One of the biggest letdowns I’ve come to see as an adult is finally maturing enough to understand the meanings behind some popular works of art. Every piece of art has a message that the creator hopes to pass. It might be educational, purely entertaining, or just their way of passing on a piece of themselves to their audience. However, it goes, there is always a message to be passed.
And many times, these messages are gotten by the audience themselves, and the people who can relate to it, or those who fully understand the message, can connect to the work of art on a deep level. That’s why when you read certain books, you feel so connected to the story because there are elements that mirror parts of your life so closely. The same can be said for music and movies.
As a child, there were a lot of songs I enjoyed listening to, not because of their message, but simply because of the vibes. Many of them were dancehall songs, and they were pretty energetic, making you dance all your sorrows away. When these songs came on, nothing else mattered to you because you simply wanted to have fun. And over the years, there were so many of those songs.
But growing up, thanks to the internet, we finally began to know the meanings behind them. Songs that we thought were majorly dancehall hits turned out to have very deep meanings. Their lyrics spoke of pain and sadness. There are some songs that, because you don’t know the meaning, you’d be vibing to it, but then in reality, it’s a song about heartbreak, or how his father beat up his mom and abandoned them.
Even in movies, you could praise an actor or actress for acting spectacularly in a role, they embodied the character so much, and you loved them in it. But later on, you find out that during the shooting of those movies, they were battling severe depression, or fighting off one addiction or the other. Or when a writer writes a romantic novel that becomes a worldwide hit, stealing hearts all over the planet, but during the period of her writing it, she was embroiled in a messy divorce that threatened her sanity.
When you learn of these realities, their works suddenly take on a new meaning to you. If you used to dance to their songs, you stop doing that. Whenever it plays, you sit down and listen, because you can now connect to them on a deeper level. A good example of this is Black Panther, it’s just your regular Superhero movie with lots of action scenes. Yeah, it’s a great movie, but not something to cry about, especially not in the storyline. But once people learned that Chadwick Boseman was battling with cancer while filming the movie, and his subsequent movies as well, the film immediately changed for them. And till today, there are people who say that they still cry when they watch his films, some even prefer not to watch them because just thinking of his struggles is enough to make them tear up.
Many times, we acknowledge that evil is begotten from pain and trauma. We rationalize when criminals do terrible things because of their past. “He raped that girl because his father abused him as a child, or the nanny touched him inappropriately”, “She stabbed her husband because she didn’t have a father-figure during her childhood, and her mother was a crackhead.” On and on it goes, we keep finding ways to justify evil. But many times, we refuse to acknowledge how pain and trauma can also inspire genius.
While some people use their pain and trauma to hurt others, others use it as a reason to create art and life. They channel their pain and hurt into their songs, books, and movies, and many times, we see them, other times, we don’t. But the truth is, once we finally realize everything they were going through, their messages become clearer, and their works become more relatable.
So, in a nutshell, do we always need to know the meaning and backstory behind every work of art? Should we always fight to get the message? Can’t we just enjoy the work for what it really is? Honestly, I don’t know. Because when you finally get the meaning, it could change the work totally for you. So maybe it’s best not to know. But then, how will you even connect fully to it without knowing?
Well, I guess we’re stuck in a bit of a conundrum.
