Theme + Characters

[Chessie]

Hiya. So I'm struggling with tying story theme into my characters, meaning their personalities, flaws, and goals. I like to play around with this because it makes the characters more interesting, although some themes are easier to incorporate into the characters than others.

For example, how do I tie the theme of eternal love into all of my characters? How do I make them--as individuals--portray a variation of that theme? While I'm figuring this out, I'm curious to know if any of my fellow Scribes play around like this and wouldn't mind sharing tactics for how they do it.

 

[Ireth]

I've done a bit of this, though in my case the theme arose because of the characters, not vice-versa. The main characters in Winter's Queen start out fairly prejudiced against the Fae, and by the end of the story they learn that, while some Fae ARE evil and the MCs' fear/hatred is justified, there are plenty of Fae who are perfectly friendly and kind, and one shouldn't paint all members of a group with the same brush. (Also, interestingly, there seems to be something of a class divide between how many Fae treat the heroine -- the nobility are contemptuous of her for the most part, thinking she's invading their space, while the servants are perfectly willing to accept her as their would-be princess.)

 

[Devor]

I wrote about this one:

Let?s Talk About Theme

In a nutshell, I don't think you need to try so hard to pin down exactly what you're trying to say with your theme. Instead, just try to use your other characters to open windows to show how things can play out differently. For instance, if your theme is "eternal love," then one character could fall head over heels, while another debates it back and forth, and another gets jilted. That gives you plenty of opportunities to comment from different perspectives if you want to - "it wasn't eternal love, I never loved that person to begin with" - or to leave it up for the reader to interpret your theme and draw the parallels how they want.

 

[Heliotrope]

Yep ^^^

I just use the characters to explore possible angles and outcomes of a theme.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

I handle writing in a way that is much more organic than many of you, so this may not be helpful. But i can speak from my own experience.

With things like theme and symbolism, my belief is that if you handle it too consciously, you kill it. When I write, i don't do it with a theme in mind. I never think to myself, "I want to use this to explore the theme X." The story leads, and I follow. The themes develop naturally as I follow the characters through their struggles and explore them.

You ask, "How do i make them, as individuals, portray a variation of that theme?" You seem to want the theme to dictate the characters. You have a theme in mind, and you want the characters to conform to it. My approach is the reverse. i begin with my characters, and take them in directions that inspire me, and the theme develops through them. I don't know the theme at the beginning. It might change a lot throughout the development of the story. It grows as the story does.

I'm not sure either approach is better than the other, since writing is very much an individual experience. But I've always found that you have to allow the story to become what it will be rather than thinking you know better. Sounds hokey, i know, but stories have a way of knowing where to lead you. There is something instinctive I can tap into.

So, my short answer is, I don't know. I know very little about your way of doing things. I hope my way might offer a bit of insight, though.

 

[Chessie]

I wrote about this one:

Let?s Talk About Theme

In a nutshell, I don't think you need to try so hard to pin down exactly what you're trying to say with your theme. Instead, just try to use your other characters to open windows to show how things can play out differently. For instance, if your theme is "eternal love," then one character could fall head over heels, while another debates it back and forth, and another gets jilted. That gives you plenty of opportunities to comment from different perspectives if you want to - "it wasn't eternal love, I never loved that person to begin with" - or to leave it up for the reader to interpret your theme and draw the parallels how they want.

I love this. Thank you. I may have it figured out but I was just wondering if anyone else did this and how they went about it, but you're right, Devor in not complicating things. I have a tendency to do just that.

 

[Chessie]

I handle writing in a way that is much more organic than many of you, so this may not be helpful. But i can speak from my own experience.

With things like theme and symbolism, my belief is that if you handle it too consciously, you kill it. When I write, i don't do it with a theme in mind. I never think to myself, "I want to use this to explore the theme X." The story leads, and I follow. The themes develop naturally as I follow the characters through their struggles and explore them.

You ask, "How do i make them, as individuals, portray a variation of that theme?" You seem to want the theme to dictate the characters. You have a theme in mind, and you want the characters to conform to it. My approach is the reverse. i begin with my characters, and take them in directions that inspire me, and the theme develops through them. I don't know the theme at the beginning. It might change a lot throughout the development of the story. It grows as the story does.

I'm not sure either approach is better than the other, since writing is very much an individual experience. But I've always found that you have to allow the story to become what it will be rather than thinking you know better. Sounds hokey, i know, but stories have a way of knowing where to lead you. There is something instinctive I can tap into.

So, my short answer is, I don't know. I know very little about your way of doing things. I hope my way might offer a bit of insight, though.

