After continuing to read Culler’s  “What is Literature and Does it Matter?”, his explanation of Literature as Fiction really stuck with me. In my mind this angle of literature is the and easiest to see and explain. Culler explains that “the relation of what speakers say to what authors think is always a matter of interpretation”. Despite the fact that an author may have a specific scenario in mind, the fact that the words used to describe said scenario may be vague can cause the reader to modify what the scenario is. For example, Culler references, giving your friend specific directions (meet me at this café, at this time tomorrow for dinner) as opposed to the simplicity of “Inviting a Friend to Supper”, the title of a poem written by Ben Jonson. The first statement, allows the reader to understand specific “spatial and temporal referents”, whereas the title that Jonson chose gives some ambiguity and control to the readers imagination. There are many works of fiction that contain many references to our world, as many things can only be explained analogously. Despite that, not everyone may interpret the same words the same way, not because of ambiguity, but because of their understanding of the world. People  of different cultures/heritages, genders, social classes or raised in different eras can read the same text and not have the same understanding. As well as the aspect of reading something during different stages in your life. A book you are forced to read in college as an adolescent may become much more meaningful or powerful if you choose to read it again at a different point in time. All of this is encompassed as the angle of literature as fiction.

This entry is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.