#theme

I always tell my students, about the biggest baddest things in life you must try to write small and light, save the big writing for the unexpected tiny thing that always makes or breaks a story. ↗

— Pam Houston

#story #themes #unexpected #writing #life

My abiding theme is separations. ↗

— Judith Rossner

#theme

And indeed this theme has been at the centre of all my research since 1943, both because of its intrinsic fascination and my conviction that a knowledge of sequences could contribute much to our understanding of living matter. ↗

— Frederick Sanger

#been #both #centre #contribute #conviction

The moment at which music reveals its true nature is contained in the ancient exercise of the theme with variations. The complete mystery of music is explained right there. ↗

— Pierre Schaeffer

#complete #complete mystery #contained #exercise #explained

You can't tell any kind of a story without having some kind of a theme, something to say between the lines. ↗

— Robert Wise

#between #having #kind #lines #say

A book isn't a single, static thing with one unarguable meaning. Each reader who comes to it brings his own special knowledge, habits and attitudes. Each reader reads a different book. Each reader imagines a different story. A few years ago, for instance, a friend of my mother's sent me a copy of a test on Rite of Passage that she had given her students. The first question read: "True or False? The theme of Rite of Passage is..." I can't tell you what the presumed themed was, but I can tell you that I didn't recognize it. Beads of sweat leaped out of my forehead. After two more questions, I had to put the test aside. I didn't know the "right" answers. ↗

— Alexei Panshin

#literature #themes #attitude

[On Female Attraction to Men in Uniform] That male military persona feeds a subconscious, passive-aggressive female desire to dominate the warrior as he is perceived an iconic example of masculinity (particularly amongst traditionally warlike cultures). The damsel in distress theme always struck me as embodying this: the hapless, innocently beautiful woman unwittingly enraptures the heroic male so completely that he would risk all to submit to her at his own peril, and quite in spite of it. ↗

— Tiffany Madison

#literature #military-theory #passive-aggressive #romantic-themes #warrior

Love for the beauty of the soul. I shall love you always. When the flower of life has gone, ever I shall find you. When all is lost and winter comes, I shall be your spring time. And memory fades and wilts then, I shall always find you.... I shall always find you.... ↗

— Laurel A. Rockefeller

#elendir #find #flower #grief #hope

I believe the biggest themes of life are put into the best focus when held up against the very sharp light of mortality. ↗

— Mitch Albom

#believe #best #biggest #focus #held

All stories interest me, and some haunt me until I end up writing them. Certain themes keep coming up: justice, loyalty, violence, death, political and social issues, freedom. ↗

— Isabel Allende

#coming #death #end #freedom #haunt