.
The best way to do this is by showing you an example: the recent movie Christopher Robin (spoiler alert!). The theme of Christopher Robin is the value of “doing” nothing. The plot centers around a grown Christopher Robin, now a supervisor at a luggage company, whose boss is forcing him to make some budget cuts… including perhaps some of his coworkers.
Christopher Robin works extremely hard throughout the movie to find the answer to this problem. Still, the plot resolves when he realizes that the solution to the furniture company’s problem is: nothing. If the company gives their workers paid vacations, they will all take vacations and need to buy Winslow Luggage to take with them!
In this way, the creators of Christopher Robin masterfully use the plot as a further metaphor for the theme that they are presenting. In reality, the external conflict (all the action happening to Christopher) mirrors the internal conflict (Christopher’s struggle to stop working and do nothing), which gives the reader a very clear picture of the theme.
Take a look at your own plot. What are your plot events saying about your theme, or are they related to a completely different theme? How can you shake things up and bring about plot events that will play into your theme?
Tip #5- Use Subtext
You have made it this far: congratulations! But be forewarned, this next step is the vaguest and most difficult to grasp about theme.
Using subtext.
What is subtext, you ask? The subtext is an undescribed area of the story that fits between two points that you, as the writer, have already established.
Let me give you an example.
In Jane Austen’s classic Pride and Prejudice, one of the characters, Miss Bingley, is always making derogatory comments toward the main character: Elizabeth. At this point in the story, the reader and Elizabeth have now heard a touching tale about Georgianna Darcy and her almost-elopement with a scoundrel (which was highly scandalous at the time).
Knowing none of this, Miss Bingley proceeds to remark: “I have heard the militia are departing Brighton, Miss Bennet [Elizabeth]. They must be a terrible loss to your family.” This seemingly simple remark causes Georgianna to pause her playing on the piano and look terribly uncomfortable.
Why, you ask? The scoundrel, as mentioned above, has been established earlier as being a member of that militia.
Do you see how Austen does it? She uses details that her reader already knows and uses them to set up subtext to the scene. Miss Bingley is entirely unaware of what her words have done, but the reader knows as well as Elizabeth the thing that she has accomplished and cringes at the awkwardness of the moment.
So you too can create scenes that say something more profound than what they seem on the surface. By repeating significant pieces of dialogue from earlier, building on information that has recently been given, but above all, NOT telling your reader what you mean by these things, you can create a scene full of implicit meanings.
All along, it must be implied, shown, not told.
Pull up your own story. Is there anything going on under the surface? Spend some time thinking about the feelings and emotions beneath the scenes and how they relate to your theme.
See if you can use the details you are slowly revealing along with your plot to make your scenes more meaningful for the reader.
Writing Theme the “Right Way”- Your Next Steps
Wow, you’ve made it! You already know what theme (and thematic question) are, some steps to developing them, and five tips for implementing them in your current novel!
But you may also be feeling overwhelmed by all the information you have just been given. I certainly was when I began studying theme. It opened doors to new levels of depth that I didn’t even know existed in books and movies… and made my writing stories that were even remotely good seem almost impossible.
Let me give you some encouragement, young writer. It’s ok that you’re still learning and growing. You don’t have to have a great theme with all the elements I’ve mentioned in this post on your first full-length book project or even on your third project.
The important thing is that you educate yourself about the technical side of writing and actually write. The fact that your draft seems impossibly flawed is a good sign: it means that you are becoming more aware of what good writing requires.
But give yourself permission to slow down. You don’t have to do it all at once. It’s ok to implement these tips one by one.
In the meantime, I would challenge you to continue learning about theme. Read the book I mentioned at the beginning of this post. Follow writer’s blogs and consider joining groups for more advanced training (like our own Young Writer’s Workshop, which offers training on theme, plot, characters, and much more!)
But learning doesn’t help anything if you don’t implement it. If you get so discouraged by learning that you don’t keep on writing. So, most of all, I want to encourage you to keep on going, and to try to implement the five tips that I’ve included in this post into your current story!
Having trouble keeping the five tips straight? You can click here to get a free PDF version for you to print, hang up, or just keep on your computer to remind you of these five simple ways to implement your theme.
While you are working through these, give yourself permission to implement things slowly. You don’t have to do it all at once, but do try to do it!
You will be a better writer for it.
