Interpretation And Creation
It is a modern assumption that there is a key to every poem and the author has it. The trouble is that I don’t believe this. I happen to think that the author may be the last one to know what his work is about. I’ve often noticed that the more I like a poem I’ve written, the less sure I am that I can explicate it…in general, [an author] is too involved in what he wanted the poem to be, to be able to see what it actually is.
—Galway Kinnell
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An ineluctable conclusion:
Kinnell is noting the true authority of the artist: to create a whole, a world that can be entered and interpreted in many ways. That can’t be done if you start out to illustrate a theory — universities teach illustration.
Universities can’t teach creativity, so theory becomes paramount in schools of the arts. The theoretical becomes predominant in the studio arts as well. The artist is taught explication, exegesis.
