The hearer makes the message: audience and the evolution of meaning

Stories and the nature of story-telling are natural to the mind because they begin in our minds. The first story we tell ourselves is the story of our own lives. We are often the main character of this story and sometimes the main narrator. We learn who we are through what we tell about ourselves and what we hear told about us, from others. Our lives are folklore.

The audience is important because they transfer the story to us, through response, approval, reaction.

I wish sometimes that my essays, like rock songs, could be recited live, in front of a responsive audience; an audience that recites along with me. Then, I might be able to have an insight, and a change of understanding, like the one Eddie Vedder had about the song “Alive,” as he explained on VH1 Storytellers.

Vedder explains that the chorus, “I’m still alive,” was initially meant as a “curse.” Over the years though, he heard the audience sing it in celebration, and that “lifted the curse.”

A problem for writing is tone. It takes forever to develop and then, one wonders, how many readers can really perceive it? No offense (said softly, and not really seriously), but I only have words to work with. Spaulding Gray had the right idea: stand on a stage and talk aloud with lighting and sound effects. Ideas are a show. An audience is a group of people.

The comment form on blogs and online magazines is a start for audience input, but it is nothing compared to the input from a crowd at a rock concert. The connection that rock concerts offer between the singer and the audience is an immediate one, one that the creator gets to experience. Writing forms a connection over time. And, the connection for the writer is as much in the imagination as the content of the writing is.