[drigel]

In an interpretive community meaning might reside within the reader but that meaning is only validated by approval from our peers.

not for me, thankfully

So, would you agree that the meaning of the text can be both defined by readers and by the Author?

cant have one w/o the other milady

For all our intellectualising, the Author aint dead round these parts

Agreement. Except for the fact that his work is dead. Which leads me to:

That remains my position.

Same here - HA. My original thoughts on this thread being that the only thing I consider *canon* is what actually published by the *author* for us *readers*.

The 'boundaries' are set as much by the posters and their ideas and what they wish to say as by those who run the joint--even more so, I would suggest.

Unless they fall into the group from my first quote of Lal. Then, they might get shouted down, drowned out, or become *disenchanted* by either a majority or an outspoken minority.

And which is the correct approach? Well that depends upon what you wish to get out of the book.

And what one wants to get out of this site as well. Beths entry does cause me to conisder the nature of this forum. I like to discuss Tolkien on many levels, both inside and outside of the pages. I also appreciate the resulting creativity that has been inspired by the works. But as to the tenor of the overall attitude/opinions on this thread, I wonder if there is an influence. I dont RPG and fanfic, so in this case, I am an outsider here. I just like discussion, along with some pot stirring and devils advocation. But, as to opinion influence, once you "help yourself" to the original creation in terms of writing, RPGing etc, does not the author's intentions become inconsequential, even irrelevent? Anything I have read about the author's intentions on the subject of interpreting his work dealt with visual art, music and cinema.

Story and poem and epic romance and novel take us someplace other than the primary world and so, I would suggest, we need to address such creative language in ways which recognise its creativity.

YES. This is why the work is great. Plenty of that stuff out there, but whats special about Tolkien? I would submit that it's because of the authors mastery of the various subjects incorporated in the stories, and the desire to tell a Story. Of course the author has intentions for the Story, and IMO at least, the author wasnt intending to say "oh look - a how clever I am! Those english lit guys are going to really enjoy this nugget of metaphorical anit-dada puffinstuff that Ive snuck into the subtext!

But when some read *no* allegory/simile/metaphors, others will read *open to any* allegory/simile/metaphors. And, as Beth said in an earlier post, it depends on who your english teacher was in your formative years....

Sorry you have caught me on a day off...