This comment was written by Chelsea Larymore on 8 May 2019.

Postcolonial Speculative Fiction

Does it have to be a symbol?

Your post got me thinking that I'd really like to have a chat with the guy who decided every ambiguous thing in writing has to be a symbol. I think academics is wildly obsessed with symbolism and I fail to understand why. I heard a phrase somewhere once that goes "sometimes a stick is a stick and a hole is a hole," and I am a firm believe in that. Perhaps the milk is black because in a world of monsters, things are dark and grim and don't always make sense to normal people (for lack of better phrasing)? Perhaps I am way off base and the black milk holds some deep, complicated meaning that I will never understand. Either way, I think this opens a really important conversation about the dynamics between symbolism and aesthetics. Is aesthetic value not equally as important as symbolism?

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