Hidden Meanings

[Kureous]

With so much out there about the "hidden meanings" in X or Y, I've started to wonder: Are there really so many hidden meanings in shows, series, and literary works, or are people just reading too much into them? I'd like to hear your opinions

 

[Cipiteca396]

I wouldn't say they're reading too much into them. Well, assigning meaning to something that wasn't meant to be there is probably bad, since it puts words in the author's mouth; but coming up with your own meaning for a story is fine. It's just icing if it was intended rather than hidden.

 

[AmeronWerschrux]

I think there are a lot of hidden meanings as I've found especially in Japanese works due to how kanji work. It's pretty interesting like in finding out names' meanings. They're like puns

With so much out there about the "hidden meanings" in X or Y, I've started to wonder: Are there really so many hidden meanings in shows, series, and literary works, or are people just reading too much into them? I'd like to hear your opinions

 

[Jocelyn_Uasal]

I wouldn't say they're reading too much into them. Well, assigning meaning to something that wasn't meant to be there is probably bad, since it puts words in the author's mouth; but coming up with your own meaning for a story is fine. It's just icing if it was intended rather than hidden.

Assigning meaning to something that might've not had an intended meaning is all English majors ever do. Thats like, what literary analysis is.

I've heard tons of academics say that "the author didn't know what they wrote, and their opinion doesn't matter." I'd say its even the general consensus within English major nerds, that an author and their works become completely distinct.

I don't think there's often "hidden meaning" unless it is like a mystery novel. Most of what you might consider hidden meanings are things that someone doing an analysis would pick up on, that might've not been intended by the author yet makes a significant thematic impression regardless. Like, maybe an author unintentionally keeps mentioning a specific color or flower, and the meanings of those things point to what happens at the end of the book.

Just because he didn't mean to do that, doesn't make it any less meaningful. Authors really do be just throwing sht at the wall, academics then later get to piece it together based on the writers prejudices and preconceived ideals that are not shared by the general reader.

 

[Hans.Trondheim]

With so much out there about the "hidden meanings" in X or Y, I've started to wonder: Are there really so many hidden meanings in shows, series, and literary works, or are people just reading too much into them? I'd like to hear your opinions

Sometimes, yes. A lot of social commentary novels do this.

But there are works of authors where it was written that the door is blue. And the writer meant that the door is simply fucking blue.

Oh, and yeah, I'm not the usual literature teacher. ??

 

[Jocelyn_Uasal]

And the writer meant that the door is simply fucking blue.

9 times out of 10 it really is just blue ?? I think the fun part is figuring out why though!

 

[Hans.Trondheim]

9 times out of 10 it really is just blue ?? I think the fun part is figuring out why though!

Heh, if future teachers would try to figure out why my characters are named as they are, they would be bamboozled to know that I name my characters based on what stuck, rather than deep meanings.

Literature can be read between the lines, and also serve as pure entertainment, without the need to think too deep about it.

 

[Jocelyn_Uasal]

Heh, if future teachers would try to figure out why my characters are named as they are, they would be bamboozled to know that I name my characters based on what stuck, rather than deep meanings.

Literature can be read between the lines, and also serve as pure entertainment, without the need to think too deep about it.

Well you say that its just what stuck, but a good literary analyzer will dig down deep and try to figure out why those names stuck for you specifically, and try to use your background as an individual to find the answer!

So it's all 100% just "idk but heres my fan theory" and I love that! Like word sherlock

 

[TroubleFait]

It's like those Game Theory YouTube videos. Is the theory actually onto something? Probably not. Is it fun anyway? Hell yeah!

There are works were there's undeniably a deeper meaning though. Sometime it's not interesting and the authors did an asspull (Matrix), sometime it's actually great and adds much to the story, but it was kept so vague the we only understand it years later (Star Wars).

 

[Hans.Trondheim]

Well you say that its just what stuck, but a good literary analyzer will dig down deep and try to figure out why those names stuck for you specifically, and try to use your background as an individual to find the answer!

So it's all 100% just "idk but heres my fan theory" and I love that! Like word sherlock

I'm crazy and spontaneous, that's it. ??

Also, fan theories/literary discussions are fun, until the ACKSHUALLY guys come in. That's where the talk will devolve into a 'I'm the smartest' deathmatch.

 

[Deleted member 41774]

I have the perfect meme for this--

 

[BearlyAlive]

Ah, yes. The "hidden meaning" people nowadays hunt for like they're in search of Monty Pythons Holy Grail... Were the blue curtains really blue or was the author forced to make them blue by a heteronormative society?

Let's be honest: They were blue. Period. Blue curtains are nice to look at, that's it. We have now arrived in a timeline where language and literature majors have more common with delusional shippers writing fanfiction than anybody else.

I had a drunk argument with a fujoshi during my last anime convention where her argument was "every male character is gay, even if they don't know it yet" and she had like 69k pages of "evidence" to prove it... (she knew some good femboy doujins, tho)

 

[CharlesEBrown]

Six of one half a dozen of the other.

Sometimes an author does hide a meaning in their work. Sometimes an author writes because they have something they need to get out and are unaware of it. Sometimes they write because they just love telling stories and don't worry about the "why."

 

[RepresentingWrath]

Apophenia - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Jocelyn_Uasal]

Apophenia - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

"coined by psychiatrist Klaus Conrad in his 1958 publication on the beginning stages of schizophrenia."

Sounds about right

 

[corruption]

Sometimes there is no hidden meaning, and sometimes there is.
Sometimes it is a social commentary that people miss, like the anime "Ghost in the Shell" which was totally changed when Hollywood remade it.
Sometimes I think authors leave hints of hidden meaning, when they are none, just to mess with the minds of people looking for them. That's the kind of thing I would do.

 

[QuercusMalus]

With so much out there about the "hidden meanings" in X or Y, I've started to wonder: Are there really so many hidden meanings in shows, series, and literary works, or are people just reading too much into them? I'd like to hear your opinions

People like to find patterns, even if none exist. So much so that we even have a terms for this.
Apophenia- The human propensity to unreasonably seek definite patterns in random information.

A subset of Apophenia is Pareidolia-the tendency for perception to impose a meaningful interpretation on a nebulous stimulus, usually visual, so that one detects an object, pattern, or meaning where there is none.

I remember a story I heard years ago about an English teacher raving about the deep meanings of the blue curtains is a characters room and how it was symbolic of their struggles with depression and the author of the work commenting that no, they just like the color blue.

It's really easy to find connections that seem plausible, hell, this is what makes good 'Who dun it?' Stories, the author wants you to draw the false conclusions.

 

[NotaNuffian]

 

[Nolff]

With so much out there about the "hidden meanings" in X or Y, I've started to wonder: Are there really so many hidden meanings in shows, series, and literary works, or are people just reading too much into them? I'd like to hear your opinions

First thing to do is to know whether that is intentional or not. If not, then the lore would be made up by the community instead.

 

[2wordsperminute]

Ah, yes. The "hidden meaning" people nowadays hunt for like they're in search of Monty Pythons Holy Grail... Were the blue curtains really blue or was the author forced to make them blue by a heteronormative society?

But were they navy blue or sky blue?