Re: Which book sounds most compelling?

On Apr 20, 6:20 pm, Bill Swears <wswe...@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Nicky wrote:
On Apr 20, 11:47 am, Nobody <n...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
 Words are after all no more than signals that we must
decipher.

Odd attitude for a writer.

Nicky

I think James has already adequately proved that you can mean one thing
by a word, and then turn around and claim a different meaning.  at the
least, you can be aware of all the subtexts people are going to get from
your word choice, and deny that you meant any of those when asked, and
that is a perfectly fair game.

But Nob's comment about words being signs that readers must decipher is
straight up literary crit ala Jaques Lacan and several other French
Structuralists.  Nothing new there.  I can copy you a one page treatise
from one of the grad students in my program, if you wish.  Put you right
to sleep, that will.

It's OK I did philosophical logic for a while back in the day, but I
still think its an unhelpful outlook for a writer.
Words are about music as well as about symbol, about subtlety and
shades of grey. You can expand the meaning of symbol or reduce the
meanings of words but either way it seems an odd approach for a writer.
.

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