Theme and Strategy: Part 5 - Pattern in Thought

We should always know why were telling the story were writing.

Maybe it's because we want to be rich and famous or maybe it's because we want to write literature to keep people talking for years to come. Knowing this will effect what you write and how you write it. Knowing this will help you find your theme.

The word theme may scare some but it really does help us know what path is right for our story and what is not. The idea of theme comes from what is called priority of techniques.

The major elements of storytelling is:

• plot
• character
• style
• idea
• mood
  

Any one of these elements can dominate the work and that would be the novel's theme.

1) Plot as theme: this book is for action junkies and escapists. With plot as main theme, no serious attempt is made at social commentary or human condition. These books make money because it allows the readers to escape.

2) Mode as theme: the writer tries to make an emotional effect on the reader. Terror, suspense (like Hitchcock's The Birds), love, romance or comedy. With this, make sure you clearly understand the expectations of the audience before you write.

3) Style as theme: Not many stories are written with style as theme because it's more like reading poetry. The elements take a backseat to the style. The style will have a profound effect on every other element as scene through it. Like a colored lens in which everything is shot.

4) Character as theme: Often 'The Great American Novel' or 'Literary Masterpiece' is one that has a name in the title. Like David Copperfield or Anna Karenina. People like books about other people, they find it fascinating.

5) Idea as theme: The moral of the story is the theme...(fairy tales often have ideas as theme) and themes fall into 6 main categories.

• The moral statement - the writer is often trying to preach or get across their ideas. The problem could be that the characters and plots often fall flat.
  
• Human Dignity - The fight for human dignity. Ex. One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest
  
• Social Comment - I recently read a book with this as a theme, it was called The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. The author, Anne Bronte, preached about the woman's condition the whole time. She was trying to make comments on life at the time. She was often called the beginning in the woman's liberation movement.
  
• Human Nature - In this category, the characters often represent universal human types.
  
• Human Relations - The author is concerned with understanding who we are as people and the difficulties people have when it comes to getting along with others.
  

Source: Theme and Strategy by Ronald Tobias

Theme and Strategy: Part 4 - Pattern in Action

Once you decide what your plot will be in your story, you can translate the concept into action, into events. Who does what, when. 

A common mistake beginning writers make is to think of action as nothing but a series of successive events like beads on a string. First this happens, then that, then that, and so forth. But action is responsible for building tension, for gaining momentum in a story. You have to learn to pace actions so that events build dramatically.

How to create pattern in action:

1) After you write a scene, ask yourself in what way (or ways) a scene contributed to developing or answering  the plot questions you've raised.
2) When stuck, ask yourself the plot questions and how to direct your efforts to answer them.
3) Don't overwhelm your readers with plot questions, 2-3 are enough.
4) Don't delay giving answers. Some answers give early. For example in a mystery you can answer 'Whose are the bones?' and later answer 'How did the bones get into the cellar?' Pace the answers from beginning to end.
5) Make sure the action is consistent with the dramatic phases of the pattern.

Action is the means; plot is it's end.

Source: A book from Ronald Tobias

Theme and Strategy: Part 3 - Pattern in Structure

It is impossible to create the totally original plot with totally original characters.

That aside, in how we write, we write with a pattern in structure. For example, we all start at the beginning, we have a middle and we have an end.

SO where should a writer start?

1) Establish characters - Introduce them one at a time or in small groups. Now, this doesn't mean we start the story with pages of backstory. If you do that, you will be struck by lightning. Well, actually you won't. But, it's a really big pet peeve of mine and I'm sure 99% of your readers. The best way to introduce your characters is through your other characters. Don't force your characters on the reader, give us time to get to know them, but don't take too long either.

2) Establish place - This doesn't mean start with the weather and the city. But, place them somewhere and give brief glimpses into where that is so your reader can get a bearing.

3) Start the action - Set up the dramatic presence to the story. Raise the central question. If you're writing a mystery maybe start with a murder. Then the reader asks: Who did it? If it's literary fiction, give your readers a puzzle to ponder. In Citizen Kane it's "What's Rosebud?"

4) Start the story late - Stories should begin the moment they get off the ground. It gets the reader involved immediately.

5) Establish the tone - is it a comedy or a tragedy? Give us a feel for the style, is it witty or somber?

Source: Theme & Strategy

Theme and Strategy: Part 2 - Pattern of Audience

Does writing to our readers matter?

According to John Steinbeck: In writing, your audience is one single reader. I have found that sometimes it helps to pick out one person—a real person you know or an imagined person—and write to that one.

And that makes sense, our readers are the ones who will buy the book and then have to suffer with our words.

How can we write for our readers?  Every story should offer a challenge to the reader in a form a puzzle to be solved. They want to be part of the story, given a chance to solve the mystery for themselves. (This is true no matter what genre you write.) You need to provide questions, each a mystery, each intriguing for them to answer. What will happen? Will she choose that man or the other? What's behind the attic door? Where is his wife?

Writing is like a chase. Coyote (the chaser - the reader) vs the roadrunner (the chased - the writer).

• The reader tries to catch the writer by figuring out where the story is headed. If you make your clues to obvious, the reader finds it too easy to know what will happen. The chase ends and the reader feels cheated because you haven't challenged him. Predictability = Boring!
  
• However, if the writer doesn't give enough clues, you are guilty of leaving too far behind. And out of the blue solutions are NO solutions. How did I arrive so fast just now? Easy, in a time machine. Please! What do you take me for? You risk the reader losing interest and giving up the chase.
• The solution? Find a course that keeps you off balance but keep the writer in sight. Precisely at the moment when the reader thinks he knows what's going to happen, something else happens that upsets his theory and forces him to come up with a new one. As your story develops be careful not to give too much away but don't delay information too long either.
  

1. No major unanswered questions.
2. No clues unaccountable.
3. No characters left hanging.
4. All the pieces are in place and they all fit.

Theme and Strategy: Part 1 - Pattern in Strategy

A few years ago, I was at a yard sale and I came across five books on writing. I spent less then $3 for the five and they turned out to be the best books on writing I have ever read. The first book is entitled: Theme and Strategy.

The author, Ronald Tobias, states: "The secret in writing isn't simply knowing what ingredients go into its making, but in knowing how to make those ingredients work together."


How much characterization is too much for your plot? How much action is too much? Too little?

He makes a good point when he says: "When you hear someone say, 'He'd never do that,' or 'That would never happen,' what that person is really saying is: You've disturbed the fiction by violating he patterns of character and plot."

Not that you need pages and pages of notes before you start. But, you should "design an overall strategy that allows you to be open-minded enough to allow the hidden to emerge on its own, unhampered by your ideas of what ought to happen."

So what should writers do?

1) Start with a beginning. Not THE beginning, but A beginning. It's where the story should start.

2) Pick an ending. 

3) Set short-term objectives. Dramatic structure is usually made up of connected series of mini-stories. Maybe, before you write a chapter, decide what your objective is for it.

4) Develop a working strategy. Don't decide on a strategy for a chapter before you've written the chapter before it. You may adapt or change your story while writing and need to readjust.

5) Don't ever look back.  The temptation to go back is sometimes very strong and you must resist it. Use the force, Luke, use the force! Don't waste precious time writing the beginning to perfection because, first, you'll never get there and second, if your strategy changes along the way, you may have to readjust the beginning in the second draft. Keep a notebook for things you may want to change in edits, but don't go back.