While Lance is using historical perspective to support the view that the author's conscious purpose should control, I would argue that it can also be used in the other direction, at least in some periods of history. My argument is from D. W. Robertson's A Preface to Chaucer.
For educated medieval readers the prevailing model of interpretation was interpretation of Scripture, a complicated matter with many levels, and one that certainly did not limit itself to the literal or "original" meaning of a text.
For example, a medieval interpreter would have no trouble looking at a verse of the Song of Songs--"Thy teeth are as sheep coming up from the washing"--and declaring that the teeth represent the doctors of the church, whose teachings tear away error. The idea of sticking to the intentions of a single human author was just not big in medieval people's thinking.
Now, the students who usually answer the original question probably wouldn't know that argument, but I think we're allowed to take it into account.
In short, the idea of what a text means can and does change, even if authors do not like that fact.
Maryann
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