Can a reader "misread" a poem?

[PoetGuy]

There is an obvious referent to this question, but Poet Guy wishes to pass over that and not get involved with a "who is right and who is wrong" discussion about some particular post. He is interested in the more general question: Can a reader "misread" a poem?

Meaning, for example, is it the reader's job to "properly" interpret the author's words, however confusing or vague or obscure?

If a reader forms an internally consistent reading of a poem that does not map onto the author's original intent, is the reader "wrong" or "incorrect" in that reading?

Who determines the "meaning" of a poem? The poem's author or (perhaps various) readers?

If readers consistently read some different theme/message into a poem than what the author intended, who is mistakenly interpreting the poem, author or reader?

Can a poet write something that absolutely conveys meaning? (That is, can one write a poem that cannot be misinterpreted?)

Does any of this matter? (i.e., does one have to worry about writing so clearly that one cannot be mis/re- interpreted?)

Poet Guy has, of course, his own opinions about these questions, which may be partly obvious from the form or phrasing of the questions he has posed. He assumes others will have different opinions, though, and is interested in hearing them.

May you all be well.

 

[vrosej10]

There is an obvious referent to this question, but Poet Guy wishes to pass over that and not get involved with a "who is right and who is wrong" discussion about some particular post. He is interested in the more general question: Can a reader "misread" a poem?

Meaning, for example, is it the reader's job to "properly" interpret the author's words, however confusing or vague or obscure?

If a reader forms an internally consistent reading of a poem that does not map onto the author's original intent, is the reader "wrong" or "incorrect" in that reading?

Who determines the "meaning" of a poem? The poem's author or (perhaps various) readers?

If readers consistently read some different theme/message into a poem than what the author intended, who is mistakenly interpreting the poem, author or reader?

Can a poet write something that absolutely conveys meaning? (That is, can one write a poem that cannot be misinterpreted?)

Does any of this matter? (i.e., does one have to worry about writing so clearly that one cannot be mis/re- interpreted?)

Poet Guy has, of course, his own opinions about these questions, which may be partly obvious from the form or phrasing of the questions he has posed. He assumes others will have different opinions, though, and is interested in hearing them.

May you all be well.

Only in the event that the individual finds something that is clearly not there such as if they interpreting Wordsworth's Daffodil poem as a anti dog tract or commentary on nuclear war

As a rule literary theory has it that meaning emerges from an interaction between the text and the reader, thusly the reader's own experience helps to determine what they find in the writing. There is neverjust one meaning to a text and all meanings that can be justified by proofs would be considered valid. Again the limit to this would be something like extracting I hate canaries from Mary Had a Little Lamb but a comment on vegetarianism would be a stretch but not impossible.

 

[mizzmaree]

Agreed with vrose

A crafty author will either intentionally create ambiguity or clarity in his or her work. And yes, if the reader brings a different interpretation to the poem, then that is the truth as read by the reader.

Just my 2 cents.

MizzMaree

 

[bogusagain]

The author has no say over how his/her poem is read once they put it out there in the public, it exists on its own. If it is consistently misread from the poet's perception then tough, the poet is to blame.

A poem just is, to be read and interpreted how the reader wants and different readers with different experience and knowledge will see a different poem. It is not as though one poem is just one poem, it is as many poems as there are readers.

If a poet wants to create a didactic work or work where the correct interpretation is paramount, they would be better off writing in prose, which is still a rather crude way of communicating but better for didactic texts.

 

[fridayam]

Perhaps Shakespeare is at fault when some readers can discern the hand, life and intentions of a Bacon or a DeVere in his sonnets?

 

[UnderYourSpell]

The author has no say over how his/her poem is read once they put it out there in the public, it exists on its own. If it is consistently misread from the poet's perception then tough, the poet is to blame.

A poem just is, to be read and interpreted how the reader wants and different readers with different experience and knowledge will see a different poem. It is not as though one poem is just one poem, it is as many poems as there are readers.

If a poet wants to create a didactic work or work where the correct interpretation is paramount, they would be better off writing in prose, which is still a rather crude way of communicating but better for didactic texts.

In a way I agree with you but in the past I have been praised for something that was way beyond what I had intended and I thought to myself did I really write that? and was merely amused, but if someone came down on me like a ton of bricks for some misdeamenour that I had not written into it at all but was concocted in their own warped mind then it would be their own fault and not mine!

 

[Liar]

Can a poet write something that absolutely conveys meaning? (That is, can one write a poem that cannot be misinterpreted?)

One cannot write a sentence that cannot be misintepreted.

But one should at least try to avoid it.

Art is a mode of communication. Art with words, definitely. Poerty is about communicating ideas.

