"Empty space on the page, that absence of language, provides no clues. But it doesn’t communicate nothing — rather, it communicates *nothing*. It *speaks* void, it telegraphs mystery."
The word "text" has the root meaning of weaving, as in "textile." When we write, we weave--past, present. and future; formal and informal; story and argument; mixing genres and even media. Nothing is ever one thing.
@CarolJago Depends on whether you're teaching theme as statement or topic / abstract idea. I do the latter & emphasize that a theme cannot be touched (since it's a *concept*) and that it differs from main idea in that many stories can have the same theme but not the same MI.