Yes, but I don’t think that’s what she meant to say.
I would’ve said “projection.”
I also would’ve come across this thread sooner if it had been in Cafe Society. No?
no home runs yet… perhaps the suggestion to move this to Cafe Society might be the best suggestion. again, thank you to everyone for making a stab at this.
Hm. “Projection” isn’t it? It’s exactly the word I always use in that same sense. What other meaning are you trying to convey?
My second response is that there is no such word, it’s one of those wild goose chases people sometimes start. But then on re-read I think you may mean ‘gloss,’ because, there is no:
" - specific term in literary criticism …
- that is used to describe the meaning projected into a text …
- by the … critic
- that is in addition to …
- and in fact … more important
- than … the artist’s intention"
Erasing the nonsense from this question, the answer you want is “Interpretation” or as I wrote “Gloss.” If you have another word in mind, the question is not adequate to recall it.
Misprision?
Thanks again.
Wendell, thanks for the offering, but Misprision carries a negative connotation that the critic/viewer/reader 's interpretation is a misintepretation,whereas the term I am searching for carried a laudatory tone…
I think I may have to hunt down some graduate film studies or English students, and put them into a social setting where they feel compelled to act at their most pretentious, and take notes 
Are you sure that’s not it?
Very assertive Sevastapol - perhaps an indication that you share my frustration. However when I first heard the term months ago, I did check and found a definition that was pretty similar to what I have put into the OP. The possible inadequacy of my question to one side, there definitely is such a term, even if it is not easily found in any on-line lexicon (and yes, I did check several before I posted).
When I do find the correct term, I will let you know… and you can point out to me how I should have phrased my question. mmmmmmmmmmmK?
I thought it was eisegesis also. It may not be the particular word the OP is searching for, but it seems to me to be the closest by definition.
Appropriation? As when a reader or consumer appropriates the text so that it serves his own purpose. (Ex: gays identifying with Dorothy; Latin American leftists reading the Bible as a Marxist argument for social justice, etc.)
Also, subjective interpretation.
There’s another angle that might be worth pursuing: the lit crit of Wayne Booth, who in The Rhetoric of Fiction (1961) promulgated the “implied author” as the de facto third author in fiction (the first being the flesh-'n-blood writer, the second being the fictive narrator). The third, the “implied author,” is the presence which conveys emotional shadings such as irony, judgment, and reliability, and serves as an implied companion for the reader. [NB: I haven’t read this work; I’m just paraphrasing from his recent obit.]
What you’re looking for may be the give-and-take imaginary discourse between the reader’s stream of consciousness and the implied author.
Impressionism, maybe? It seems to be used that way (in the form “impressionistic”) in this essay.
For those who suggested eisegesis, thanks, but I am certain that is not it. As to appropriation… an excellent suggestion, but also not the term … I think part of the problem is that most lexicons I have consulted are primarily concerned with literary criticism, whereas the term (as I mentioned in the OP) is also employed in criticism of the visual arts.
Again, I do very much appreciate people taking the time to offer suggestions. This is beginning to be like a sore tooth to me… I keep poking at it with my tongue.
Splunge?
:wally
I think the word you’re looking for is “asstardery.”
I came in to say eisegesis. I concur with those who beat me to it.
An example often used to demonstrate it is from Flannery O’Connor’s A Good Man is Hard to Find. In that story, the villain (“The Misfit”) is a scrawny middle aged escaped convict wearing a pair of tight stolen jeans, no shirt and a black hat. One critic went into a long explanation of just why O’Connor chose to portray him in a black hat when it’s a cliche of western movies, and how it was actually indicative of the state of the guy’s soul, yadda yadda blah blah. Flannery read it and sent him a letter stating “No. It’s just a black hat.”
That’s the beauty of this word. It doesn’t do anything.
(somebody had to say it)
I would have said eisegesis, but I don’t know how.
Just think of Christ dying on the cross for your sins, only the cross is covered with snow and the people standing at the foot are all penguins. “Icy Jesus”, as used in the sentence “My cat’s breath smells like eisegesis.”