Posted by Kathleen Pooler/@kathypooler with Denis Ledoux/@denisledoux

 

“When we start to look for the undercurrent that connects all parts of our story, we begin to see the river running through it.” Mary Carroll Moore, author, artist,teacher from her book,How to Plan,Write and Develop a Book.

 

Please join me in welcoming memoir author, teacher and editor Denis Ledoux back for this fourth and final session of Memoir Writing Tips in preparation of The Memoir Network’s “November is Lifewriting Month.” This week’s topic is Conveying Theme Effectively.

 

Here are the previous sessions: Action, Describing Characters and  Establishing Your Setting.

 

It has been a pleasure to feature you in these four sessions, Denis.

 

Welcome back!

 

 

Underlying all of your stories is its theme. The theme is really a message, the global way in which you understand your story – either in its entirety or in its parts. The theme conveys the essence of the you (or the them) that you want the reader, and history, to know and understand. The theme provides spirit to your piece, the breath of life that individualizes your life story.

 

1) The theme is dependent on your insights. Insights are glimpses of understanding. (“Oh, that’s why – or how – she did that!”) When insights accumulate, as you view your stories over time, and bring them into ever sharper focus, you begin to see larger, broader conclusions about your subject’s life – and even the meaning of life itself. The themes of your stories evolve from, and are synonymous with, these conclusions.

Self-serving excuses should not be confused with insight. For instance, we might write in our life stories that it was because of our parents’ style of raising children or of the strictures of our ethnic group or of the limitations imposed by our socio-economic class that we have not achieved certain goals. Of course, this “insight” fails to account for our failure as adults to create our own opportunities to overcome these very real shortcomings or to turn them into advantages in a creative way. This so-called “insight” then is really a self-serving excuse to avoid doing work on how we live our lives.

 

2) Discover the theme of your story as you proceed. It is all right to begin writing without a specific theme in mind. As you write, and re-write (rewriting is crucial in deepening your sense of the story’s meaning), be attentive to the theme which may gradually reveal itself to you. This process can be an intriguing one if you are open to it. Theme is revealed as you find yourself using certain words and phrases or expressing certain ideas over and over again. Discovering your theme in this way is not only important but it can catch your interest and make your life writing compelling. It will keep you coming back to your writing.

 

3) Let’s look at the shell of the plot to see how theme functions:

Your father was laid off; a difficult time followed for the family; your father received additional training and obtained a different job.

 

Your treatment of this plot will vary according to your theme. Let’s suppose the following is your theme: “events whose consequences we can’t understand happen gratuitously to us in our lives, but we can always make the best of things.” In the elaboration of this particular theme (message), you will find it natural to set your father’s being laid off not only with his reaction at the time but also with its consequences. Because of your positive theme, you will write about the new circumstances that developed for your father and about his psychological growth (character). To develop your theme, you will show how important it was for him to “roll with the punches,” to allow himself to experience being without the identity his job and his role as family provider had furnished, and ultimately to exercise choices that led to new, satisfying pursuits.

 

So much for one plot development. Now imagine that your theme (obviously based on different insights) had been: “life deals each of us gratuitous, unwarranted dirty tricks and my father was no exception.” In this story you would emphasize the role other people played in your father’s being laid off and how no one helped him. You would dwell on the negative elements–how the economic demands made on him by his children left him with few choices, how his insufficient education (due in turn to his parents, his ethnic group, etc.) limited his job options. You would probably undervalue the training that led to a different job and fail to acknowledge the psychological growth that he experienced as a result of training and his new job challenges.

 

Both of these plot developments would be based on the same facts, but the stories themselves would be very different because they are inspired by very different themes. As a writer, you must be aware that your theme (the message you seek to impart) affects the interpretation of every fact in your story.

By conscious use of theme, you can make a story into your own distinct and unique account.

 

Good luck with your writing.

 

***

Thank you Denis for giving us examples of how our insights can help us find themes and how our themes can affect the interpretation of every fact in our story.

This has been an informative and inspirational series on memoir writing. Thank you for sharing your expertise with us!

 

 

Author Bio: Every November, Denis offers November is Lifewriting Month. NILM provides writing prompts via e-mail, free tele-classes on memoir-writing techniques and many surprise memoir gifts. Denis is the author of the classic Turning Memories into Memoirs/A Handbook for Writing Lifestories. Most recently , he completed his mother’s memoir, We Were Not Spoiled, and his uncle’s, Business Boy to Business Man. Denis is currently working on a book about “writing with passion.” Jumpstart materials are also available for writers wishing to be memoir professionals in their communities.

 

How about you? What’s your experience in finding the themes in your stories?

 

Denis has generously offered to give away the Memoir Start-up Package at the end of the series to a commenter whose name will be selected in a random drawing.

 

We’d love to hear from you. Please leave your comments below~

 

 

Next Week:

Monday, 10/28/13: “Overcoming Childhood Abuse and Healing the Spirit: An Interview with Memoir Author Marion Witte” , author of Little Madhouse on the Prairie. Marion has graciously offered to give away a copy of her memoir to a commenter whose name will be selected in a random drawing.

Winners of  The GoodbyeYear, Kvetch: A Memoir of Music and Survival and The Memoir Start-up package will be announced on Monday, 10/28.