I am reminded of a tale Isaac Asimov told of the time he was sitting in on a college English class on science fiction. The professor spent a long time lecturing on the meaning of a certain Asimov story. Asimov came up to him after the class, introduced himself, and said that he never meant any of that. The professor went through the obligatory thank-yous for coming to the class and how much he admired Dr. Asimov and then said, "But just because you wrote the story, what makes you think you have any idea what it's about?"

I was never sure whether Asimov was telling the story on the professor or on himself.