A Few Good Reasons Why Not To Think So Hard.

For as long as literature has been around, there has always been that one person who decided that there MUST be a deeper meaning to what they were writing. After reading two essays on the deeper meaning of works of literature, I have come up with my own theory that would suffice in looking further into literature than necessary. But first, I must explain the opposite views these writers posed.
The first of the essays was written by George Will, an intelligent man with a knack for writing, not to mention a Pulitzer Prize in his pocket. To start off his essay, he blatantly stated that "all literature is.. political". This poses the question, why exactly? He dives a little deeper into saying "culture is oppressive and a literary canon is an instrument of domination". Oh? So what he's really trying to say is every book ever written has a certain reason as to why it is being written, whether it is to show the oppression of the domination culture of to drop slight hints on feminism. This is a very interesting take on the perspective of books, but lets take a look at the other side of things..
Stephen Greenblatt, a professor at Harvard University, takes us on this walk on the wild side (according to George Will at least). His ideas are rooted in that fact that professors of the "curriculum" of looking in the deeper meaning of books are "bent on sabotaging Western civilization by delegitimizing its founding texts and ideas". Interesting. What does he mean by "delegitimzing you say? Greenblatt goes a little further by saying "[literature].. is not cement. It is mobile, complex, elusive, disturbing" and that "[writers] cannot soar when their feet are stuck in social cement". So in a sense he is saying that looking at literature through the peep hole of everything being political, the readers and everyone else are missing the fact that there is actual beauty in literature. One could go so far as to saying it is a form of art.
After all this, do you really want my point of view? Well too bad if you said no, because here it is anyways. Yes, I believe that there are some books and stories that have a deeper political meaning, but to say that every book has one? Now that is just too far. Looking at literature with different "lenses", such as the political lens, the religious lens, or even the ethical lens, distorts and manipulates one's self into thinking and seeing something in a piece of literature that may or may not be there. An example of this is the Lord of the Rings trilogy. The majority of the Christian community believes that the entire story is a giant allusion to Christ's death and resurrection and rapture. In all honesty, why not? You can see whatever you want to see in stories such as those and who's to say that you are wrong? It is all opinion, with no right or wrong answer, unless of course you ask the writer yourself, then maybe there is a right answer. Just maybe..