C H A P T E R 4
Interpretation
One of the things we mean by calling a piece of writing ‘literary’ is
that it is not tied to a specific context. It is true that all literary
works arise from particular conditions. Jane Austen’s novels spring
from the world of the English landed gentry of the eighteenth and
early nineteenth century, while Paradise Lost has as its backdrop
the English Civil War and its aftermath. Yet though these works
emerge from such contexts, their meaning is not confined to them.
Consider the difference between a poem and a manual for assem-
bling a table lamp. The manual makes sense only in a specific,
practical situation. Unless we are really starved for inspiration, we
do not generally turn to it in order to reflect on the mystery of birth
or the frailty of humankind. A poem, by contrast, can still be mean-
ingful outside its original context, and may alter its meaning as it
moves from one place or time to another. Like a baby, it is detached
from its author as soon as it enters the world. All literary works are
orphaned at birth. Rather as our parents do not continue to govern
our lives as we grow up, so the poet cannot determine the situa-
tions in which his or her work will be read, or what sense we are
likely to make of it.