Thanks for your input, Dragon. I'm out of thanks though! But to answer your post, you're right in that forcing it does kill it. I've done that before and gotten slack from my readers at the time. However, I don't believe that story should do its own thing. I'm the master, I'm the creator. The reason why theme is the first thing I choose is because, well, I'm kind of philosophical in my approach to storytelling.

I don't so much care about the characters or the plot as I do exploring a question. What would someone do for love? What would they not do for it? Under what conditions would a person accept love out of nowhere? How would a person react to true love if they were already established in their life and love beckoned them elsewhere? It helps that I don't believe in the concept of TRUE love. But it's fun to write about in a fantasy.

 

[Svrtnsse]

I'm still pretty uncertain about theme. I know it's important and that it's something I should be keeping in mind. I'm still not fully at grips with it though.
For my story I'm preparing for the nano the them was very vague, and in some ways it still is, but something happened just earlier tonight.

I sat down to start and outline the plot, which I always do. However, this time I decided to add in a stage where I described my main character's motivation for each act of the story, and I think this really helped with finding the theme. It's a lot more about finding your place in the world than I originally thought. Then again, it might change again.

So, the advice based on the above. Find the motivation of the characters and pull your theme out of that. You can probably pull more than one them out of the same motivation.

 

[Chessie]

I'm still pretty uncertain about theme. I know it's important and that it's something I should be keeping in mind. I'm still not fully at grips with it though.
For my story I'm preparing for the nano the them was very vague, and in some ways it still is, but something happened just earlier tonight.

I sat down to start and outline the plot, which I always do. However, this time I decided to add in a stage where I described my main character's motivation for each act of the story, and I think this really helped with finding the theme. It's a lot more about finding your place in the world than I originally thought. Then again, it might change again.

So, the advice based on the above. Find the motivation of the characters and pull your theme out of that. You can probably pull more than one them out of the same motivation.

So what did you end up discovering?

I do believe theme is the real reason why I write. There are just so many questions in this life that need answering.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

Thanks for your input, Dragon. I'm out of thanks though! But to answer your post, you're right in that forcing it does kill it. I've done that before and gotten slack from my readers at the time. However, I don't believe that story should do its own thing. I'm the master, I'm the creator. The reason why theme is the first thing I choose is because, well, I'm kind of philosophical in my approach to storytelling.

I don't so much care about the characters or the plot as I do exploring a question. What would someone do for love? What would they not do for it? Under what conditions would a person accept love out of nowhere? How would a person react to true love if they were already established in their life and love beckoned them elsewhere? It helps that I don't believe in the concept of TRUE love. But it's fun to write about in a fantasy.

It's kind of strange because we kinda believe the same things about writing and theme, but we seem to look at them in different ways.

You say 'I don't so much are for the characters or the plot as I do exploring a question.' Well, my characters, and the things they go through, are how i explore questions. I tend to deal with themes in a very personal way in my stories, meaning through the characters and their relationships and internal struggles. It comes from my method of figuring things out.

When i say i let the story become what it wants to become, that is not to imply that my approach is random or undirected. There's a reason why certain characters and ideas interest and inspire me. It's because i have something to say about the themes they lead to and explore. When I follow the characters and story, it naturally leads me to what i have in my heart to say. And sometimes stories can lead me into surprising places, encourage me to think about ideas I never really considered before.

 

[WooHooMan]

I really love theming and talking about themes and I would love to tell you, point by point, what you should do.
But I don't know your story and, really, I don't even know what "eternal love" is.

I mean, I guess I could tell you how I do themes in my characters but I generally assume that you don't care about my story (correct me if I'm wrong) and this thread isn't about my story.

So, can I get some more info, maybe?

 

[Chessie]

WooHooMan, yes, I'm genuinely interested in how others do it. So...how do you explore theme through your characters?

 

[Svrtnsse]

So what did you end up discovering?

I do believe theme is the real reason why I write. There are just so many questions in this life that need answering.

Right, let's see if I remember, or discover something new as I write it down.

First act is about loss and perseverance.
Second act is about searching for a purpose and a place in the world as well as about fitting in.
Third act is about betrayal and possibly about hope.
Fourth act is again about loss and perseverance, but also about finding (as opposed to searching for) a goal.

...also, yes, I'm doing the four act thing again. I think I've got a better idea for it this time.

EDIT: Optionally, all four acts could be about being an outsider, or being apart.

EDIT2: This is sounding really emo. It's not what I have planned, but it might be that anyway. I'll try not to make it whiny though.

 

[WooHooMan]

WooHooMan, yes, I'm genuinely interested in how others do it. So...how do you explore theme through your characters?

