How to avoid pointless symbolism?

I admit that I starting to fall into the camp of true art is incomprehesible but I realize that there is soem backlash behind that. Most stories don't need an Aesop but you end up finding it anyway as some fans overanalyze everything even when soem thigns are just author appeal. I am trying to avoid the trap of pointless or faux symbolism that leads to an equally anvilicious aesop. How can avoid this? Or how can use this without being overbearing or anvilicious?

Don't do it on purpose.

People seeing symbolism in your works where you intended none to exist is unavoidable, so you might as well just live with it.

edited 17th Apr '11 3:28:21 PM by annebeeche

Use symbolism, but it has to mean something every time, and not be a cliched symbol. To use an example: Jane Eyre:

Rochester and Jane get engaged. Neither Jane nor the reader knows that Rochester is already married. However, foreshadowing is provided by a tree being struck by lightning. On a second read through, you see this as symbolic of God smiting Rochester for his adultery. A more obvious example occurs at the end, when Rochester is blinded while saving Bertha from the burning mansion. He had been blind to Bertha, and blind to how Bertha and his marriage would hurt Jane. Now he is blinded for it.

None of these are obvious symbols that had been used a thousand times before, yet both are clear symbols, which are also plot points, and, in the case of the second, develop Rochester's character. The symbolism serves to further plot and character development. The best use of symbolism crystallises a meaning, without drawing too much attention to itself as a symbol.

I think it's pretty simple. Just don't add the anvilicious aesop, and deny the symbolism exists at all, and was created out of whole cloth from the readers' imaginations.

Tada. Problem solved.

edited 19th Apr '11 7:10:08 AM by OhSoIntoCats

That sounds like a meta twist.

Well, you say symbolism has author appeal to you, and everyone knows that people will find symbolism everywhere whether it's there or not, and if your work becomes popular enough or analyzed enough, you can just give your mighty Shrug of God. Then you get to have Mind Screw and eat it too, so nobody can get mad at you for symbolism, and the Fan Wank gets their Epileptic Trees. Everyone wins!

edited 19th Apr '11 9:37:00 AM by OhSoIntoCats

Oh So Into Cats: That's more or less my attitude towards this sort of thing, as well as towards shipping. Fans will be stupid regardless of anything you actually put into the work, so unless you're actually going for that kind of response, the main thing do is leave it out entirely. The fans will do whatever they want, but at least you'll know that you weren't responsible for it.