Quote Originally Posted by Cthulhu View Post
Embedded themes within the story improve it 100%, such as the "coffin money" in James Clavell's Tai-Pan or Kambei's "losing actions" in The Seven Samurai
Oh, right. Yeah.

Every story has a theme. If you don't have a theme, then you haven't written a story. Officially, without a theme, you've written an anecdote.