Ok, I'll try to be brief...

So, in my last theme-heavy WIP, the overall theme was the distinction between survival/existing and living.
To build on that: the four main characters (three protagonist and the antagonist) are built around the old Plato idea that a person can be divided into significant components. The four characters represent the mind, the heart, the body and the stomach.

The Mind is a cold, analytical type. Almost like a Mr. Spock. Her primary faults are her inflexibility, their tendency to over-examine her own problems and positions and her "ends justify the means" attitude. The latter fault lead me to put her in a political position (the setting also reflected the setting but that's not terribly relevant so I won't explain it).

The Body is ruthless but cold and controlled. She values her own personal safety over all else. She's also prone to quick judgements - very impulsive - which is a big fault of hers. She tends to do things without fully understanding why. To demonstrate this, she starts-out in a very safe position where her needs are met but she doesn't get any emotional or intellectual stimulus. She gets thrust into the action and doesn't know how to deal with it which is why she goes for the obvious short-term benefits (survival) over anything more substantial or long-term.

The Heart (or spirit or whatever) is a blend of emotional and idealistic but violent and impulsive (but not malicious or cruel). She has a very strong, very absolute and unshakeable, ethos. I made her a warrior-type person. It made sense, I thought. She's undoubtedly the most heroic of the main characters.

The Stomach is the villain. Her whole deal is consumption. She's greed and gluttony personified (with a dash of envy).

Their relationships play-out in according to the parts of the body they represent.
Mind and Body don't get along. They have totally different goals. Body thinks Mind is a bitch and Mind thinks Body is stupid.
Mind and Heart disagree here and there but they usually get along. Mind can rationalize and understand Heart while Heart is easily enough swayed when Mind appeals to her ethos. Mind without Heart is kind of directionless. She'll survive but without that "greater good" that Heart brings, she won't really get much from life.
Body and Heart are cool with each other despite how often they fight each other. Though they also team-up quite a bit.

Heart's character arc is centered around her betraying her own ethos to both focus on her own survival (Body) and the sensible compromises (Mind).
Mind has to be willing to choose between the "smart" but amoral path vs. the self-harming but moral path. Pretty simple arc, I think.
Body needs to decide if it is better to, as the cliche goes, "live as a happy dog (no Mind) or an unhappy human (with Mind)" and to make that decision, she needs the moral clarity that Heart brings.
That's how the three can really live instead of just survive: by working together and enriching each other.

Stomach is dangerous to all of their safety. Stomach can persuade Body to do almost anything (the poor girl is very gullible). Stomach can put Heart in danger when Heart gets in the way of her greed. And Mind is too smart to give into Stomach's trickery but powerless to really stop her. So, the two are locked in a stalemate for the whole second act of the story.

Also, I should point-out that I decided on the theme first thing. So the characters were created, thrown-out, recreated and altered several times to fit the theme.

So, there you go...
Did you get anything out of that?

 

[Gryphos]

I think the best method, when it comes to trying to represent a central concept through an ensemble cast, is to break that concept up into its core components and distribute them amongst the characters.

An overt example of this in my work was a novel in which a key recurring theme was the idea of 'The True Hero', the term one character uses to represent the pinnacle example of Humanity. This character's philosophy was that the four aspects of the True Hero are grace, fury, compassion and strength. So what I did was have each of this character's four companions exhibit one of these aspects; they would be the avatar, as it were, of that aspect of the True Hero.

The avatar of grace, as defined by the main character, was in complete control of herself in every way, turning every action into something purposeful, and every thought into something logical. The avatar of fury did everything to excess, laughing louder, fighting fiercer, and raging longer; if the avatar of grace did everything with precision, she did everything with great energy. The avatar of compassion was, well, compassionate, exhibiting the raw love of one living thing for another. And the avatar of strength was a pillar that others leant against, and the source of mighty force capable of overcoming any obstacle.

The story explored these four characters for the purpose of illustrating what kind of person a True Hero is, in the philosophy of the main character.

So for you, I think the best way to explore eternal or true love would be to try to isolate the different aspects of this kind of love. What is it that makes a love stronger or more potent than another? Isolate the criteria, and distribute them among your characters.

 

[Chessie]

I think I may have it:

-hero: searches and finds love, actively works to have it reciprocated.

-heroine: is skeptical of love at first, but curiosity works in her heart and she unravels the mystery of what she considered non-existent.

-heroine's father: stands in the way of love, refuses to support his daughter in anything that contradicts his wishes.

-heroine's betrothed: love=posession, jealousy, manipulation. That's how he fights for "it".

