I am entirely too amused by the mental image of trying so hard at subtext that your "s" key breaks :)
Other than that, I have some thoughts on this topic, though I don't know how helpful I'll be. I honestly tend towards the opaque rather than the transparent.
1) Not everyone has to get the subtext. I've read some (published, sometimes Hugo-nominated) stories that left me scratching my head, or that I only fully understood after re-reading or having it explained to me. The folks who "get it" will love you even more for making them work/making them feel smart. The classic example of this, to me, is Neil Gaiman's "A Study in Emerald." It is an astonishingly clever story whose main plot twist requires a strongish understanding of Sherlock Holmes. I love it BECAUSE of that, even though I had to go and re-read "The Empty House" to fully understand it.
2) You can always take stuff out. In the first draft of "Powder of Sympathy" I pretty much exactly spelled out what Crowley was up to; then I realized it was much more interesting if I left the implications vague, and just showed Dunsany's reaction to it. Now I get the reaction of "I don't know what happened!" from some people, but I also get some really interesting theories that are better than I could even come up with ;)
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Date: 2014-07-17 04:08 pm (UTC)Other than that, I have some thoughts on this topic, though I don't know how helpful I'll be. I honestly tend towards the opaque rather than the transparent.
1) Not everyone has to get the subtext. I've read some (published, sometimes Hugo-nominated) stories that left me scratching my head, or that I only fully understood after re-reading or having it explained to me. The folks who "get it" will love you even more for making them work/making them feel smart. The classic example of this, to me, is Neil Gaiman's "A Study in Emerald." It is an astonishingly clever story whose main plot twist requires a strongish understanding of Sherlock Holmes. I love it BECAUSE of that, even though I had to go and re-read "The Empty House" to fully understand it.
2) You can always take stuff out. In the first draft of "Powder of Sympathy" I pretty much exactly spelled out what Crowley was up to; then I realized it was much more interesting if I left the implications vague, and just showed Dunsany's reaction to it. Now I get the reaction of "I don't know what happened!" from some people, but I also get some really interesting theories that are better than I could even come up with ;)