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A lot of plot bunnies pop up in my head, but most of them do not make it to paper (or screen) unless there is an underlying theme I want to explore. Everything needs to tie together in some fashion, thus I put theme as the center of my plot. I plan my scenes to fit with this theme; I also come up with certain motifs, foils, and symbolic objects, as well as pieces of music that fit with what I want to write. Incidentally, most of my story outlines are actually mp3 lists.
My greatest weakness as a writer, then, comes from the character development. I don't stretch the length of my chapters to build the characters as thoroughly as I like because I'm always itching to move the plot forward to build the theme further. Plot follows from expanding upon the theme, so in my mind it's important that it follows some sort of logical sense. That in itself can be a challenge that I find myself stuck in rut with.
I can definitely answer the question as to when the theme becomes "over-workshopped". It's when readers become confused as to what kind of message you're trying to convey because there are too many thematic objects that don't tie in together elegantly and the narrative becomes convoluted. Readers will wonder why the heck you keep bringing up something when it has nothing to do with the actual plot. Keeping the theme subtle and apparent but not obviously tacked in is the most difficult thing to manage when you write stories around themes.
Kenhime
Member Since 11 Sep 2005Offline Last Active Sep 15 2011 01:18 AM
