Question

How does a reader determine theme within the text?

Answer 1

How does a reader determine theme within the text?

Answer 2

hmmm, can you tell us the text? it may help to walk through an example

Answer 3

night by elie wiesel

Answer 4

but the theme is basically the broad idea or moral of a story or paragraph

Answer 5

for example the theme of cartoons is usually "be nice to your friends"

Answer 6

let me see

Answer 7

http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/night

Answer 8

http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/night/themes.html

Answer 9

but how do you determine theme within the text? like what do you look for?

Answer 10

"Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work."

Answer 11

Usually it is the moral of the story, or something that is emphasized consistently by the story itself. For example if you read a story about three people that steal for a living, and for all three of them stealing comes back to haunt them in different ways (e.g. arrested, more stolen back, etc...) - then you would see a commonality between parts of the story - that "stealing is bad"

Answer 12

Nowhere does the author necessarily state that stealing is bad - but rather shows that throughout

Answer 13

what sticks out so that you can find the theme inside?

Answer 14

well, for a story, you may want to search for what the struggles of the main character, what are they usually about, what does the main character have to resolve at the end of the story.

Answer 15

alright that helps a lot actually. thank you

Answer 16

according to sparknotes, the main character in night has to resolve her "faith in a Benevolent God" (sorry I haven't read it). So there are probably many instances throughout the book where she questions whether or not God is real or good due to events that happen, but by the end of the story, her lack of faith is resolved in some way

Answer 17

ok no problem! good luck!