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Old 03.28.2006, 03:54 PM   #20
truncated
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Quote:
Originally Posted by noumenal
I rarely look for extra-musical meaning in SY. For me, I look for meaning in the music and not in "what it's about". This is part of the reason that I don't pay much attention to their lyrics.

Honestly, I don't think it matters much what SY meant by a song. What matters is what it means to you. In other words, what it means to SY isn't neccesarily the authoritative meaning.

This type of thing is discussed quite a lot in literary theory circles. I guess when you guys are dissecting the lyrics, you're doing literary criticism. I prefer to stay away from that and keep my opinions strictly about the music.

A book that would be enlightening, maybe (I haven't read it, but I mean to. I have friends that have read it, and like it):

Is There a Text in this Class? : The Authority of Interpretive Communities by Stanley Fish

Apparently, he talks in this book about exactly what Trunky is saying. The SY board is an "interpretive community"? I'm going to read this soon.

Ah, literary theory...

My college days also came to mind with this topic. I will make the blanket statement that English majors are INSUFFERABLE.

You'd sit through class after class, listening to some goatee-sporting jackass elucidate his enlightened theory about homoeroticism in Whitman's poetry. Thanks for sharing, but

1. Duh.
2. Just because the guy wrote "I Sing the Body Electric" doesn't mean he tries to cop a feel every time he goes to the harrier's.

My point being, the construct of ANY media is highly subject to interpretation, and you could literally endlessly dissect a song.

I agree, noumenal, that if any 'significance' is to be had from a song, it makes more sense for it to be personal, rather than a regurgitation of what it meant to the writer.

I think it's ironically amusing that so many literary figures recognized this tendency to extrapolate unnecessarily on their work, and began writing tongue-in-cheek bits just to watch their readers flail in an academic cesspool of bullshit.

Sometimes, things just are what they are.

As John Cage said, "I have nothing to say and I am saying it and that is poetry."

What's my underlying point? I'm not entirely sure. Maybe that John Donne is gazing down upon the millions of people salivating over his poetry, toking up a fattie, and thinking, "That poem's three lines long! Get a life, jackasses."
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