-heroine's maid: supports the union, actively works to preserve what she believes is genuine affection between the heroes.

-hero's ally/the witch: in her own dark and twisted way, makes the hero work for his goal but teaches him that love is worth sacrificing for.

It's some stupid love story probably, but I'm intrigued by the potential to show love as an action, something worth preserving and striving for no matter the cost, equally from both sides.

 

[WooHooMan]

I would recommend looking-up Walter Yates. In his poetry, he had three characters who represented different views on love.

Aedh is lovelorn and kind of masochistic. His famously says to his lady "I, being poor, have only my dreams; I have spread my dreams under your feet; tread softly because you tread on my dreams".

Then there's Red Hanrahan who is romanticism personified. He's a bard, an artist who romanticizes everything: women, his country, his youth, his aging, everything. He loves the idea of love.

And finally, Michael Robartes is the intellectual. He can't grasp love. He knows all the old romance stories and cliches but doesn't experience it himself.

Yates describe the three as thus: "Michael Robartes’ is fire reflected in water, and that Hanrahan is fire blown by the wind, and that Aedh is fire burning by itself."

 

[psychotick]

Hi,

Speaking as a complete pantster, I don't try to put a theme on a character at all. I start with this part at least, by asking questions about the character. Who is he? How did he get here? What's he like etc? In doing this I slowly build up a character bio, and that lets me work out what he'll do in a particular situation - thus driving the plot.

So for example in my latest Wolves of War which I'm just editing, my MC is a morph - a shapeshifter in essence in an epic fantasy. He's also a thief. Morphs in his world are hunted and killed, and he grew up having discovered his parents being crucified when he was young and thus having lived a life on the streets. This is what leads Briagh to his career as a thief and to his life long focus as someone who hides and runs. He is no hero. This of course guides his actions throughout the book, and the largest part of his character arc is in fact his beginning to change from someone who lives in secrecy and fear to someone with courage. Who has begun to discover that he can be brave. Who as the book advances, begins to actually volunteer for things - and then spends ages questioning himself over why he does this! Wondering if he's had some sort of breakdown because - he runs and hides! Stupid people fight!

Cheers, Greg.

 

[skip.knox]

I do think theme is important, but for me it is so organically tied to the story, which means characters and plot and setting, that it's hard for me to think about it separately in advance of the story itself. I go in knowing there is some sort of theme in there somewhere, but without choosing anything in particular. Somewhere along the line I start to get ideas. Then, and it's usually a particular moment, a light goes on. I look and I see oh, that's what the story's about!

With my WiP, I wrote and wrote and wrote. Had essentially a first draft (in that I had beginning, middle and end, but with numerous plot holes) before a theme began to emerge. It wasn't even one I thought was particularly strong: patriotism.

My main character is not a patriot. He's a cynic. Over the course of the story, he comes around to believing that his patria (it's set in 4thc Rome) is indeed worth defending. It's a pretty easy call because the Empire is being invaded by monsters, so the only choice besides stand and fight is cut and run. The latter would make for a lousy protagonist!

But here's the part that surprised me, and I think it's a lesson with general applicability. The interesting part is not the theme itself. It's not patriotism per se. The interesting part is how the decision to fight plays out for this particular character at this particular moment.

Once I saw the theme from that perspective, I suddenly found it worked for all my characters. Because being patriotic, having courage, standing firm, these are not simple choices and they are not without nuance. It's something that has to be done every day, in different circumstances, with different costs. The theme became a thing to explore, not in an abstract way, but from inside the eyes of characters I knew well.

For my main character, to close with a specific example, it was a revelation for me. I realized that he had always been a cynic precisely because he longed to be a hero. If he held himself to a higher standard, though, then there arose the possibility of failure. By rejecting the high calling, he stayed safe, and by mocking it he gave himself the excuse to reject it. The invasion by monsters overturned his smug view of himself and the world.

But that's just one man's reaction. Other characters react differently. Not everyone who dies for the Fatherland dies in the same way.

Likewise with love. There are a hundred versions of true love, not all of them happy.

 

[spectre]

I guess I'm a biased writer. Versus a theme for my characters, which may develop naturally in the story, I rely on schticks, culture, flaws, and biases to develop my characters. I do keep archetypes and the material from the Mythic Scribes guide, soul triptych and such, when I write but I'm finding that theme tends to differ chapter to chapter as I write and it isn't always consistently meaningful so my mind isn't practiced at theme. Reversely I like anathema a lot, I guess we have options for the maturation of our stories. I still consider myself an amateur and want to grow into successfully fabling in my stories. Or philosophizing, however one wants to put it.