A story’s theme often emerges only after a year of drafting

Evidence

In the first draft of my novel Cutting Stone, for instance, I opened with the sentence, “It took a hundred and twelve bottles of champagne to see the young Poindexters off to Arizona.” A page later one character whispered to another that young Mr. Poindexter had “consumption.” I worked on this book for a year (taking my characters off to Arizona where they dealt with the desert heat, thirst, alcoholism, loss of religion, and the development of mining interests and the building trade) before I saw the connection between “consumption” and “champagne.” When I understood that simple link, I understood the overarching theme—surely latent in the idea from the moment it had taken hold of me—between tuberculosis, spiritual thirst, consumerism, and addiction, all issues of “consumption.” — Janet Burroway; Elizabeth Stuckey-French; Ned Stuckey-French, Writing Fiction, Tenth Edition, 653

Categorization

• XREF: Concrete exemplar of the thesis (p.652) that writers often find they’re wrong about what their story is about; also grounds the theme-as-discovery argument. — connects to: Story shape emerges late, after factual material is already gathered — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 1141; Committing to a structure too early makes flawed writing seem right — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 1078; Writing often requires passing through a muddle and despair before shape emerges. — Janet Burroway; Elizabeth Stuckey-French; Ned Stuckey-French, Writing Fiction, Tenth Edition: A Guide…, 78 (+2 more)
• SEED: Could serve as a vivid case study in an essay on why drafting first and discovering meaning later is a legitimate, even necessary, method.

Related

• Writing often requires passing through a muddle and despair before shape emerges. (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Writing often requires passing through a muddle and despair before shape emerges. #corroborates (0.65) — Janet Burroway; Elizabeth Stuckey-French; Ned Stuckey-French, Writing Fiction, Tenth Edition, 78
• Story shape emerges late, after factual material is already gathered #corroborates (0.60) — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 1141
• Committing to a structure too early makes flawed writing seem right #complicates (0.50) — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 1078