I don't care much for symbolism
Looking at movies and books like a sleuth, looking for correlations, is not my thing. That is a very cerebral way to look at stories. I prefer letting them take over me with all they got, symbolism included but mixed with everything else. When it comes to fiction and magic, I wanna watch the trick, not figure it out. Much like magic tricks, I firmly believe that, when dissected, fiction tends to die.
By that I mean that it becomes less appealing.
I'm a little annoyed by the view that, if you don't look for "hidden meanings", your engagement with art is of a lesser quality. As if there was only one acceptable and elevated way to read things.
Much to my delight, people have built interesting symbolism from my writing that I never intended to create. I don't write symbolism, but I tend to use elements that are universal, well-known, and easy to interpret as symbols.
I'm not sure why I wrote this. I just wanted to organize my thoughts about this subject in a place where people are nice.
I guess that is it.
What do you think of symbolism?
I’m always reminded of Steven King’s approach to symbolism. He writes without any conscious regard for symbolism, but then after he is done he reads his work and looks for the symbolism and then he goes back through and emphasizes what he found in its nascent form. In that way, it isn’t too forced but it still adds depth to the writing.
That's a good idea. Young Brazilian writers are often obsessed with symbolism. But they start with symbolism so it doesn't feel organic.
There is an Akira Kurosawa quote that I quite like. In discussion with Donald Richie (quoted from Akira Kurosawa: Interviews, p. 8), he says: “If I could have said it in words, I would have—then I wouldn’t have needed to make the picture.” Elsewhere (same book, p. 185), he has also expressed that "If I had a message or thesis to express, I could do so in words, and it would be much cheaper and quicker to paint those words on a sign and carry it around for all to see."
The way I see it, in a good piece of art, representation of things through non-literal constructs like symbols and metaphors is not used to hide things or to make puzzles out of them, but to convey complex ideas and feelings that would be difficult, time-consuming, or perhaps impossible to just plainly “say in words”.
If you have ever read philosophers like Hegel, Heidegger, Kant or their kind, you have probably learnt how extremely difficult it is to put across even the simplest ideas, if you aim for unambiguous precision. Some have fared better at it than others.
But metaphor and symbolism is not restricted to just artistic expression. Much of our day-to-day human language actually operates in a very similar manner. In your post, for example, you write that “when dissected, fiction tends to die”, but as fiction is not a living being, it cannot really die. You talk about an “elevated way to read things”, but you surely do not mean putting the reading material to a higher vertical position. According to you, “people have built interesting symbolism from [your] writing”, but again, I doubt anything is literally built in the sense of physical construction.
I’m not criticising your choice of words, of course. There is nothing wrong with them. Instead, I’m pointing out that this is how language fundamentally operates. The more abstract the topic we discuss, the more language needs to lean on metaphorical mappings, borrowing the vocabulary of one concept to discuss another. Through this process, inanimate ideas can be seen as living things that live and die (or “thrive”, “flourish”, “suffer”, etc.), the concept of vertical position can mark success or abundance (prices “rise”, you can take the “higher ground”, when you are not doing too well you are “down”, perhaps even “depressed”, etc.), and abstract ideas can be a little like buildings (you “construct” arguments, they have “foundations” and if those are “weak”, the whole argument can become “shaky”, so you need good “supports”, etc.).
Some argue that this is not just a linguistic feature, but a more fundamentally cognitive one. If this sounds interesting, check out the theory of conceptual metaphor.
In any case, I would take the view that when good art uses metaphor or symbolism, it does so by using a somewhat similar process in an attempt to grasp and represent thoughts or feelings that go just beyond the capability of language or logic. It gives us access to something that we cannot (yet) quite talk about or rationalise, but which we can understand and relate to through other means of representation. And if done successfully, that access can become more easily available to us, perhaps even develop into a common metaphorical mapping in the same way language has mapped things between domains and standardised many such borrowings. If that happens, others can later build on top of the bridges that an artist built and continue to reach even further towards the unknown through processes like reuse, reference, reinterpretation and recalibration, whether in a modern, postmodern, metamodern or whatever manner.
