Reading Ron and the question of Authorial Intent

[Dicentra spectabilis]

No: HPFGUIDX 106160

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "mayeaux45" <mayeaux45 at y...> wrote:
> 
> Let's stick to canon "Ron" and not fanfic "Ron"!  IMO it seemed as 
> if you were running off at the mouth when you said 'I don't care 
> anymore what JKR has to say about Ron, not since she
> proved that she's prejudiced against him'...Are you mad?  It's her 
> character.   

I'm going to refer back to an ancient post by Elkins (34802) which
addresses the question of how much control an author has over her
story and the degree to which the readers can come up with different,
yet valid, interpretations of it.

Thus spake Elkins:

*****

So. In message (33930), Rebecca wrote:

> I'd like to make a brief preamble distinguishing between an
> interpretation based on canonical evidence and one based on ones
> own experience, imagination, influence from other writers and real
> world probability. Now if anyone tries to write a fanfic, which was
> Elkins original example, they must draw on all these things.

I would argue that _all_ readers both can and must draw on all of
these things. To do so is intrinsic to the very act of reading a
text. Fiction in particular relies upon the reader's ability to make
sense of the story through extrapolation from real life, and through
inferences drawn from that extrapolation. Should the reader fail to
do this, or should her inferences diverge too widely from what the
author had anticipated (as might happen, for example, due to vast
cultural differences between reader and author), then the story is
likely to fall flat: it will not make sense to the reader, or it will
fail to engage on any real emotional level.

(Yes. This _is_ painfully basic. But please bear with me: I really
am trying to go somewhere with this.)

Non-canonical sources such as the reader's real life experience,
imagination, and understanding of probability, politics, and literary
or genre convention are not the enemies of Authorial Intent. They
are very important _vehicles_ of Authorial Intent.

But the Author does not get to steer those vehicles.

We do. And We Are Legion.

This is relevant because, as the endless quality of some of the
debates here demonstrate (just how many students _are_ there at
Hogwarts, anyway?), canon itself is often ambiguous or self-
contradictory, open to many equally-plausible interpretations; on
many issues, it is simply silent. When this happens, then readers
must turn to non-canonical considerations -- themselves often
ambiguous or self-contradictory -- to decide which of competing
potential canonical 'truths' they wish to privilege. Because there
are so many non-canonical factors open for consideration, however,
and because many of these are intensely personal, no two readers are
likely to construct 'canonical suggestion' in precisely the same
way. Some disagreement over what is in fact suggested or implied by
the text is unavoidable.

It is, I believe, this very quality of fiction -- the fact that it
not only invites, but actively _demands_ that the reader insert his
own experiences into the text -- that makes the act of reading
fiction so highly engaging, and so deeply immersive. Fiction demands
a great deal of active participation from the reader. It is
intensely personal. The hazy indeterminate space which lies between
What the Author Tells Us and That Which Canon Does Not Prohibit is
the space in which the story lives and breathes. It is the space in
which not only fanfic, but also reader speculation -- such as gets
discussed on this list -- and to some extent reader engagement itself
resides.

Canonical "suggestion" lives within this space.

But so do reader imagination...and reader desire.

*****

There is much more to the post (in fact, it's divided into two posts),
and I suggest reading them if you'd like.  

The point is that no text is so *closed* that it allows only one
interpretation.  Not one of us can really say what Ron *is* with 100%
accuracy.  I doubt that even Ron himself could tell you, much less JKR.  

Furthermore, the better the work of art, the more aspects of it are
not visible to the author herself -- and yet they are there for those
with eyes to see.  I've experienced this myself when people have seen
patterns in things I've written that I never intended to put there,
but I never noticed them until someone pointed them out.

For a demonstration of how this works in the Potterverse, I'll refer
back to one of my own essays about Ron (51934, 51935).  IIRC, JKR said
that Ron has jealousy problems in GoF.  I maintain that he doesn't.


I suggest that when discussing our differing interpretations of
characters, we recognize that unless someone makes a totally
anti-canonical assertion ("Ron is a robot"), it's not fair to say
"you've got the wrong Ron."  See also Elkins' post 51178, "Re: You're
reading the wrong book."

Because if there were only one way to interpret the Potterverse, HPfGU
wouldn't have a reason to exist.

--Dicentra, whose interpretation of Ron is *really* the right one :D