That being said, That doesn't mean a poem have to comunicate with everybody.

Failure to communicate - with the intended audience - is a failed poem.


that's my 2c
accoring to my 2c, i fail a lot

 

[bogusagain]

Art is a mode of communication. Art with words, definitely. Poerty is about communicating ideas.

But isn't conveying mood and emotion amongst other sensual experience communicating ideas? Surely one uses poetry as opposed to prose because one wants to convey more than intellectual ideas which is why image and metaphor are used so often. But how can you be so precise when you are conveying mood and emotion when the reader brings their own mood and emotion to a piece which will alter the alchemy of a poem. I can read a science article or a news report in a good mood or a bad mood and I can extract the information to no detriment to what is being communicated but a poem will change every time I read it depending on many indeterminate things.

 

[Liar]

But isn't conveying mood and emotion amongst other sensual experience communicating ideas? Surely one uses poetry as opposed to prose because one wants to convey more than intellectual ideas which is why image and metaphor are used so often. But how can you be so precise when you are conveying mood and emotion when the reader brings their own mood and emotion to a piece which will alter the alchemy of a poem. I can read a science article or a news report in a good mood or a bad mood and I can extract the information to no detriment to what is being communicated but a poem will change every time I read it depending on many indeterminate things.

Definitely. Ideas are not some dusty old intellectual thesis or phisosophical axiom. Or well, it can be that too. Ideas are you're unique perspective on life, the universe and everything. Everyone's got them, about big things and little things.

For instance: I hate waiting for my water heater when I want a cup of tea. It's totally irrational that I get stressed over the loss of time, because I can waste hours doing absolutely nothing and not think twice about it. But there's juast this very distinct... feeling that I attach to that moment. One that I can't just describe. "Like stress, but not, but kind of, but not." And definitely not justify. That unworded little tidbit of my perspective on life is an idea. Nobody else have it. In order to make someone else understand it, let there be poetry.

(Ok, I'm gonna totally write that one.)

A poet is not telling people about emotions. (Or at least they shouldn't be.) That would only evoke detached sympathy fromt the reader, but no real understanding. A poet is selling the idea of those emotions. By showing how they manifest themselves in unexpected ways, by finding the most apt metaphor, cadence and rhythm and prosody in the text and lines and presentation. So that they can relate to it and also feel. Not exactly the same thing. But close enough to understand.

Good prose can do this too, by the way, but to a lesser degree.

 

[Angeline]

Is there anything that has absolute meaning? Maybe in numbers, certainly not in words. Perception is so wrappped up with our own emotions and needs that may not be met at the time of reading. Like Bogus said, any number of factors can come into play as a reader engaged with a piece of text, never mind whether or not the author has been clear or not or achieved his or her own purposes (whatever those might be) with the text. It's out of the author's hands once someone else is reading it.

Of course there's bad "poetry" and there's also poetry we don't have the tools to understand. I read Shakespeare in high school and it could have been gobbledegook to me because I didn't have the tools. There were barriers with me: I didn't understand that language evolves and that there was a gulf of cultural and historic divide that I had to cross before I could start to get it. And even with modern writers, even with writers here there are gulfs that divide us from each other, some that likely can never be crossed. That's assuming we even want to try to cross them.

I can write something and think it's great, that I've really achieved something, then put it out there only to be told it is (erm at best) problematic. Then I write something else that I think is not very good or flawed in any numbers of ways that still need work and get almost nothing but praise. And who here has not experienced multiple comments from people we respect as readers that vary wildly? One person loves line or strophe X, but the next person thinks it's where the poem falls apart. So I, as a writer, keep my own intentions close and learn what I can from comments and try not to invest them with more than that. Otherwise I think my own expectations are skewed...or screwed.

 

[butters]

what Ang said, with a healthy chunk of what Annie said. and bogus, and ...


looks like it's all been said, really.

oh, but i do think a poem can be misread - particularly a simple write. but then Annie covered that, too.

 

[Epmd607]

One cannot write a sentence that cannot be misintepreted.

But one should at least try to avoid it.

Art is a mode of communication. Art with words, definitely. Poerty is about communicating ideas.

That being said, That doesn't mean a poem have to comunicate with everybody.

