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The articles in this section aim to provide writers, particularly new writers, with an insight into the world of fiction writing.
Motivation
Using proverb based themes for story ideas - Part One
Using proverb based themes for story ideas - Part Two
Backup Your Writing for Free Online
Plot: The Fiction Writer's Itinerary
Choosing and Describing a Perfect Setting
Characterisation
Learn to be quiet
Delving into your past
Regaining your writing confidence
Using inclusive language in writing
Copyright: Where To Find Information
Critiquing guidelines
Anti-Virus Tip for Writers
All Rights Remain With the Author: Fact or Fiction?
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In part one I showed how proverbs relate to existing stories, now it's time to show how you can relate proverbs to new stories. Before you begin writing your next masterpiece, think about its underlying theme. Is your story about love? Perhaps you could use love conquers all as a theme. Or is this too strong? Maybe it's a small world is more appropriate, perhaps your characters' lives are drawn together through fate on an overseas trip. There are many proverbs from which to choose.
Once you have settled on a proverb based theme, it's time to work on ways to maintain that theme throughout your story. Take every shoe fits not every foot as an example and apply it to a story where a woman and man swap bodies. First of all, it's important to show the two characters walking in their own shoes, otherwise the comedy aspects won't materialise later on when the roles are swapped. It's also important for the characters to make statements that the other has it easy, so that later they can see each other's point of view.
Although trying on someone else's shoes couldn't come close to the shock of waking up in a different body, it does give a feeling of discomfort, of not belonging, of wanting to get out of the shoes and so on. Explore these feelings by placing the characters in each other's normal routines such as getting dressed, going to a public toilet and taking on each other's work and family commitments. To add suspense and interest to a story such as this, imagine how awkward it would be to have tried on someone else's shoes only to find the double knot laces impossible to untie. This problem can bring other characters into the situation that help the main characters swap back. In the end, explore the emotions of returning to normal. Liken it to placing your tired feet into a pair of comfy slippers.
To demonstrate further how to maintain a theme throughout a story, I'll focus on the proverb nothing so certain as death. Apart from fantasy and science fiction, death is certain for all humans. Death also occurs to political movements, forests and fads. Their deaths aren't always so certain, however, because they can be restarted, reborn or brought back. Although you can apply the proverb 'nothing so certain as death' to stories focusing on things that are uncertain, I will concentrate more on the certainty of death type.
Well known stories portraying inevitable and foreseeable human death include: Beaches, based on a novel by Iris Rainer Dart, where a character has cancer; Philadelphia where the main character has AIDS; and Dead Man Walking based on a book by Sister Helen Prejean, where a character waits on death row following a heinous crime.
Each of these stories lets the audience know, early on, that the main character won't be around for long. The stories continue to appeal, however, in showing the characters dealing with their impending deaths. They remind us of our own mortality, they shake us up and show us deep emotions we don't experience every day. They take us on an emotional downhill ride, but on the way they show snippets of the grand and glorious thing we call life. They show us moments for which to be grateful, even if it's only an ocean breeze, an opera recording or a conversation with a caring human being.
To maintain the theme nothing so certain as death for an inevitable death story, it's necessary to take into consideration various emotions, thoughts, regrets and memories as well as new experiences leading to up the death. It's then a matter of stringing these together in a believable and intriguing sequence. The mere playing out of this collection of emotions, reflections and pensive thinking periods, becomes the story itself and shows the character's essence whether it be good, bad or mediocre.
In Beaches the theme is masked by showing a life long friendship, in Philadelphia it's masked by a law case following the character's sacking due to his AIDS diagnosis, and in Dead Man Walking it's masked by probably the only caring relationship the character has ever experienced. All three, however, maintain the underlying theme of nothing so certain as death via the exploration of emotions and experiences, past and present.
Now that I've given you my thoughts on proverb based themes, you're equipped with a new tool. So, next time you're out shopping and get the urge to write, don't forget to look up a dictionary of proverbs for a theme for your story. Actually, why wait for the next idea to float your way? Next time you want to write, just browse through a dictionary such as The Penguin Dictionary of Proverbs or the Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs. There you'll find thousands of themes all ready and waiting for you. All you have to do is come up with the characters, the setting, the plot, the dialogue and the narrative. That's the easy part...isn't it?
© Justin O'Leary 2004
Using Proverb based themes for Story Ideas - Part One
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