In As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner a common reoccurring symbol was of Addie's coffin. Her coffin represents the cumbersome burden that was placed on the family when she died. Like the family members lives, the coffin is thrown off balance when she dies.

Foster would argue that I should interpret the symbol as something I know or what the coffin stands for to me. He would say that there is not one definite symbol that the coffin represents and that it varies among different people. To determine what a symbol means to us personally, people should use questions, experience, and preexisting knowledge to connect it to our own lives. Every persons perception is different because they all have encountered different experiences and all value different things.

My experience as a reader did not match his suggestions. I simply asked what the coffin represented and was told by my classmates and by google that it represented the burden placed on the Bundren family. I didn't look to see what the coffin meant to me or how I could relate it to myself and just accepted what others told me. But this was wrong, because as Foster pointed out, there isn't just one answer in particular that can apply to everyone, I had to search for the answer that applied to me.