Failure to communicate - with the intended audience - is a failed poem.


that's my 2c
accoring to my 2c, i fail a lot

Poetry isn't neccesarily a mode of communication. Language is certainly a mode of communication, but poetry often obfuscates meaning under the banner or guise of art. Symbol/sound over conveying meaning, because there's always easier ways to say, "The sky is grey, I feel sad"

 

[Epmd607]

Poetry isn't neccesarily a mode of communication. Language is certainly a mode of communication, but poetry often obfuscates meaning under the banner or guise of art. Symbol/sound over conveying meaning, because there's always easier ways to say, "The sky is grey, I feel sad" but the poet chooses metaphor on top of metaphor. It is the mission of many poets to get the less intelligent readers to misread their work. Only a mason understands a mason in certain communicative contexts. And just for fun, what does it look like to convey meaning via poetry?

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Should language 'barrier ' (for want of a better word) come into this? What I write in English English as opposed to American English can come over completely different from what I intended. Obvious words like 'fag' and 'rubber' etc I have to think twice about using, but there must be plenty of other words that would make the majority of Litsters read me in the wrong way

 

[butters]

Should language 'barrier ' (for want of a better word) come into this? What I write in English English as opposed to American English can come over completely different from what I intended. Obvious words like 'fag' and 'rubber' etc I have to think twice about using, but there must be plenty of other words that would make the majority of Litsters read me in the wrong way

what's important, Annie, is that you are saying what your poem needs to say the way you, as its author, intend for it to be said; some consideration of the target audience is wise, but is not paramount. your loyalty has to be to the poem-in-creation, and never, ever, dumb-down what you write. ever.

got it?

 

[UnderYourSpell]

what's important, Annie, is that you are saying what your poem needs to say the way you, as its author, intend for it to be said; some consideration of the target audience is wise, but is not paramount. your loyalty has to be to the poem-in-creation, and never, ever, dumb-down what you write. ever.

got it?

Yes ma'am got it!

I love it when you're strict

 

[GuiltyPleasure]

Two cents.........

Can a poem be misinterpreted? Definitely and there's nothing wrong with that.

 

[bogusagain]

A poet is not telling people about emotions. (Or at least they shouldn't be.)

That's why I used the word 'convey'.

 

[annaswirls]

I agree that once a poem is put out there, it is no longer in the hands of the poet.

But....

I see a difference in the concept of misreading a poem and under-reading a poem.

Not everyone has the time or inclination to give a single poem the attention needed to understand what a poet is trying to say.

Guilty as charged myself.

If I love a poem, or even the poet- I will take my time, go back and read a again and again, until the subtle becomes more clear. If a poem can be absorbed in a quick pass through, then perhaps there is not much substance to absorb.

I do not like poetry in which I have to look up every obscure reference being made or wading through the muck of the purposefully opaque, that is not what I am referring to here.

Does the reader share responsibility if he or she does not understand or misreads a poem? Sometimes. Certainly. I have been guilty of this, of not giving a poem enough attention and totally missing the point, which I picked up very easily on the second go-round.

Clear to anyone with half a brain and more than half awake.

what is the origin of "just my 2 cents"

 

[theognis]

I agree that once a poem is put out there, it is no longer in the hands of the poet.

But....

I see a difference in the concept of misreading a poem and under-reading a poem.

Not everyone has the time or inclination to give a single poem the attention needed to understand what a poet is trying to say.

Guilty as charged myself.

If I love a poem, or even the poet- I will take my time, go back and read a again and again, until the subtle becomes more clear. If a poem can be absorbed in a quick pass through, then perhaps there is not much substance to absorb.

I do not like poetry in which I have to look up every obscure reference being made or wading through the muck of the purposefully opaque, that is not what I am referring to here.

Does the reader share responsibility if he or she does not understand or misreads a poem? Sometimes. Certainly. I have been guilty of this, of not giving a poem enough attention and totally missing the point, which I picked up very easily on the second go-round.

Clear to anyone with half a brain and more than half awake.

what is the origin of "just my 2 cents"

I've always thought "just my two cents" referred to the fact it used to cost only two cents to mail a letter. I just googled it and I see there are numerous ideas as to its origin.

 

[EroticOrogeny]

Is there anything that has absolute meaning? Maybe in numbers, certainly not in words. Perception is so wrappped up with our own emotions and needs that may not be met at the time of reading. Like Bogus said, any number of factors can come into play as a reader engaged with a piece of text, never mind whether or not the author has been clear or not or achieved his or her own purposes (whatever those might be) with the text. It's out of the author's hands once someone else is reading it.

Of course there's bad "poetry" and there's also poetry we don't have the tools to understand. I read Shakespeare in high school and it could have been gobbledegook to me because I didn't have the tools. There were barriers with me: I didn't understand that language evolves and that there was a gulf of cultural and historic divide that I had to cross before I could start to get it. And even with modern writers, even with writers here there are gulfs that divide us from each other, some that likely can never be crossed. That's assuming we even want to try to cross them.