I know that this is a very romantic, somewhat anti-rationalistic, perhaps even mystical take on the role of arts, and I don’t claim it to be the only valid use for things like symbolism and metaphor. Sometimes it’s fun to just try to crack open a narrative puzzle, too. But in many ways, I do agree with you that one’s raw visceral response is often more important, or at least more immediate, than the need to logically puzzle out details. And I totally share the view that @CannibalisticApple expressed in another response here -- pieces that work on multiple levels are also my favourite. Which reminds me that the works of Akira Kurosawa, with whose thoughts I kicked off this comment, tend to do exactly that, managing to be both hugely entertaining as well as full of social, philosophical and personal commentary.
That said, I also think that it’s valuable to self-reflect, ask the question why something affects you in some way, and why something else doesn’t. Perhaps vital even, if you want to develop as an artist or just understand yourself better. So in that sense, trying to figure out the magic trick can be quite useful.
Thank you for the answer!
Perhaps I will give you a complete response later. But it did clarify this:
In the following line:
The meaning you use for the word "symbolism" seems broader than I have. I'll probably comment on that later.
I think that symbolism is an extension of the human need to tell stories. A person reading something you've written is creating an internal narrative about the experience of reading your piece, latching onto mental shortcuts and existing known story patterns to ease the mental load of understanding your writing. Anything is a symbol. Whether you intentionally include them or not, people will read into your words more than you said.
Yes. You're right. Also, I found it delightful when someone made symbolism out of me. That is not something I seek as a reader myself, but symbolism can be a great thing.
One of the most frustrating parts of my various literature classes in university was the insistence that every single word on the page was symbolic. We would have discussions on why we thought that the author told us that the walls were a color, and what the hidden symbolic meaning might be.
One time we were looking at the first chapter of The Hobbit and there was an at-length discussion on what the author could have possibly meant by this:
The professor was insistent that there was more to these sentences than telling us that the hobbit was well off, liked visitors, and lived comfortably in an underground home.
I dunno, I thought maybe a children's book might do something a little bit silly and whimsical in door design because it is a children's book.
Nah. Not buying it. If the goal was to do that symbolically then he wouldn't dedicate the next page and a half to directly explaining how the Bagginses never do anything interesting or out of the ordinary.
From what I know, Tolkien wrote that sentence totally randomly on a blank page while grading assignments. He had no clue what a hobbit was at that point, it just randomly popped into his head. That whole opening was probably him just writing whatever popped into his head while figuring out what a hobbit was. So trying to find symbolism in that is pretty funny to me.
I used to get so pissed off when teachers would posit those kinds of connections with no further supporting context elsewhere in the work. Like, bro, how am I supposed to take you seriously? This widespread college lit idea that any interpretation is valid if you can support it is probably responsible for the ridiculous glut of bad media analysis on Youtube, which doesn't even make sense because these opinions often don't stand up to the most rudimentary examination. I don't have much patience for it.
In painting, there is the concept of edge control. There are generally three buckets of edges: a hard edge, a soft edge, and a lost edge. In traditional painting, hard edges are used sparingly. Hard edges have no guesswork for the mind - they are definite, they give all the solutions. Useful for subjects, but exhausting when too present. Soft edges describe the gradations of form. Lost edges are what tell the story of the painting - the implication of an edge, without ever defining an edge. They are important because it allows an artist the grace to represent a world too complex to mark down on paper, for the artist to imply detail and have the audiences mind fill in the rest from their own visual bank. It’s the tree that’s actually speckles of light and dark green, that represents a vast forest no painter has the time to individually draw.
Metaphorical storytelling is a way to have soft and lost edges in a narrative. When the plot simply states something, there’s no wiggle room, no space for the uncertainty of real life. When it is implied through metaphor, now the final result is colored by experiences of the reader, and there’s space for the reader to use their own experiences to fill in gap. It’s a way to allow readers to have experiences they otherwise would not be able to have, because no author is omnipotent.
Is that symbolism, or is that just leaving detail to the readers imagination?
I remember in the empire strikes back, Lando tells Han that the millennium falcon used to be his ship. Neither of them expanded on this and it let you as a viewer imagine this wild and rich history between the two of them, colored by your own experiences (I guess Disney later walked everyone through this story letter by letter eventually, but that's besides the point). That's not really symbolism though, it's just the implication of a richer world.
