Not Everything Is Open To Interpretation

Reading Is Like a Puzzle

Language is a fun but convoluted thing. For example: emotions are real things that affect our lives, but when it comes to putting what one feels into words (even just words thought rather than spoken aloud or written out), it’s not always easy to thoroughly and accurately describe those feelings.

If we can’t even use words to explain these things to ourselves, it’s no wonder that we have difficulties communicating with each other! Luckily in most cases we can rely not just on words, but also on gesture, inflection, tone of voice, facial expression, to explain what our words mean.

What also helps is if we’re talking to a friend or family member or coworker who knows us, and therefore can fill in the gaps or “autocorrect” any mistakes in speech or writing that we might make. This is why, when at a loss for the right word, we can say to them, “Oh, you know what I mean!” and assume that yes, they do know, or at least can make an educated guess.

So reading, in addition to being symbols made of lines and dots on paper and screen to be deciphered into words, assigns the additional task to the reader of interpreting the words into actual meaning. It’s communication without the safety net of hearing the writer’s voice or seeing their face or gestures. Sometimes the reader has no knowledge of the writer at all, and so can’t interpret sincerity from irony with any real confidence.

Reading Is Not Like a Puzzle

The problem is that readers often take this first concept to an unwarranted extreme. All the sentences are picked through with a fine-toothed comb, reading between the lines is given more credulity than reading the lines themselves, and words are interpreted with the modern rather than the contemporary definitions in mind.

A reader raised in the culture of today can’t help but interpret things through a modern lens. But to take issues that are “hot topics” today and impose them on innocent books written long before these issues were brought up is willful misunderstanding. Besides that, the results of some of those “modern lens interpretations” can be just plain silly.

A friend from college, a classmate in many a literature course, harbors an odd distaste for one of my favorite poets, T.S. Eliot. I once forced her to read The Waste Land, and to her credit gave the poem a fair shot. When she put it down, however, her verdict was one of confusion:

“So, it’s about global warming?”

Now, The Waste Land lends itself to many interpretations. Anyone would be hard-pressed to tack it down to one specific theme or meaning. But my friend’s interpretation was one that was born more out postmodern Millennialism than the Lost Generation.

Not every piece of literature is so vague. We don’t interpret Winnie-the-Pooh as being about deforestation…at least, we shouldn’t. And if we allow that there are some interpretations that are NOT valid, that means that, even if there are several valid interpretations, there is one interpretation that is more valid than all the rest, because it coincides most faithfully with the author’s original intent.

Reading Is Like a Puzzle, Again

The task duty of a reader is to translate lines and dots into words and then interpret those words into meaning.

Not just ANY meaning. This isn't Arts and Crafts, and we shouldn't cut-and-paste an author's words to mean what we want them to mean. (One probably shouldn't cut-and-paste words, anyway, since it makes one appear as if they're constructing a ransom note.)

Contemporary issues are good to think about or discuss or read up on. But we are missing out on so much if we simply read books and interpret them to fit our worldview. It is so much easier—and in the long run, more edifying—to seek out the original meaning, to truly allow the author to communicate their thoughts. Whether we agree with them or not, hearing other points of view (even across the expanse of time and culture) can only expand our perspective of the world and, hopefully, give us wisdom that otherwise we might not be able to collect in our short lifetimes.