Against Interpretation

In schools today, it is not uncommon for teachers to ask their students to “dig deeper” into the text that they are reading. In fact, every high school English course that I took part in involved interpreting the texts the way that I saw it. After reading Poetics by Aristotle and Against Interpretation by Susan Sontag, I now realize that it is not always important to find the hidden meaning of texts. As a student, it is necessary to look closely at the texts, however it is not always necessary to find incantations while interpreting them. Analyzing texts is a very important way for people to understand literature and to develop as students. Without a close study of different works, it would be impossible to really learn what goes into creating a well-written piece. Last semester, our English class focused on the elements and style that created good writing. I believe that by reading the works we did, I was able to grasp the concepts and apply them to my writings. However, the readings did not come easily. It often took two, three, or even four readings to fully understand what went into its creation. With those careful contemplations, I was able to become a more effective writer. My problems came when I started to search for incantations in the texts. An incantation is defined as “a series of words said as a magical spell or charm,” and they often cause many problems for students. Last semester, I was enrolled in an introduction to philosophy class. It was a fairly easy course, and looking back now I can see how relevant it was to the readings that we have done so far. In class, we would read ancient philosophy covering many topics. Often times it was very hard to comprehend, and what I thought the author was saying turned out to be completely different than what he actually implied. My problem was that I was always searching for incantations, and this over-analyzing caused me to lose track of what the author was trying to tell me. This is exactly was