Personal subjective experience

From Introduction to Electronic Literature
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Poetry. One of the many things that stumps each reader in new and varying ways. It begins as a feeling within the poet's heart and soul, and is later transferred to paper. The beauty, then, is that whoever picks up this paper to read it has the authority to interpret it as they please, and each interpretation often presents itself as a reflection of the inner workings of each individual. If I am in love I may read into certain words and phrases, giving them a meaning that was not originally intended, but exists just the same to me.

The reader experience is just as important as the poet experience, but the reader experience is somewhat more exciting because there are endless reader experiences while there is only one real poet experience. Should the original poet read his or her or their own poem, it would still be a reader experience because it can only be written for the first time with an original meaning once. That is the beauty of poetry. A poem will always carry its intended meaning in the depths of its letters, but through ages and through readers that meaning will slowly disappear into the background of the poem and eventually only new interpretations will exist.

Poetic versus reader experiences even exist in real life, say in an argument between two people. The person speaking is the poet, choosing words for good reasons and intending a certain meaning, while the person listening is the reader, experiencing these words in a way that is possibly quite different from the way the poet had intended. Both experiences are important, but in this case which one is MOST important? Should we alter our speech so that the reader might better grasp the true meaning? Should we change nothing and let the reader think what he or she or they like? Is it wrong to get mad at someone who simply does not and will not understand what it is you are so mad about because his or her or their different brain cannot comprehend what it is you are saying in the way that you are meaning to say it?

I see these ideas floating around in the room when I read the Youtube and Video Vortex Readers. And because of this I will combine my experience of these texts and the intended experience of these texts in a project that will mimic yet expand on my midterm instagram, further exploring the world of digital poetry and post-digital user experience.