Here’s a fun topic for all of you who ever had to sit
through a high-school literature class: symbolism.
If you just felt a chill run down your spine, then this is
the article for you. This little post is going to be the catharsis you have
been longing for all these years after you were forced to interpret what the
author meant when he wrote about the
sunset passing over the city like a flock of birds.
As a writer, I have always scoffed at people’s attempt to
force symbolism on writing that isn’t theirs. Don’t get me wrong, personal
interpretation is very fine. Everyone brings a unique perspective in life that
affects how they digest information, and I will see a piece of art differently
from the person standing next to me based on my previous experiences and individual personality. The swell
of emotions I feel when I look up at the stars on a dark night are never quite
the same as the next awed individual craning their neck for a peek at eternity.
What I tend to roll my eyes at the most is when I hear someone
declaring confidently that a certain writer meant
something deep and intense by their words. The more obscure the connection, the
better.
Even as a young student, I used to imagine that if the
authors we were reading in class could sit in the back, unnoticed, and listen
to our desperate attempts to please our instructor by utilizing the magical,
metaphorical shovel, they would roll on the floor laughing at some of the crap
we were forced to come up with.
I had a teacher once tell me that an extremely unlikeable
character in a novel was a Christ-figure simply because his initials were J.C.
and he died standing in water.
Very convincing. I think Spark Notes comes up with more
intellectual associations.
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| Comic by Kate Beaton, harkavagrant.com |
So here is your chance to mourn all those misused brain
cells and re-claim your dignity, and you have young Bruce McAllister to thank
for the redemption. Well, Bruce isn’t so young anymore. He was 16 years old in
1963 when he sent a survey to over 100 famous novelists of the time, asking
them specifically if they placed symbolism in their work, consciously or unconsciously.
Those that answered directly (some simply told him to do his own research and
stop bothering them) often refuted the idea of conscious symbolism entirely.
The full survey has been published in a book, but here are some
of my favorite responses:
Isaac Asimov: “Consciously? Heavens, no! Unconsciously? How
can one avoid it?”
Norman Mailer: “I’m not sure it’s a good idea for a working
novelist to concern himself too much with the technical aspects of the matter.
Generally, the best symbols in a novel are those you become aware of only after
you finish the work.”
Ray Bradbury: “…each story is a Rorschach Test, isn’t it?
And if people find beasties and bedbugs in my ink-splotches, I cannot prevent
it, can I? They will insist on seeing them, anyway, and that is their
privilege. Still, I wish people, quasi-intellectuals, did not try so hard to
find the man under the old maid’s bed. More often than not, as we know, he
simply isn’t there… There are other things of greater value in any novel or
story…humanity, character analysis, truth on other levels…Good symbolism should
be as natural as breathing…and as unobtrusive.”
Richard Hughes: “Have you considered the extent to which
subconscious symbol-making is part of the process of reading, quite distinct
from its part in writing?”
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