> I have no problem with people discussing what purpose it serves for you. What I have problem with is this frequent notion that you know the intent of the author. Unless they told you.

I think everyone, even dedicated lit crit advocates, know that we can't know what the intent of the author is. But we can see the purpose it serves in the writing, and with a decent author be moderately confident that the important elements here are not complete accidents.

> I've witnessed enough discussions with authors to not accept this for a second. It's pure fiction.

K.

> I absolutely do, very much on purpose, because I utterly detest this obsession with showing when it comes at the cost of slowing down the story.

OK. I don't really like reading massive amounts of exposition drivel, where the author tries to convince me that the world is interesting and makes sense without example.

If I drop in a couple page digression about a character making a sandwich-- why?

- Does the character make the sandwich in the expected way, consistent with the way I, as the author, view them in general?

- Does this fastidious, fussy character carefully arrange his ingredients like I would normally picture him doing so, or does he throw them together?

- If he does something different from how the reader probably pictures them to this point, is it an accident, or am I revealing something about his state of mind or an unexpected other side of his character?

- Do I need some obvious break in the action; some downtime. Do I need to make it clear that the characters are obviously unhurried and open to leisurely talking or exploration next? Do I need to put the characters in some specific place for the next step to happen?

- Did I just run out of things to write that advance the main story, and I'm just doing random things at this point? If I'm taking a digression, or I'm doing something different from what would seem to be in character, I'd hope I'm doing it for a reason.

- Yes, there's still aspects that are totally without purpose. Putting a tomato on the sandwich may not be super meaningful (though it actually does still tell us small things about the world the characters inhabit, and is hopefully still consistent with other things we've been shown/told).

Authors have a whole lot of freedom, but what makes a cohesive story is already a highly constrained sequence of events compared to what could be written on the page. If you want that story to hit with maximum impact, there's yet fewer good choices.

> but also because I find it dreadfully annoying when writers are coy about their intent and encouraging that.

OK, so--- you detest hidden and layered meanings, and assert your writing doesn't have many. That's OK, but assuming that this is representative of most literature isn't valid.

> I'd argue that irrespective of the purpose of individual words or paragraphs, most of the book is there not to make the message clear, because the apparent message is trivial and bordering on trite, but to make the book a compelling read.

For most books, sure! But -why- is it a compelling read? As Chekhov said -- "If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off. If it's not going to be fired, it shouldn't be hanging there." Every word is a chance to create tension and to play with readers' expectations for what may happen next-- and then fulfill or subvert these expectations. Good literature does this a lot.

This can be a beautiful thing. Reading Mending Wall by Frost, and all of his ambiguity --- wait, does the author like walls or not, and why won't he tell me? Realizing that the first couple sentences were talking about frost not liking a wall was a pure hidden delight. Perhaps this was an accident, but I doubt it... and the meaning's there whether he intended it or not.