Theme

Theme is the ‘universal truth’ of a story, play, novel, poem, etc., and of course it can be individually interpreted.  On the other hand, we want to try to come as close as possible to what the author may have intended, without putting words in the author’s mouth.  It can be a slippery slope.  How do we do this?  An author respects his/her audience and expects the reader to bring his/her mind, intelligence, and experience to the text.  At the same time, the reader respects the author and wants to do justice to his/her intent.  When both are working well together, and with integrity, the outcome is knowledge and wisdom-which can be from more than one vantage point.  Still, your goal in critical analysis is to come as closely as possible to the author’s intent/purpose in the work of literature, thereby increasing both your understanding of the piece and your contribution to other readers’ understanding as well.  You do this by noticing symbols, metaphors, and other images; tone; language, irony, plot details, character.  But for a short essay like the upcoming critical analyses, you choose only one or two aspects of the author’s style and relate them to the entire piece and what you have determined is the author’s theme.  Spend some time looking at the sample student papers uploaded to the course syllabus: they will give you both the correct format for these assignments and ideas for how to execute your own papers.

An author does have a particular theme (universal truth) in mind when s/he writes a piece.  It is his/her job to convey that theme through plot, character, setting, symbolism, etc.  It is our job as readers to infer that theme by paying close attention to the author’s ‘prompts.’  We must notice everything and try to do justice to the author, not just to our own ‘opinions’ about life, values, morals, etc.  The author must ‘play fair’ with us; and we, too, must be fair to the author.  Always stress in your writing what you believe to be the author’s point in his/her writing: what is s/he trying to convey to the reader?  What is the point, the message?  What should we learn from this piece?   Is the theme about prejudice?  loyalty?  friendship? love? soul? Is it about war? oppression? classism?  ethics?  values?

What is going on in this story, play, novel, poem, painting, movie?  What is the point?  To be fair, of course sometimes the author’s point is sheer entertainment, the laugh of joy, recognition, irony-all of which also have their points to make about the human condition, yes?  Our job as readers is to try to determine the author’s intent.  Our job as writers is to try to convey that intent to others.