I can write something and think it's great, that I've really achieved something, then put it out there only to be told it is (erm at best) problematic. Then I write something else that I think is not very good or flawed in any numbers of ways that still need work and get almost nothing but praise. And who here has not experienced multiple comments from people we respect as readers that vary wildly? One person loves line or strophe X, but the next person thinks it's where the poem falls apart. So I, as a writer, keep my own intentions close and learn what I can from comments and try not to invest them with more than that. Otherwise I think my own expectations are skewed...or screwed.

Numbers require a context, much like words.

7
7 what ? 7 why ? ...

To pick a perhaps trivial example of numbers and context, consider a computer program. Not its expression in a programming language like Fortran or C, but the actual instructions the code is compiled to. It runs fine on a PC, but does nothing useful on a Mac.

And as others have said, misreading can be the fault of the reader or the writer (or both)

 

[Liar]

Poetry isn't neccesarily a mode of communication. Language is certainly a mode of communication, but poetry often obfuscates meaning under the banner or guise of art. Symbol/sound over conveying meaning, because there's always easier ways to say, "The sky is grey, I feel sad" but the poet chooses metaphor on top of metaphor.

Hmm. I don't believe in art for art's sake.

"The sky is grey, I feel sad" is an easy way to say it. But it doesn't say much. Sad how? Grey how? What's the connection between grey and sad? This is where art (poetry or other) comes in. If you tell me you are sad, I know you are sad. But there are, roughly 54 trillion types of sadness, and maybe words for five of them. If you show it to me in art form, I also have a chance to understand your sadness. Not understand it perfectly, but better.

It is the mission of many poets to get the less intelligent readers to misread their work. Only a mason understands a mason in certain communicative contexts.

Well, like I said. Everything is not for everybody. One writes for one's intended audience - those one wishes to understand it. And one makes them get it. Even if it's an audience of one.

That being said, if one does so in public, and intentionally dangles obscure poetry in front of people and imply "ha ha, look at me, I'm so clever that you cretins don't understand a word", one might be right about that. But one is also a bit of a douchebag.

Now, sometimes it looks like obfuscation, but it really isn't. I use metaphors and references that are familiar to me, so that my poems say what I want them to say when I read them. Then I make them very public, by putting them online where every Tom, Dick and Harry can read them. If Tom gets it, I'm happy. If Dick enjoys the rhyme but miss the point, that's fine too, at least I entertained. And if Harry looks it over and says "Huh? Whatever", I'll have to just accept that. You can't win 'em all.

And just for fun, what does it look like to convey meaning via poetry?

Just for fun eh? hey, that's the BIG one. We could have a whiole new thread just about that. Or a whole new forum.

 

[twelveoone]

as always PG, there are always more than one way, of looking, finding, whatever, trick usually is a sliding scale.
i.e. there are laws, there are lawyers, they often are not right. It is interpretation.
the laws are different in every state, country, even international jurisdiction
even in a case where nobody "gets it" it may either that the guy is whacked or ahead of the curve; then you have to look further, away from assumptions, conventions.

These are all absolutes, you are asking. Without even throwing in time as a constant.
I suppose for a perfect example yes if is possible to write a poem that communicates exactly what the author intends, if it is read by his identical twin, right after he wrote it.

So none of it matters.
As stated previously, there are infinite ways to write poetry, infinite ways to read it. I sometimes use a triangulation method.
IF Person A thinks something is "wonderfull", that I don't respect.
and Person B doesn't who writes a different type doesn't
and Person C doesn't who yet writes a different type doesn't
and I didn't think it was wonderful either, I'm quite comfortable with my opinion, i.e I'll move it up to near 100% up from my usual 50%
This is based on a true experience regarding New Poems, a few years back.

And poets play games. Ever read Frost, and feel like you're getting there, but not quite. He was Very Good at that. And if questioned would sometimes deny.
He was very good at fucking up the metre also BTW.

 

[twelveoone]

If a reader forms an internally consistent reading of a poem that does not map onto the author's original intent, is the reader "wrong" or "incorrect" in that reading?

Why is Greenland bigger than Australia?

 

[Epmd607]

I remember reading "two roads diverged in a wood and I took the one less traveled" poem in 7th grade and I read it literally as some sort of pastoral poem. Up til then poems were silly rhymes without anything hidden beneath the surface then my English teacher told us what the poem was about. I guess it didn't help that we were walking trails at a county park when given the poem to read. So say Frost never spoke of his two roads poem. Wouldn't my youthful man takes new path reading be as accurate as the life's choices full of heavy symbol reading? We weren't initiated into artful symbolism until junior high; was that late, just the right time?