I am sitting in the library, and there is a boy sitting at a table with three girls. He has his shirt on really tight and he has his sleeves on his short sleeved shirt pulled up so that the ends rest sitting on his muscles.  And he is working out of a trig book and at the same time he is helping a girl at her homework, and because of these two things, he sits up very tall and looks down and explains that “when you get to my level, those things will look easy” (I overhear) when she is looking at him.  Then the girl puts her face to her book and is working, and the boy looks at his book.  And his head is resting on his hand.  And he has this look on his face.  And he keeps staring at the page.  And then he keeps staring at the page.  And then he looks at the girl who is doing her work and then he looks to the back of his book and quickly copies down the answer and the steps of the problem he couldn’t start.  Then the girl looks up and lets out a sigh, and the boy says, “Look at this,” and he shows her the longhand he just “performed” on his page.  She says “wow,” and then looks at him, and he looks at her, and they both smile into each other’s younglove, pretty eyes, and then she gets back to work and the boy puts his head back in his hand and gets that really confused look on his face and just sits there, staring at his book.  I’ll bet that the way she is reading this guy is nowhere close to how I’m reading him.  And yet, the ‘body’ we are engaging with is made up of the same components—his muscles are no less bigger to her than they are to me,  but maybe in a certain context, maybe looking at this from different angles, alters and effects our reading of the whole.  And we are coming from different interests, I believe.  Maybe his muscles are strength, to some.  Maybe his muscles are an ironic trait of weakness, to others.  Does this mean that my reading of him should affect her reading of him?  It won’t, because I don’t just go around telling girls about their boyfriends like that! But the author’s intent (the boy’s intent) has made its way to some, but others choose to go by their own readings, upon which relies heavily, in some cases, on knowing what the author’s intent probably was. So, if we say that the author’s intent is to seduce the girl with his ‘impressive’ math skills, and that is all that we look at, then he is a guy impressing a girl with his math skills. If I the reader eavesdrop in, and I understand what he the author is purposely giving, and, just as importantly, what he is unintentionally giving; that he doesn’t really know what he’s doing (but neither does she, and so he is fully capable of bluffing his situation)…then he is a guy who is bluffing his situation to impress the girl, and that is a full reading (maybe)  (…my full reading, anyhow). And so the author’s intent is always playing some part in what we derive, but that is by no means the whole picture.  And maybe I read the whole thing wrong myself—maybe they are all about irony and that is why they like each other! But I’m just playing around with one of the Working Questions from TT, pg. 27 number 2.  So, how’s anyone reading the people around you?