How to Choose Your Novel's Theme
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- Опубликовано: 2 авг 2024
- A theme can be the secret ingredient that makes your novel stand out above the rest. So how do you find what theme is right for your book?
In this video, we’re talking about how to choose your novel’s theme. Theme can be a murky concept, but I hope to shed some light on it and give you some pointers on how to find the right one for your story. I explore how to find themes, the 3 levels of thematic ideas, the 4 qualities of a good novel theme, and how to explore and implement your theme.
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TIMESTAMPS
0:00 - Welcome
0:20 - What Is Theme?
1:21 - Finding Themes
2:10 - 3 Thematic Levels
3:46 - 4 Qualities of a Good Theme
5:34 - Exploring Themes
6:59 - Recap
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#writingtips #authortube #novelthemes
ABOUT
I'm Grayson Taylor, an author and filmmaker, here to help you on your creative journey by sharing what I've learned-and what I'm still learning-about storytelling. After writing my first full-length novel when I was seven, I've authored more than a dozen action-adventure, sci-fi, mystery, and dystopian books. I've also written and directed several short films, composed music, and acted onstage, on TV, and in films.
You'll find writing advice, publishing tips, and behind-the-scenes videos on my channel.
You can find my books, films, music, and more at graysontaylor.info.
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Good work.u seem in ur earliest twenties but whatever u explained is way wiser. Well,this could also be a good theme - wisdom doesn't depend on age.
You're so young, but you're so articulate. I love the clarity of your language.
How do you find people with different points of view from your own? Could you make a video that has some examples of how to do this for the purpose of developing themes for novels?
I think most people tend to gather like-minded friends who share the same political and philosophical perspectives. Unless you have an exceptionally rare point of view and practically disagree with everyone, you will probably not have a unique point of view, and you'll probably be unable to imbue your novel with a unique perspective and a unique theme. And most people spend their time talking about sex, booze, and music in a shallow and uninteresting way. It's hard to force every person you encounter into a deep philosphical conversation so that you can develop the theme of your next novel. I imagine that you could, for example, study the political perspectives of every registered party in the UK, USA, and Canada to investigate different political and moral perspectives. But how would you investigate different perspectives for a theme that applies to an individual but not to society as a whole?
Thanks! I do agree that it can be easy for someone to become trapped in an echo chamber of sorts. And it can indeed be hard to simply find a lot of people very different from yourself to talk to about thematic concepts and philosophical perspectives. The best way I've found to learn about other points of view is through reading. Books have been written from just about every perspective on earth, throughout the course of history. So reading a diverse array of writing about a theme you're interested in is perhaps the most effective, simple way to explore new perspectives, and hopefully take away some things you can use in your story.
Here’s how I do it: Listen to your own internal conflict about the issue, and then split yourself up into different characters. Then make sure to equip the characters that represent the opposing perspective to your own with the strongest arguments possible. As far as I’ve heard, this is how Dostoevsky used to do it. Ultimately, when you are writing the scenes with your characters debating, arguing, or even physically fighting over something, since you’re writing on your own, you are still just talking to yourself anyway. You’re merely giving different faces and voices to these different standpoints that already exist inside your own mind.
If you don’t have any (remaining) internal conflict about the issue you want to build your story around, you may have gone too far into one direction to write something nuanced about it. You may be passionate about a particular topic, but one common reason for that is if you’ve become ideological about said topic. So if you want to stop yourself from writing propaganda for your personal views at this point, you’ll have to re-learn how to play devil’s advocate first. 😅 You have to be willing to question even your most fundamental beliefs, especially those you’ve never questioned before.
RUclips is of course a great platform to listen to arguments by people from other bubbles. Make sure to listen to the eloquent ones here, rather than just the most popular ones. Don’t fall into the trap of creating a character that is an in-universe equivalent of one particular real-life person. If you want to insert real-life people into your story, do the same you do with yourself: Split their attributes up into several different characters. For example, I just realised that two of the antagonists in my story are partly inspired by the same real-life person, but they embody different qualities of that same real-life individual.
Hence, I will NOT combine the two antagonists into one. Because that would make readers more likely to identify the real-world inspiration. And when they do, that will inevitably catapult them out of the story (disrupt their suspension of disbelief), since they’ll be thinking of the real world all of a sudden, rather than of my fictional universe.
@@cosmicprison9819 Those are some great points! As a writer, you certainly have to be willing to listen to different perspectives and try to understand why people hold opposing views on a given theme. It may not always be comfortable, but it'll lead to better character writing-and likely a better understanding of the complexities of the real world, too.
@@graysontaylornyc That’s why some people call writers “empathy machines” 😁…
When you started talking I subscribed
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Great breakdown of this it helped alot
Thanks! Theme can be a tricky topic, but I'm glad this video could help.
This has been super helpful! I've been having trouble finding a good theme for my NaNoWriMo novel, but now I have a few good ideas. Thanks!
Glad the video was helpful! And good luck with your novel. I've done NaNoWriMo a few times (though I must admit, I've never won-yet).
you have great advice to give people how what to write a book & scean play as will too & you are a great man
I've been looking at story themes this whole time and didn't realise you could break it down this way. Great video!
Thanks! Glad it helped.
The “philosophical battleground” of my sci-fi story is basically Schopenhauer vs. Nietzsche. Now I have to delve deeper into Nietzsche’s works to not misrepresent him 😅.
Ah, sounds interesting! I think sci-fi, particularly because a speculative fiction world is so malleable, is quite well-suited for exploring philosophical ideas.
And this is why Homelander is far better as an archetypal representation of a narcissist than as the orange-man stand-in the Boys’ authors intended him to be.
I haven't watched the show, but I have heard good things about its writing, and that character in particular.
You don’t find the theme. The theme finds you. 😁 And then, you might write a completely new story to start that same theme from the top down this time.
Yeah. The story ideas I come up with usually connect quite naturally to themes and ideas I've already been fascinated with for a while. And writing multiple stories to approach and examine a theme from different angles is always fun!
You sound like if NileRed was an english teacher instead of chemistry
😂 I just checked out his channel, and I see what you mean.
And when you have characters representing the opposition, always remember: Don’t make them into strawmen. 😊
Yes, giving your antagonists compelling and understandable reasons for their beliefs is one of the best ways to make them memorable and complex. Of course, in some stories, an antagonist can just be evil for the sake of being evil, but generally, it's best to present their side of the thematic argument with some depth and nuance.
@@graysontaylornyc Also, make the antagonists enjoyable to write.
@@tunebeat3809 Sure! Boring antagonists are no fun. And they're forgettable, which is the opposite of what you should be aiming for in a story.
Bro bro.. I don't want to be rude, but you sound almost exactly like nile red
I guess so-you're not even the first to point it out 🤣 But it's a coincidence, since I hadn't come across that channel when I made this video. I think I sound less similar in my more recent videos.
@@graysontaylornyc lol, on a side note I've watched a couple of your videos now. And the timing of me finding you is impeccable because I have just decided to start writing a book for my first time. I'm already a few chapters in but I really appreciate the advice you give! So even though I've just got here, I just wanted to thank you for the quality content.
@@coxbrawls5918 Great! Glad my videos could help. I've got more on the way-I'm aiming to release a new video every Saturday starting this week.