Theme is what your memoir/essay/fiction is really about, what it all means.  It’s the subtext of the story. Sometimes writers are very clear about their theme; they’ve consciously woven it into the plot from the moment they started writing.  Other writers haven’t a clue what their story means, at least not until after it’s written. Usually I tell my students not to worry about it – we all have major themes, questions and beliefs in our lives and eventually they appear in our writing. 

Teaching the elements of story structure last weekend with Billy Mernit, I talked about the themes in Brokeback Mountain, The Hours and A River Runs Through It.  All three – a short story, novel and novella – were translated into beautiful films because the screenwriters and directors were respectful of their sources.  You’ve most likely seen the films, but if you haven’t read the stories, you’ve got some wonderful reads ahead of you.  (You’ll also learn a lot about writing characters, setting, plot and theme.)

Annie Proulx said she wanted to explore enduring love when she wrote Brokeback Mountain. (The image that so beautifully embodies this theme is Ennis finding the two shirts hanging together in Jack’s closet.) There’s also another theme that’s stated three times in the story: If you can’t fix it, you’ve got to stand it.

Close to the end of The Hours, Michael Cunningham writes: “There’s just this for consolation: an hour here or there when our lives seem, against all odds and expectations, to burst open and give us everything we’ve ever imagined, though everyone but children (and perhaps even they) know these hours will inevitably be followed by others, far darker and more difficult.  Still, we cherish the city, the morning, we hope, more than anything, for more.”

At the end of Norman Maclean’s  A River Runs Through It the protagonist’s father says, “ ‘After you have finished your true stories sometime, why don’t you make up a story and the people to go with it? Only then will you understand what happened and why. It is those we live with and love and should know who elude us.’”   When Robert Redford made the film of this beautiful book he had the good sense to use voice-over narration in a lot of scenes and quote Norman Maclean directly.  (An inspiring aside: this was Norman Maclean’s first novel and he wrote it when he was past seventy.)

I also discussed themes in my weekly class which is more focused on memoir and personal essay than fiction, and then everybody did the following exercise which seemed really helpful, especially to those students who are deep into their memoirs.  There was some amazing writing (in 5 minutes!) as they got deeper into the meaning of their own stories. Others realized they weren’t sure of their themes and needed to think this through at some point.  (An exercises that shows you what you don’t know can be very helpful too.)

To Do:  Write about your themes. What does your story or memoir mean, what are the issues addressed?  And most important, what are the questions you’re asking?

Let us know how you approach the themes in your own work.   Do you know what they are before you start to write or after?