"What if this was more common? Great writing is precious enough that I wish we had multiple interpretations of most great works. It would be a great way to see the evolution of artists."
Yes! Mark Twain on Jane Austen is a good (read as: hilarious) place to start: In his extensive correspondence with fellow author and critic William Dean Howells, Mark Twain seemed to enjoy venting his literary spleen on Jane Austen precisely because he knew her to be Howells’ favorite author, In 1909 Twain wrote that “Jane Austin” [sic] was “entirely impossible” and that he could not read her prose even if paid a salary to do so. Howells notes in My Mark Twain (1910) that in fiction Twain “had certain distinct loathings; there were certain authors whose names he seemed not so much to pronounce as to spew out of his mouth...
Rather than pitying Twain when he was sick, Howells threatened to come and read Pride and Prejudice to him.
Twain marveled that Austen had been allowed to die a natural death rather than face execution for her literary crimes. “Her books madden me so that I can’t conceal my frenzy,” Twain observed, apparently viewing an Austen novel as a book which “once you put it down you simply can’t pick it up.” ... In a letter to Joseph Twichell in 1898, Twain fumed, “I have to stop every time I begin. Everytime I read “Pride and Prejudice” I want to dig her up and beat her over the skull with her own shin-bone.” From: https://www.vqronline.org/essay/barkeeper-entering-kingdom-heaven-did-mark-twain-really-hate-jane-austen
"What if this was more common? Great writing is precious enough that I wish we had multiple interpretations of most great works. It would be a great way to see the evolution of artists."
Yes! Mark Twain on Jane Austen is a good (read as: hilarious) place to start: In his extensive correspondence with fellow author and critic William Dean Howells, Mark Twain seemed to enjoy venting his literary spleen on Jane Austen precisely because he knew her to be Howells’ favorite author, In 1909 Twain wrote that “Jane Austin” [sic] was “entirely impossible” and that he could not read her prose even if paid a salary to do so. Howells notes in My Mark Twain (1910) that in fiction Twain “had certain distinct loathings; there were certain authors whose names he seemed not so much to pronounce as to spew out of his mouth...
Rather than pitying Twain when he was sick, Howells threatened to come and read Pride and Prejudice to him.
Twain marveled that Austen had been allowed to die a natural death rather than face execution for her literary crimes. “Her books madden me so that I can’t conceal my frenzy,” Twain observed, apparently viewing an Austen novel as a book which “once you put it down you simply can’t pick it up.” ... In a letter to Joseph Twichell in 1898, Twain fumed, “I have to stop every time I begin. Everytime I read “Pride and Prejudice” I want to dig her up and beat her over the skull with her own shin-bone.” From: https://www.vqronline.org/essay/barkeeper-entering-kingdom-heaven-did-mark-twain-really-hate-jane-austen
Haha, amazing