The moral of a story is something that perplexes me in writing.
I don't mean going into a story ready to preach, but every story has a meaning behind it, even if the meaning is nothing.
I have always believed these to be things that just show up naturally in the course of writing. After all, we want to tell the story for a reason.
How can we figure out what are moral is if its not obvious? If it doesn't jump out at you.
For example I have story that I am currently revising. Its mostly complete - storyline wise, though its nowhere near ready for submission. After putting my characters through adventure and trials, I am still not sure what my story is really about other than the story itself.
Basically its shallow. Maybe these are two different questions - how to add depth and how to see the moral of the story?
posted
They say you should always be able to express the idea of your story in just one sentence. Try that, and see if that's the moral.
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posted
If you look into this enough you'll come across the idea of writing to a premise: something like, for example, "greed leads to destruction". Some authorities insist that writing to a premise is required, others do not.
My own way of looking at it is this. A strong dramatic story will have a motivated/determined entity struggling against (i.e., in conflict with and acting in opposition to) a significant obstacle to produce some outcome. So there is always an implicit premise that can be formed based on the result of the struggling forces. So start there. What's up against what in your story, and what is the outcome? It could be as simple as "good triumphs over evil" or "love will last through many trials."
For my part, I don't even consciously think about a premise, except maybe as an after-the-fact exercise when making editing decisions.
I look at a moral as a premise that has an overtone of morality (from some moral belief system) to it, as in the traditional morality tales for children. A premise in general could fly against that approach. You could have as a story premise: "greed leads to wild success and happiness", as long as your story events support that idea.
On the more literary side of contemporary fiction it seems common to have mixed or ambiguous outcomes, which might make the premise/moral idea a little tricky. "Greed leads to success for some and destruction for others" perhaps? Dunno.
[This message has been edited by dee_boncci (edited October 01, 2009).]
posted
I've heard different writers say more than once that sometimes you don't know what the story is about until you've written at least the first draft. (This goes especially for those who don't write to a premise or with an outline.)
Maybe you should step back (so to speak) and ask yourself what the story is about (or what your subconscious would like it to be about), and then when you rewrite it, let that help you.
posted
Moral like message ties very closely to theme. Not uncommonly, a moral is the message. Nor does a moral or message or theme need to stand out appreciably.
The romantacist resolution staple of poetic justice comes from a range of themes oriented around good and evil. Poetic justice's template moral and message is good will triumph, be rewarded, evil will fail, be punished.
Pithy maxims are a staple of fables and fairy tales, message and moral. Don't count your chickens before they hatch. A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. Life goes on. Time heals all wounds; wounds all heels. A penny saved is a penny earned. Mind your P's and Q's. In for a penny, in for a pound. Be careful what you wish for . . . ad infinitum.
Beginning with a theme, a moral or message presents, in reading and contemplating, and writing and contemplating. Pick well-know or favorite stories and study them for theme and moral and message. Like Star Wars, for expample, a theme is good and evil, and poetic justice. A moral is that good will triumph. Another, it's never too late to repent. Blood is thicker than water, and so on.
[This message has been edited by extrinsic (edited October 01, 2009).]
quote: Maybe these are two different questions - how to add depth and how to see the moral of the story?
Different but related; writing passionately and with purpose is one way to add depth. I’ve just read the Stakes chapter in Donald Maass’ Writing the Breakout Novel. He says the author must know why he’s writing the story, its purpose, in order for his passion to come through. The author has to care before the reader can care. He seems to say that the reason for the author’s purpose is not as important as having and knowing the purpose.
My interpretation: Maass describes a premise as a summary of the story, with the underlying theme(s) expressed in the plot and the characters. Theme is the 'good vs. evil' or whatever.
Oy, I’d love to get my notes out and delve further, but no time now.
[This message has been edited by MrsBrown (edited October 01, 2009).]
posted
I agree with Maass on premise as a summary of a story's dramatic relativity. The proverbial logline of scriptwriters, the elevator speech, the pitch component of queries, publishing proposals, promotional reviews, etc. Premise is what I know it as through Aristotle and Freytag and Lubbock, to name a few.
My premise boilerplate, a larger than life character emerges from suffering insuperable struggles in dramatic contexts while addressing a life-defining complication.
