What the Heck is That Supposed to Mean?!

Ch. 10 of Writing About Literature.

"In determining whether an object, action, or character is a symbol, you need to judge the importance that the author gives to it. If the element is prominent and also maintains a consistency of meaning, you can justify interpreting it as a symbol" (151).

Rather lenghty quote, no? I thought it was important. I guess this is why we write academic essays, so we can provide evidence for why we think such and such stands for this or something like that. I know that I'm better at decoding what something means (at least most of the time) in a story, but I'm still not quite there with poetry. I don't go looking for a symbol every time I read or watch something, but it is nice to say that I figured something out that no one else noticed (and then when you try to explain it to them, they're "Huh? What are you talking about?"). I'm looking for a pat on the back, but it's nice to see that paying a ton of money for an education is starting to show some results.

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