Challenger Approaching

It has happened. Someone has finally risen up and challenged the very ideology of our beloved Literature is a lot like a 5 Layer Beefy Burrito, and I feel it is my duty to defend my honor from this assailant known as Laurence Perrine. The time has come for this blogster to take up the smash ball and defend the concept that there truly is no definite meaning to The Written Word, and any one person's interpretation is just as good as the next. This is particularly evident through poetry, where the figurative language and symbology symbolism are open for an infinite number of interpretations, because they are in essence, indefinite. For those keeping track at home, that makes two Super Smash Bros. references and a Boondock Saints reference all in one bite-size chunk of text. Go me.

I will start this show with a generalization: All things made by humans are indefinite, that is to say, not always clear-cut and 100% true in all situations. Before you get all up in a tizzy that I just generalized, please allow me to make my point. Math is definite. Math was not invented by people. Two plus two is four. Physics is definite. Force is mass times acceleration. It took humans to discover these things, but they were true before the discovery, because they are independent of human thought and emotion. I can deny the existence of gravity 'til my face turns blue, but I will still hit the ground. On the other hand, to make an example, music was created by people. Granted, the physics behind music always existed, but the grouping of music into what sounds good and what sounds bad is a human invention. Therefore, I declare that music is completely open to one's own interpretation and preference. I can say that Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata" is about peace and tranquility. You could say it's about some current event at the time of its writing. Mr. Strawman could say it's about a long lost love, or chips and salsa, or maybe it was just nighttime when Beethoven wrote it. One of us has to be right, right? No. Whatever the song makes one think and feel is the song's meaning. We are all right, if that's what we truly think. I say that this tendency to have infinitely many interpretations is due to its nature as a human invention. Language, literature, and poetry, as human inventions, are therefore no exception.

This of course brings us back to the original matter at hand. Is there one definite interpretation of poetry? Can any one person look at a piece of poetry and declare that there is one definite meaning, and all others are wrong? I like to think that such arrogance is nonexistent amongst the literary elite, but Mr. Perrine would tell us differently. He declares that a correct interpretation is defined as the one that accounts for every detail of the poem, and the one that relies on the fewest assumptions. I, on the other hand declare that it is, not just difficult, but outright impossible to form an interpretation that accomplishes either of these tasks. The problem essentially occurs in the difference between poetry and prose. The two are, essentially, like entirely different languages. I think Perrine alludes to this himself when he says "[a poet] cannot say "What I really meant was..." ... without saying something different (and usually much less) than what the poem said. Italics were added by yours truly for emphasis. And because I really like italics. If the actual poet himself can't be expected to come up with something that fully encapsulates every minute detail of a poem, then I just personally feel it would be impossible for any person to sum up a poem in prose and fully interpret exactly what it means. No matter what, something gets lost in translation, from poetry to prose, and from writer to reader. Thus, I do declare it's impossible to ever create an interpretation that satisfactorily accounts for any detail of the poem. The best we can ever hope for is to focus on the details that personally appeal to us and form the best interpretation we personally can. Thus, there is no right or wrong; only personal interpretation.

I think this means I win, yeah?

Although if you disagree, I suppose that is entirely up to your own personal interpretation of my writing.