Recurring Themes

It seems it is indeed difficult to escape the reuse of themes in writing. I'm not writing that as the lead-in to my slamming some insanely successful novelist or screenwriter who seemingly continues to recycle the same ideas. I mean someone who's accomplishments in writing are infinitely more modest. I am writing about my own writing.

While the stories can be completely different in terms of characterization, plot, person and point-of-view, setting, ad infinitem, I am finding a specific theme has developed, somewhat covertly, in my new screenplay. While writing from the subconscious is not a new discovery, and it is almost surely necessary, what is interesting to me is the idea that my subconscious still wants to play with that theme. You would think one novel would be enough. I mean, how far will my subconscious take this theme? First a novel, now the new screenplay, what's next? A play? A collection of poetry? An essay or two? Greeting cards? A new blog post?

I hope to protect my new novel from my subconscious. This recurring theme has no business weaseling its way into "Marion" no matter how well it seems to have served "Deeds of Men."

But that begs the question... Can your conscious self veto the input of your subconscious during the creative process without killing the process itself? Without the subconscious, does your cooking go from pheasant under glass to Kraft dinner? Assuming you weren't already maxing out your potential by ripping open the little blue boxes of Kraft dinner and adding the powdered cheese?

Do writers really have to exhaust a theme and their own subconscious before they can move on? What if there are a finite number of themes a writer's subconscious will provide, and by too quickly discarding one, a writer has moved too soon toward exhausting the supply of themes in her or his head? What if some of us only get one?

Okay...enough...I'm going to go make some Kraft dinner now.