Both novels and short stories contain the elements of plot and theme. These two components work together to build a story with meaning as well as physical action.
Plot: The Story’s Action
A plot is the series of events that moves the story along. Plot involves action. The plot takes a reader through an experience by showing it actually happening to the characters in the story. Plots usually follow a pattern of rising and falling action, of failures and triumphs for the hero. Developing a plot allows the reader to follow the physical actions of the hero and want them to succeed.
Theme: The Story’s Meaning
The theme is the underlying message the story is trying to tell. It is what the author wants a person to “get out of a book.” Some of the classics have very weighty themes, but a theme can be as simple as crime doesn’t pay. A common theme in many novels and short stories is good versus evil.
The action of the plot brings about the theme. For example, in The Great Gatsby, Jay Gatsby discovers you can’t buy love. The plot of Gatsby draws out this theme by actually showing Gatsby trying to win Daisy back by displaying his wealth and power.
On the surface, Hawthorne’s well-known short story Young Goodman Brown is a horror tale about a man who takes a frightening journey through the woods where he finds that most of the village, including his wife, Faith, are involved in devil worship. But dig deeper and one discovers a theme about faith and how loss of it can corrupt a person's view of the entire world.
How Plot and Theme Work Together
A good plot and theme are interwoven into the fabric of the story. A good plots make a theme interesting to the reader. For example, the theme crime creates guilt does not stir up much empathy unless a reader is taken through a series of events in a novel such as Crime and Punishment.
Crime and Punishment demonstrates through plot and action the consequences of committing a murder one believes is justified and thinking it will not take an emotional toll. The reader must be walked through the steps, see the murder committed, feel Raskolnikov’s guilt as he guards hidden money he dares not spend, experience his illness and hallucinations. Once the reader goes through Raskolnikov’s specific experience and suffering on a personal level they will have a better understanding of the theme the author is trying to convey.
Both a solid plot and an underlying theme are necessary to tell a satisfying story. Plot takes a reader through an experience and theme leaves them with something to think about.
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