Perrine Poetry Post! (Bonus Points for Alliteration?!)

        I'm not going to lie, I may have began reading this six page article, The Nature in the Interpretation of Poetry, with the wrong intentions. Before reading this article, I have always believed that any interpretation of poetry that makes logical sense, should be considered an acceptable interpretation. Who has the authority to tell me that what I think about a poem is wrong? Well, reading this article by Lawrence Perrine has given me a whole new perspective on the subject! I cannot say that my mind is completely changed because I still believe there should be room for discussion on different interpretation. However, many of the points he makes, I understand and agree with- especially the way he comes up with the most sensible interpretation. Also, I had never considered some of the things he said about the authors and how they may have trouble explaining the meanings of their own poems. Perrine makes the statement, "He cannot say, 'What I really meant was...' without admitting failure, or without saying something different (and usually much less) than what his poem said." This makes complete sense to me because it would no longer e a mystery waiting to be solved, which is sometimes the beauty of a poem, but instead it becomes an image that the author just describes in a creative way.
        Now the main piece of this article that I plan to utilize in guiding my study of poetry in this class would be this: "Of several interpretations, the best is that which fully explains the details of the poem without itself being contradicted by any detail." This statement made in the first page was a profound one, though I may not have realized it until I saw the few examples he gave, using poems we had read last week for an assignment. Perrine presented the poem by Emily Dickinson, and explained the difference between what his students had written was the subject of the poem and what he believed to be the subject of the poem. Interestingly enough, most of the students' interpretations coincided with most of my own class's interpretations. Most people in my class thought it described a meadow, just like Perrine's students; although, we did have a few that said the poem described a sunset. A sunset is believed to be the correct interpretation according to Perrine, and some other external proof that the poem was published in earlier years under the title, "Sunset". Even so, Perrine goes into detail explaining how those who interpreted the poem as a garden, failed to account for some of the details in the poem- like the Wharf. Therefore, I was struck by how true the statement I originally mentioned turned out to be! Knowing this, I will go about the study of poetry knowing that every detail is important, and if I'm not accounting for each one, I am not doing it correctly.