MrsBrown, later chapters in Maass' book keep on pouring on the insights, message and moral too. It's a gold mine.
quote: My premise boilerplate, a larger than life character emerges from suffering insuperable struggles in dramatic contexts while addressing a life-defining complication.
The “life-defining complication” sounds like Maas’ personal stakes. But what of the public stakes, the overarching plot? Granted, a personal story can be the plot, but SF/F tends to have a larger story (saving the world, changing society, etc.). Is that your “dramatic contexts”? (Um, sorry if this is veering off-topic. Also I don’t know how well Maass’ ideas translate to the short story medium.)
I'm betting the underlying theme is there, even if you haven't identified it yet.
[This message has been edited by MrsBrown (edited October 01, 2009).]
posted
I believe that a life-defining complication can be personal as well as greater in scale than individual, and private and public, as Maass means it. Larger than life characters emerge from within to change the larger world. Life as all of humanity, saving all life from an alien invasion or a manifestation of ultimate evil, for examples.
Dramatic contexts as I mean it are settings and other characters and their circumstances that affect change.
I perceive Maass' ideas translating to short story, with a little elbow grease.
My premise boilerplate contains seven essentials of story, not all the essentials, but it's a good start: character, idea, milieu, event, and in the combination of them a plot and a theme and an emotional context, though they're not immediately interpretable as such in that template. However, once I've filled in the blanks of each, their meanings become apparent and useful to me. I.e., an orphaned boy strives to come of age in a secret magic milieu while confronting the evil that killed his parents. Plot, theme, message, and moral come to me from interpreting a story of any length by that method, reading or writing.
[This message has been edited by extrinsic (edited October 01, 2009).]
posted
I am very familiar with Maas's "Writing the Breakout Novel" and agree it's well worth the read. He also has a new book, I believe titled "The Fire in Fiction" that so far is excellent as well, although what I've read so far doesn't deal much with premise (still have a few chapters left to read).
A book of similar subject matter I found useful is "The Plot Thickens" by Noah Lukeman. I don't recall if premise is explicitely discussed in that book, but it deals with the general enriching and strengthening of stories, of which giving them meaning is a significant one.
I didn't mention this before but one of the main takeaways I've found in reading on the subject of premise is it's use as a unifying factor. One writer (Eddlemen maybe, can't recall) says to remove everything from a story that is not related to or does not outright support the premise. I've never done that myself, just offer it in the spirit of the discussion. I focus on the dramatic story ingredients and believe them, when executed correctly, to contain the premise.
posted
I've found in reading writing on writing that any given tome focuses on an attribute or two that are rarely directly stated. Lukeman and Maass, for example, focus on attributes that relate to resonance, seducing and keeping readers in the all-important immersion trance. Aristotle and Freytag, among related topics, plot. Lubbock, narrative point of view. Swain and Bickham, causation. Rand, theme, moral, and message, and so on. Card's groundbreaking MICE. What I wouldn't give to find it all in one place, but then it'd probably be an entire library full, somewhat outdated as language is ever alive, and it'd probably be no more readily accessible than the current state of affairs.
One topic I'm looking for as it relates to story, antagonism. I don't think there's a volume on that topic because it's a tenuous concept yet in studying the craft of creative writing.
posted
This reminds me of a friend that wrote a pretty good piece and put it up for critique on critters. One critter said he liked it (as most did) but said it didn't have achance to get published because it lacked a moral. It prompted this response (paraphrasing) from my friend...
quote: ...so whats the moral to Lord of the Rings then? Don't let Orcs take over the world?
posted
I've seen that comment often in other places online in similar contexts as it pertains to Lord of the Rings' themes, messages, and morals. That moral doesn't arc across the entire story as a moral ought to ideally. One that does is; power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely.
quote:Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky, Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone, Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die, One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie. One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.
posted
LOTR has many intertwining themes - one of my favorites is a true friend sticks through thick and thin.Posts: 2003 | Registered: Jul 2008
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posted
As I understand theme and message and moral, that theme is friendship, the message is true friends stick together through thick and thin, a good example of a message that's not also patently a moral.
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posted
I agree that a true friend sticks through thick and thin is more of a moral in LOTR. However, a theme is "the underlying idea of a literary work...[that] reflects its broader meaning," according to The New York Public Library Literature Companion.