Symbolism and metaphor are a few of a variety of literary techniques that can be used to accomplish what's being described above. They're tools in a toolbox.
That is true about the multiple experiences. That is possible without symbolism but I understand the point that symbolism is one way to achieve that.
I have seen quite a few young writers invest so heavily in symbolism that a failure in the combination of the symbols can demolish their entire project. Perhaps they should work on creating multiple "edges" as you mention.
I find this is less true if you presume one simple thing: The author is a genius, and you are merely trying to comprehend it. When taken through that best-intentions lens, things hold up better.
I do think the best fiction does hold up to detailed analysis. If a high school class can't dissect a work by discussing themes, topics, symbolism, and ponder the intentions behind the author's work....it's probably not that coherent.
These things don't have to be intentional by the author. The symbolism will often be applied through the lens of the reader.
Part of the reason I love Animal Farm so much is that an communist and a capitalist can reasonably debate about whether it is a critique of Capitalism or Communism, and they would both be right. Orson Wells was an atheist, antifascist, democratic socialist. Knowing that about tne author, we can see it was really a critique of all patriarchal societies.
@unkz mentioned Stephen King, and a similiar thing applies. Now that we can see a lot more of his personal beliefs very publicly, you can go back and read some of his older works and see the characters and themes can have a very different vibe. If King was instead an awful MAGA idiot, it would paint the picture very differently.
Heinlien's work is a lot less fun when you learn that the thick, heavyhanded militarism of Starship Troopers is not a social critique, but an advocacy. It definitely distorted how I felt about my favorite novel The Moon Is a Harsh Mistresa.
Re: starship troopers. I'm usually annoying about movies staying true to source, but this is one exception where I'm so delighted by the film, the book is dead to me. Starship Troopers made me the viewer I am today.
Psst: I think you meant George Orwell, not Orson Wells.
Yuuppp. 3AM brain strikes again.
I once wrote a poem, intending to tell a story in a rhyming structure. It was a personal story with powerful emotions from my life history. Rereading that poem the next day, there was strong symbolism that I never intended but it fit the poem and made it more powerful. The writing process can be cool like that.
I can see where you're coming from. However, I disagree with you in the specifics, as well as the characterization itself.
I would consider myself as someone who looks for symbolism and deeper meaning in the media I consume. However, I don't really approach this sort of task in the way you describe. Instead of trying to pick media apart as I experience it, I try to approach it on its own terms and enjoy the ride as far as it goes - which seems very much in line with how you prefer to experience media.
The symbolism and deeper meanings come after the fact and come naturally, when I think back to some of the things I experienced. But even then, I don't approach it like a scientist, looking for some deeper objective truth backed up with facts and logic. My interpretations are personal, and I also don't presume to think that they are the interpretations intended by the author, or equally valid for anybody else who experiences it.
This process doesn't happen with all media, but I would say that my favorite stories are those that I keep revisiting over time, spurred by these contemplations.
This reminds me to when I was reading game of thrones at the same time as a friend. I remember that every time a prophecy was mentioned, I'd just read through it. Then my friend would ask me, did you see that x character is going to do/be x thing? I'd answer: What? When did it say that? Maybe I'm just bad at interpreting, but I just wanted to read, I didn't want to have to do puzzles.
I've never been much one for symbolism either. I can appreciate it, and really admire writers who manage to add multiple layers of symbolism, but I'm into a more direct and literal approach. I do love foreshadowing and complex narratives, but those are still fairly direct. So, symbolism can be hit or miss for me (and "miss" is literal).
I think the best approach is when it can be caught after completing a work once. I saw a note by a mangaka that their first priority when writing is entertainment, and that defines my own writing philosophy. I don't want readers to have to trudge through works to enjoy them, and that includes having to analyze every scene for symbolism or overly flowery language just to understand what's happening. Catching symbolism and foreshadowing on a reread or rewatch can be great and make it even more enjoyable, but for the first time? It should just be enjoyable for everyone.
I see both the sentiment you share in your post and the opposite of it fairly frequently online, especially lately. "it's not that deep" vs "it IS that deep" is a really weird discussion to me, because to me, analyzing literature is something you do purely for yourself, as a way of enjoying said piece of work.
