There is a moment I write for. It is not a moment of discovery, nor a moment of conclusion. It is a moment that allows a reader to stop in the middle of a piece, put the book down, or not, because they can't help but consider: did the author intend this? Or perhaps that? He chose those specific words, so he must have intended it this way. However, wait. I'm unsure. As I read further, I'll discover.

That moment is the writing working. The uncertainty, that small feeling of unease, of not being able to determine exactly where one stands, is not a failure of the writing. That is the writing performing the exact purpose it was created to perform.

For myself, ambiguity is not a style. It is a necessity. It is the foundation upon which true literature exists. Because life is not resolved. People do not completely explain themselves. The reasons behind actions are layered, conflicting, sometimes even unknown to the individual taking them. A fictional work that provides clear-cut explanations at the end has not reflected humanity's experience; it has offered a more palatable lie.

However, there seems to be a growing trend in contemporary literature that concerns me. Many readers now enter a literary text asking "What happened?" "Why?" "Can you confirm my interpretation?" Rather than allowing ambiguity to exist and developing their own interpretations. Additionally, many authors are now producing texts that comply with these requests, texts that explain their own symbolism, resolve their own conflicts, and leave no loose ends for the reader at the completion of the text.

I understand why people prefer clarity over ambiguity. Clarity is comforting. Resolution makes sense. There is certainly enjoyment to be found in a story that fulfills the expectations of the reader. However, I am not arguing against narrative structure, conclusions, or satisfying resolutions. I am arguing against the removal of the original question.

When a text is so transparent that it demands nothing from the reader, something critical has been compromised. Not only in regard to craft, although that has also occurred, but in regard to the potential for communication between a reader and a literary text. Reading at its highest level is not merely consuming information. It is a negotiation. The reader brings his or her own history of experience, blind spots, loss, and desires into the conversation, while the text meets him or her not with answers, but by applying pressure to the right points.

Ambiguity is how writers apply that pressure.

When I write characters whose motivations are intentionally ambiguous, I am not being vague. I am acknowledging the limits of what any of us can possibly know about another person. When I conclude a scene without resolving its conflict or tension, I am not withholding. I am continuing the story within the reader's mind, where it will evolve, grow, and represent multiple meanings depending on where each reader is in their life at the time of reading.

This concept is not new. All great literary works have recognised it. However, it is less frequently practised today. We should acknowledge what we are losing as it disappears, not nostalgically, but by clearly identifying what is at stake.

Literature devoid of ambiguity is literature that has lost faith in its readership. And readers who have never been trusted to think for themselves within a story are ultimately limited in developing that capacity.

Ultimately, what I find most disturbing is not the novels currently being written, but the type of readers being shaped by those novels, readers who arrive at a text seeking to be instructed, rather than to question.