Am I right? Is this meaning in there? I don't know. I could ask them but then I'd feel like a
dork because I basically said their album makes them into the Messiah of modern music.
You could always rephrase the question so as to not sound snitty....
In all seriousness, asking them what they mean is an option.
If CS Lewis never pipes up his mouth, then we're left to fend for ourselves. We are left to conjecture.
(Alternatively, there's the case of a writer being dishonest about his own work. But that's something else
entirely, I guess.)
I agree that a certain amount of speculation is probably going to be necessary, (a necessary evil).
But, what the reader speculates about should be "what the author meant", not "what can I take out of
this for me, the most important person in the world?".
If a writer is known to be dishonest, (undeclared worked shoots in wrestling terms), then it is probably best to
assume that they are always lying.
Here's another thing! Last Stand of the Wreckers. (Which I still haven't read. I am a bitch.)
Damn, you suck O6. You need to read that series. (Good luck finding a copy though....)
If Roche comes out and says what the story means, and it differs from my (or anyone else's) reading of
"Last Stand of the Wreckers", then Roche word takes priority. Alternative readings are unambiguously wrong.
The only correct reading is the one that Roche defines. (And, I say this as somebody who grossly mis-read
"Watchmen" back in the day. So, yeah, I acknowledge mistakes happen. But, that does not make mistaken views
correct.
Some literary theories state that aspects of the authors intent can be/or is subconscious and
that they aren't really aware of putting it in themselves. There is *legitimate merit* to finding more
meaning beyond what the author consciously intended.
That is actually getting into the higher concepts of free-will and moral agency. I would argue that even
if one has a sub-concious motive, their basic day to day decisions are based on their own choice and
free will.
I am sure there are some writers who are mush-minded enough to not really know what they are writing about,
(I certainly work with clients who have that problem). In those cases, the most accurate view to take of their
work is that it has *no* intent. And, the fundamental question becomes if that writer's work is worth reading
at all.
No one here is saying stories just spring into existence. I don't see why you're trying to twist the argument around to even suggest that.
The point is that any and all IP only exists as the writer intends for it to.
The band admits the song doesn't send the message they intended it to, not that it's commonly "misread".
How is it a "misreading"
when even the bad admits the song "sucks" for what they meant it to be?
The band admits that the song sucks. It does not do what they wanted it to do. Anyone who
says the song is good is *wrong*. The people responsible for "Fight For Your Right to Party" say it is
a bad song.
How can an author legitimately claim they
anticipated the reaction to every single aspect of their work?
The author's job is to be clear in what they say. The audience's job is to read/listen/watch maturely.
If the readers are deviating from the author's intent, they are either making an honest mistake, or they
are feeding their own needs rather than understanding something.
And it's not the same thing as "putting words in the author's mouth" as
long as they distinguish the difference between the author's intent and audience interpretation.
[/quote
How can the audience find something that is not there?
That is the question I am have been asking for the last 3 posts.
Finding additional meanings beyond the author's intent is a text book example of putting words
into the author's mouth. In that case, the audience is attributing intention and meaning that
the author did not.
If a reader is mistaken, that is one thing. But, if the author's intent is known, or there is evidence to
indicate what it might have been, the reader should adhere to the author's intent as best they understand it.
And, again, wrong conclusions arrived at through legitimate mistakes are still wrong.
Marxism is only but one school of thought though. What about the literary theories that are
not on the Marxism side that advocate for audience interpretation?
I was using Marxism as an example of soemthing in Political Philosophy that I disagreed with, yet did not
cause me to disregard all of Political Philosophy/Science as a discipline.
Even with Marvel, as owners of the franchise, the question remains is the allegory something Marvel
intends or is it just something only Singer wanted to get across?
Marvel cleared Singer to write it. That makes it legitimate.
The meaning of a particular work doesn't die just because the creator is finished creating it.
The meaning does not die. It was never "alive". The meaning of any work is strictly what the author
says it is.
Authors, as well as owners, have a right to edit by fiat. If Lauper says "True Colors" is a gay anthem, that
is her right as the owner of the song. If I say that it is not a gay anthem, then I am completely wrong.
There are degrees of being wrong, (resonable mistake, negligent mistakes, or self-indulgent delusion being
good benchmarks), but deviation from the author's intent makes a reading factually wrong.
I really think this why you seem so utterly disappointed with most of the fiction you read.
Well duh.
Joking aside, if a writer does not have much to say beyond "robots am teh kewlz", why bother reading their work?
The same applies to any fiction really. This is why I am pretty well fed up with Furman. He has not had any
real ideas for damned near a decade now.
I am also not super in love with "Avengers" right now. Bendis is readable, but not much more than that.
"Bendis writing superheroes" is not an idea so much as it is a stylistic riff. But, I need to read something
between issues of Costa's TF run.....
Dom
-comic reviews coming up soonish. Honest.
