Can you tell me what themes appear in diverse books?

Question

Like, I know that in lords of the rings its good vs. evil, same for star wars.
But what abouyt other books?

Answer 1

I despair. I really do. There is absolutely no education going on in this country. (By the way, what country are you in, after all?)

There are only a handful of real themes, and most of them can be boiled down to good versus evil. Most of the rest have been characterized as "boy meets girl." A small handful include such subtleties as "growing up" and sometimes political themes. But they tend to have some of the "good vs. evil" in there, too. Just like Star Wars had some "boy meets girl," although complicated by separated twins.

These general themes, of course, are told with the use of many other details, often more significant in literary terms. For example, how many times can you say, "choose good over evil." Yeah, OK, we got the point. Move on.

But getting into the complexities of what they are, how to distinguish, and how much deceit and false leads we find in pursuing the good and noble and true? There you have a story.

Answer 2

Here are some of the main plots of literature:
- man vs man (the main plot is a battle wills between the main character and his or her opponent)
- man vs society (the main plot is a person trying to figure out how to fit in / rebel against society, or some social institution)
- man vs other (the main plot is a person or people trying to understand and resolve their differences with someone that is not of their society
- man vs nature (the main plot is someone duking it out with the forces of nature, like "The Old Man and the Sea")
- man vs god/supernatural
- man vs self

This page talks about some of the other ways people have tried to categorize literature themes:
http://www.ipl.org/div/farq/plotFARQ.html
with Transformation, Quest, The Riddle, Love, Discovery, etc.

Answer 3

I have been reading sci-fi/fantasy,mystery,thriller,horror,adventure,historical fiction, history,science and other genres for over 50 years and have come to the conclusion that there are people out there who have to pick books apart in order to feel adequate. I just read books for either enjoyment or knowledge.