I guess it's a bit late to apologize for my loosely worded initial question
. The Times Higher Edu Supplement over here had something about whether the word "understand" should be dropped because it has too many meanings. Does "Understanding a poem" mean that
* you can express it in your own words
* you can take it apart, and put it together again
* you know what it's for
* you know the cause of it
? If not why not?
Some things I can't like until I understand them.
There are other things that I like less when I come to understand them more.
There are yet other things where if I like them I feel that in some sense I must already be understanding them.
And them there's the issue of what kind of knowledge works of art provide and how it stands in relation to "rational knowledge".
I suppose my only conclusion is that poetry's a wide church where many of these approaches (including some from non-verbal, non-representational fields) can apply (or at least it's fun trying to apply them).