An Author's Intent
Apr. 28th, 2007 09:25 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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queensthiefI asked this in Chatzy, and the folks there assured me it wasn't complete gibberish, so I will ask it here. I began thinking about this after Rowana's question #3 in this post.
Is there any "truth" in an author's writing, or are readers free to interpret things in any way they like? Of course, no one can stop us from interpretation; that is the fun and joy we find in reading.
My question has to do with Voice, and the author's intent, and how all narrarators are, to some degree, unreliable. We see a book's world as filtered through its narrarator, so we see the action of the book through a lens that may or may not be accurate. In some cases, does that mean we can never be certain of anything, especially if the narrators are characters such as Gen or Costis? Once an author finishes a book, is there any canon or absolute truth? Or does the story then belong to the readers?
These books fool us--what can we believe? We are fooled, even deceived, but not in a way that's unfair. What we believe to be true changes as events and emotions are revealed to us. We like to be fooled; we like having to figure things out. But, at some point, can we believe that certain things are canon and are true?
I thought this out after Really Articulate Anon Person's comment to Jade's post. RAAP interprets the kiss between Gen and Irene as Gen showing ownership, and that he wants their relationship to be more intimate. If the author says the kiss was, "not a kiss between strangers, not even a kiss between a bride and a groom..." but "was a kiss between a man and his wife," can the reader convincingly argue that they aren't living as husband and wife? If so, what's the point of that line? If Gen leapt backward "like a startled deer" and says Irene scared the hell out of him, can we still interpret that to mean he wasn't frightened, but was playing at some other game? It is Gen, after all. I don't mean to pick on RAAP but that's the example that came to mind. And somehow this came back around to the consummation question. :)
These books fool us--what can we believe? We are fooled, even deceived, but not in a way that's unfair. What we believe to be true changes as events and emotions are revealed to us. We like to be fooled; we like having to figure things out. But, at some point, can we believe that certain things are canon and are true?
I thought this out after Really Articulate Anon Person's comment to Jade's post. RAAP interprets the kiss between Gen and Irene as Gen showing ownership, and that he wants their relationship to be more intimate. If the author says the kiss was, "not a kiss between strangers, not even a kiss between a bride and a groom..." but "was a kiss between a man and his wife," can the reader convincingly argue that they aren't living as husband and wife? If so, what's the point of that line? If Gen leapt backward "like a startled deer" and says Irene scared the hell out of him, can we still interpret that to mean he wasn't frightened, but was playing at some other game? It is Gen, after all. I don't mean to pick on RAAP but that's the example that came to mind. And somehow this came back around to the consummation question. :)
Is there any "truth" in an author's writing, or are readers free to interpret things in any way they like? Of course, no one can stop us from interpretation; that is the fun and joy we find in reading.