A better example of the friendship theme in LOTR would be friendship overcomes corruption and power. This would cover several of the relationships, including Merry and Pippin as well as Sam and Frodo.
posted
Theme and message and moral are decidely interconnected in indivisible but distinguishable relationships. Shades of meaning and subtelties contribute to the difficulty in singling them out for any given story. A moral I see from the friendship theme and messages of Lord of the Rings is, a true friendship survives the rough patches.
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quote:...remove everything from a story that is not related to or does not outright support the premise.
This is probably the best approach to take when you are told that your story doesn't have enough "focus."
OSC has said before that anything that can't fight for the right to be in a story should be edited out (I'm paraphrasing him, of course), and I submit that figuring out whether something supports the theme or premise or moral or point, or however you want to call such things, is one good way to determine if that something needs to be included or not.
posted
I'm inclined to think the moral of The Lord of the Rings is that when things are in danger, some one has to give them up, lose them, so that others might keep them.Posts: 8809 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
Lord of the Rings is as grand in sweep, scope, and scale as Tolstoy's War and Peace. Sweeping stories are prone to many themes, messages, morals, conflicts, and premises. Singling ones out from published works is a good exercise for developing a skill set for incorporating their uses in writing. Dissecting for an overarching one or two ferrets out big picture figurative meaning, or low-concept premises as I also know figurative meaning--literal meaning, high-concept premises. Good and evil, war, corruption, etc., are large themes in Lord of the Rings.
Card, I remember him saying how a theme unifies a story, how orienting on a theme provides a filtering mechanism for deciding what's essential to a story. Aristotle, Freytag, Lubbock, Maass, and others, too, say the same. Ayn Rand is the only writer writing on writing I've read who really digs in to the theme topic and deconstructs its methods and relationships in writing.
The And Plot as detailed at Turkey City Lexicon describes a consequence of a story without a well-developed theme. Something happens, something happens, and something happens to no meaningful end. Non sequitur, happenstance chance, haphazard, and incoherent plots derive from lacking a clear impression of a story's theme before writing, though a potent one might surface during writing.
I've commented on theme in some stories in critiques. Several writers replied they were unaware of the themes they were subconcsiously incorporating into their stories. I was astonished that that was unintended in several that had powerful themes. Their resolutions and sometimes climaxes weren't as satisfying as I like, though. By focusing on their themes I was able to offer concrete advices on how to treat them so they had stronger, more meaningful climaxes and endings.
Lately, I've been concentrating on theme for its power to offer insight on dynamic openings. My current story's opening finally started singing when I'd nailed down its theme. Sort of a parallel to the theme of Don McLean's American Pie with contrasts to Carlo Collodi's The Adventures of Pinnochio. I've also grasped its message and moral, somewhat from a pithy Biblical maxim, 1 Corinthians 13:11, "When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me."
[This message has been edited by extrinsic (edited October 02, 2009).]
If by antagonism you mean conflict, the most useful discussion of that I have come across is in Jerry Cleaver's "Immediate Fiction." His approach is very much geared to the layman, accessible, but not terribly academic or thorough.
If you mean the state of fulfilling the role as antagonist, Maas's "The Fire in Fiction" has a chapter on "villians" that I found quite interesting. Again, like Cleaver, the treatment is more practical than thorough.
posted
By antagonism related to story, I mean the forces that compel change, and how antagonism is the push-me-pull-you influence on both causation and tension. Antagonism I see as the third axis of plot, the other two being causation and tension. Like them, antagonism has two identities, purpose and problem. Causation's cause and effect and tension's empathy/sympathy and suspense identities.
I recognize that an antagonist isn't necessarily a villain or a nemesis. An antagonist can be a partner, a lover, a parent, a friend, a respected and trusted acquaintance, and so on.
I've noted that antagonism might be either favorable or unfavorable or both. An example of a favorable, positive valence of antagonism is the interaction between a trainer and an athlete that encourages performance improvement. Their interactions occur in a range of possibilities, but in general, they share a coodetermined mutual goal in an intradependent relationship, getting the athlete in the best competition trim possible.
I've identified seven categories of interaction related to antagonism.
Coodetermination
Cooperation
Coordination
Contention
Competition
Confrontation
Conflagration
The natures of those interactions orient around types of relationships.