I think the issue you're describing is prescriptivism - the idea that a work has any "correct" way to enjoy it. Someone else mentioned lit classes in school, and I had the same experience of having to learn a work's well defined themes and meaning, all without having to put much thought into it myself. This issue was only accentuated when we had to go through a huge curriculum in a very limited amount of time, so we'd only actually have to read a select few books/novels, only learning a bit of history/context for the rest before diving into themes, symbolism etc. Now that i read (and occasionally analyze) what i want at my own pace, i find it really enjoyable and rewarding.
I don't write myself, but i would think this is a fairly universal experience among authors. If your story leaves any room for interpretation at all, you'll have people interpreting your work in a way that you personally didn't intend. imo this is a great thing, there are a lot of stories from a completely different situation or time period that i can still personally relate to, even though the direct, word for word situation would never happen to me or anyone i knew.
In the same vein, i don't think what the author intended when writing the book matters much at all. Every throwaway line or bit of scene setting you add can mean a lot to someone reading the book, and telling them that the curtains ARE just blue, or that the position of a doorknob is just a bit of whimsical set dressing, is the different side of the same coin as saying that you HAVE to hyper-scrutinize a book or you're a fake fan, shallow, a tourist, or what have you.
Personally, i like symbolism, similes, metaphors etc. a lot, i think a story straight up trying to tell you what its themes are and how you should read it is really lame.
My favorite kind of art is when something is presented which can be interpreted in multiple equally valid ways. To this end, symbolism can be a great addition to art. The ability of one thing to represent another idea contributes to an artists capacity to layer multiple different meanings into the same scene or act.
Conversely, though, I dislike art that is not intended to be interpreted in any more than one singular way. Art that has a definitive point and is just some thinly veiled lecture with a veneer of storytelling or aesthetic. As such I dont enjoy symbolism when it is heavy handed and you are supposed to do a "find and replace" in your head with whatever the obvious thing you are supposed to substitute.
Presumptive interpretation of literature, or really any media on the whole, has been a pet peeve of mine for a looooooooong time and I try to maintain a very healthy level of skepticism. The human mind is complex and an author's subconscious can bleed into their work without conscious intent, but I think you have to be careful about imputing motivations to people whose minds' inner workings you are not privy to. It's quite like relationships; a friend of mine told me once that the biggest thing she learned about romance is that no matter what, you have to stay on your side of the fence. As soon as you start telling yourself that they did this to you because you just know they thought xyz, you're in trouble. You can go by words and actions, but you can never know someone else's logic.
Having said that, pretty much every reply in this thread has good perspective worth considering, both for and against the search for symbolism.
I think the skill and mastery of it all is using enough familiar symbols/cues to allow the reader to relate while also including the references and symbolism which make your viewpoint unique. The best artists can seduce the reader into discovering more, or let them enjoy it as is without sacrificing on quality. And it's not always the end of the world if some things are not immediately recognizable... as @stu2b50 mentioned, fuzzy edges are useful.
There's a similar phenomenon when it comes to interpreting hip-hop lyrics. As rap music has grown to become the new pop, more and more people unfamiliar with a lot of the context from which the music derived attempted to decipher codes, slang, and references unfamiliar to them... so you end up with Genius.com, which is essentially Wikipedia for lyrics - just because it's on there does not mean it's true, it's just someone's opinion. I can't tell you how many ridiculous song transcriptions and lyric interpretations I've seen on there over the years, but the unsuspecting user takes it as authoritative.
Lupe Fiasco, who is at the very least one of the top three greatest lyricists/writers in hip-hop history by any reasonable metric, even released a music video poking fun at his own fanbase for the depth of the rabbit holes you can go down if you don't recognize where to stop: Precious Things.
To be fair, Lupe is an extreme exception; he can pack so many double-, triple-, and quadruple-entendres into his music to layer levels of meaning and meta-narrative, and draw references from such ridiculously disparate sources/topics, that there's almost always an angle you haven't considered. There's an oft-quoted meme among his fans - "It's hard to be a Lupe fan, go to Harvard to be a Lupe stan."