“A genuine work of art must mean many things; the truer its art, the more things it will mean.”

—  George MacDonald

The Fantastic Imagination (1893)
Context: "Suppose my child ask me what the fairytale means, what am I to say?"
If you do not know what it means, what is easier than to say so? If you do see a meaning in it, there it is for you to give him. A genuine work of art must mean many things; the truer its art, the more things it will mean. If my drawing, on the other hand, is so far from being a work of art that it needs THIS IS A HORSE written under it, what can it matter that neither you nor your child should know what it means? It is there not so much to convey a meaning as to wake a meaning. If it do not even wake an interest, throw it aside. A meaning may be there, but it is not for you. If, again, you do not know a horse when you see it, the name written under it will not serve you much.

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George MacDonald 127
Scottish journalist, novelist 1824–1905

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