Dependent
Codependent
Interdependent
Intradependent
Independent
Similar to antagonism but distinguishably different, I understand conflict as forces in diametric opposition as pertains to story. Forces in opposition can be antagonistic, but not necessarily compel change. The way I see it, antagonism can come from any direction, not just diameteric, polar opposites. For example, conflicts for an athlete might be winning or losing, success or failure in reaching another goal, recognition or anonymity, approval or disapproval, acclaim or derision. From conflict comes the natures of antagonism, tension, and causal motivations and stakes, the consequences of success or failure, favorable or unfavorable outcomes in resolving a confict.
Anyway, a theme like coming of age might orient around a conflict of resistance to adulthood's obligations and wanting to enjoy the privileges of adulthood. The forces of antagonism involved seem unlimited. Messages and morals abound from such a theme-conflict.
If I ever get a little more financially fluid, I'll look into acquiring those recommended books. As it is, they're not in the local regional library system yet.
[This message has been edited by extrinsic (edited October 02, 2009).]
posted
I come from the Idiot Savant school of writing. I don't think about a theme or moral before I write, just the story. Once I'm done with the first draft, I see if a theme emerges and then try to strengthen it during editting.
When I have tried starting with a theme, the result hasn't felt sincere.
I come from the same school, and it is only under duress that I even think post-story about things like theme or premise or moral. I once took an online fiction writing course and when it came time for the obligitory sections on theme and voice, during a forum discussion I admitted not even understanding what either of those things really meant even after all the lessons and discussions. I was told by the instructer, "That's strange, because your writing traffics in both quite adeptly." So it's possible in my view for theme and whatnot to emerge subconsciously, and as has been discussed before, it can be employed as a unifying factor during revision. Or it can be part of the composition from the start.
extrinsic,
Antagonism as you describe it sounds like one of the elements of dramatic conflict in my way of thinking. Responsive action on the part of the character to resolve the conflict is required in the story model I use in composition, but whether it changes the character is, strictly speaking, optional (although I'd guess that in general it does). My background and understanding of the finer points is limited (shallow and broad-brushed) I'm sorry to say. So it sounds like we have similar understandings of conflict, but my understanding of antagonism's role is much more limited--I think of it as the opposing force in the conflict, sometimes in the person of the "villian", sometimes not (as you point out). In short, the obstacle to whatever the story's character in question wants or needs.
[This message has been edited by dee_boncci (edited October 04, 2009).]
posted
I've not found a whole lot of shared consensus on how I view antagonism, but I'm not entirely alone. I do distinguish it from conflict for the potential that it provides for appreciating story attributes while reading, writing, and revising.
My grasp of antagonism comes in part from chemistry. In chemistry, antagonists are compounds that chemically interact to form a new compound, each original compound acting upon the other and in the process erradicating the original compounds. Change. Hydrochloric acid mixed with sodium bicarbonate yields carbon dioxide and table salt and water. That reaction is itself useful in many ways. One type of fire extinguisher is based on the same principle.
For example, Gollum in the Lord of the Rings. He's by turns villain, nemesis, friend, confidant, enemy, and antagonist in interaction and relationship with Frodo. He's a rich and deep character from his many facets. Frodo's compassion for and patience with Gollum enhances Frodo's character through his empathy, which contributes to resonance with readers' empathy for Frodo and perhaps Gollum.
Thematically, Gollum is an Everyman character physically, emotionally, and morally corrupted by the ring. In my opinion, Gollum is the main, if not the sole everyman character in focal perspective. Potent messages and morals there for readers and Frodo and Sam. There but for the grace of Providence go I.
Gollum's antagonism toward Frodo is readily perceived as potential or actual obstacle or opposition, but I see his antagonism contributing on additional levels. Not just obstacle or opposition, but compelling favorable change in Frodo from the cautionary influence he represents. Frodo wears the ring less, readers understand why, subconsciously at least. Then when Frodo does don the ring, tension is heightened. For suspense, the complications of the question posed earlier in the story steadily intensify; Will Frodo be corrupted by the ring? Gollum timely adds to tension from his positive and negative valence antagonisms at critical junctures of the plot.
Anyway, I've seen many story recipes where any given writer's outlook on the essentials of story and their meaning to a story vary widely. In part, I believe those different approaches favorably contribute to the manifold creative, original variety of stories.
[This message has been edited by extrinsic (edited October 04, 2009).]