"...the greatness of an artistic creation lies in its richness, ambiguity, and interpretability, and that it is both futile and somehow wrong to search for the correct interpretation, the one which the author intended... I do not believe that any interpretation is sure and infallible, any more than any other hypothesis can be. But I do think that we can try as historians to restore the original context in which these words were intended to function and it is always worthwhile to venture upon this perilous path..."
- E.H.Gombrich, The Evidence of Images
In reading a book or appreciating a piece of art we are like travellers in a distant land. We can find only so much understanding and worth in it as we carry there.
- IGNOU, School of English
"We must infer much and supply chasms in the record. The history of the Universe is symptomatic and life is mnemonical."
- Emerson.
