From Theme to Genre

While the plot or story will recount the events of a narrative, these are not the reason the author wrote the work.  Most narratives are written with the intention of passing along some sort of a message.  Frequently these messages are a moral judgment of some sort.  The handiest example of this are fairy-tales which are recounted to children for countless generations in order to teach moral lessons to each new generation.  That lesson, or central idea is called the theme.   For instance, Othello's theme is jealousy.

The author can convey meaning to the reader in a number of ways.  One of the least obvious means of communicating is through narrative form or genre.   Genre is a French term meaning literary type or class.  Genres are formed of groups of narratives which share the same conventions or narrative forms.

Narrative form is the way such components as character, plot events, actions, themes, setting and other elements are combined in ways that are easily recognizable and, because they can be recognized as such, they carry a meaning of their own.  For instance, if the author sets the narrative in space, you can guess that the narrative is Science Fiction.  Or if it revolves around cowboys, it's probably a western.  This is important because the reader recognizes the conventions of the narrative form.  We know what characters are supposed to show up and what is going to happen.  Take, for instance, a superhero comic book.  We know that muscular people in spandex are going to show up, we know they are going to be confronted with some evil act, endangered by a villain, but, in the end, good will prevail.  This has been the case since 1939.  After anyone has read two comics, you know what to expect.   This creation of a set pattern creates what is called:  narrative expectation.  We pick a narrative based on what we know is going to happen because we want (or need) to hear the story again.  When the author follows the rules of the genre (the good guys saving the day at the last moment) the reader's expectations are fulfilled.  The reader is happy and the status quo is reaffirmed.  However, if the narrative expectations are flouted (the villain just shoots Batman instead of telling him the entire plot and leaving him hanging over a cauldron of boiling gumbo) the reader is faced with a powerful contradiction in that the meaning of the genre itself is broken.  While this conveys a powerful theme it is rarely successful because the reader does not want to be disappointed.

The traditional genres were:

• epic - A long narrative poem, on a grand scale, about the deeds of warriors and heroes (Odyssey).
• tragedy - (from the Greek meaning "goat song," first referred to some sort of ritual sacrifice) A serious drama which usually ends in disaster  for the hero who undergoes a number of nasty turns of fortune (Oedipus Rex).
• lyric - A brief melodic and imaginative poem characterized by a first person narrator expressing private and powerful thoughts and emotions in a very structured metre.  Forms include ballad, sonnet, and ode.
• comedy - Amusing and entertaining works that highlight the "lighter side" of life.
• satire - narrative that uses irony, wit, and sarcasm to expose   humanity's weaknesses with the intent to provoke change or reform through ridicule (A Modest Proposal).

Contemporary Critics include:

• novel - a long fictional prose narrative.
• short story - a brief fictional prose narrative.

Narrative theorists have expanded genre studies to include such genres as:   science fiction, detective stories, westerns, romance novels, situation comedies, actually nearly every form of narrative is grouped into a genre.