I would be lying if I said I weren’t waiting for torches and pitchforks when I state my first confession: I read both this article and this article and I had no idea what was being said.

Now, now.  Hold on.  Don’t deny my an English degree yet.  Hear me out.  I figured out the general idea.  ” Books are meant to be read, not written, and so the ways readers interpret them are more important and “real” than the ways writers write them,” said the article from TVTropes.

I can understand that.  After all, anytime I’ve written a piece of fiction, I don’t think, “I’m going to make this character’s bedroom walls yellow to symbolize their happiness” and I don’t expect the poor soul who’s been bribed into reading it to think that way, either.  My reader can take whatever they want away from my writing.

That being said, maybe I’m completely out in left field with that thought process.

Then again, maybe not.  The Immortal Bard saw the incredible William Shakespeare flunked in a class about his work.  Plays he had written!  Who would know Shakespeare better than the gentleman himself?

I guess that just goes to show that we have to take what we can away from a work.  After all, the author won’t always be around to hold our hand and tell us what they meant.

At least…I think that’s what these authors meant.