How to Read Literature Like a Professor: Prompt 6

Ambiguity is a means of personalizing a reader’s experience. This is due to the fact that as more details are left unclear the more our minds must draw connections together. The mind cannot draw from an experience it has not dealt with, and as a result a story becomes more personally connected to an individual. Experiences we have lived are fastened onto the storyline and its characters become reflections of ourselves. For a short amount of time we live our life in the pages written by someone else.

Ambiguity does in some cases stop individuals from understanding a text. While a text normally has a purpose for being unclear, if statements were simply stated then many more individuals would understand them. Despite this, is the meaning not diminished if the essence behind a book is too easily grasped? We value the mental struggle of books. Therefore ambiguity can be a way in which we mentally struggle to then stumble across an idea in our mind that brings us to a new horizon.  

What is satisfying to one man can be vastly minimal to another individual. That is something that I think an author has to think about when they write a text. Is this too ambiguous? Should it contain more ambiguity? The author must write from themselves and hope the audience perceives it well. Therefore, it truly depends on personal preference if satisfying outcomes must be definite. However many times endings do contain ambiguity and that is where our mind can go crazy creating a story afterward.