When reading one quote from a full work or watching one scene from a feature-length film, important messages are often lost in translation. Unfortunately, a tendency to condense has now made its way back to creators.

Writer and Syracuse University alumna Cheryl Strayed, best known for her memoir “Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail,” which was adapted into the 2014 film, “Wild,” released a book called “Brave Enough” last week.

The book is a collection of quotes taken from a variety of her previous works and presented in an inspirational way. Strayed said she chose this format because “[she thinks] of quotes as mini-instruction manuals for the soul. It’s my appreciation for their very usefulness that compelled me to put together this book.”

Now, Strayed calling quotes “mini-instruction manuals for the soul” may make you cringe, but the vast majority of her writing is crafted to be inspirational — she used to write an advice column and at first this seems like a natural project for her. If the people want inspirational quotes, why not just give it to them directly instead of hiding them in a bigger work that carries the same message?

The problem is that even with material that seems to fit this model well, a quote or passage from a longer piece can never completely carry the same message as the whole book because the intricacies inherent in the full work can’t be perfectly translated to another, shorter, format.

However, the constant sharing of quotes over social media networks has led them to appear to hold more artistic weight than they should. This has, and will continue to, lead to numerous problems with misinterpretation.

Rarely does a week go by without seeing multiple quotes shared online and this is fine, but it becomes problematic when the quote doesn’t truly come from a place of understanding.

Countless people have read “The Great Gatsby,” yet there is a large section of its modern readers who think it is a perfect love story. Anyone who has a basic understanding of “The Great Gatsby” know this could not be further from the truth; it is an extreme condemnation of blind love.

One thing that made people believe this was the out of context sharing of quotes from the book. With the young age of many social media users, these quotes have had the ability to reach people before they have had a chance to read the book for the first time.

Taken out of context, sentences like “so we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past” can sound inspirationally defiant instead of the tragic statement of resignation it is in the book. Even worse, there are many shareable articles that take quotes from different, disparate sources, and cram them all together so the individuality of the works is blended out until they all carry a same superficial beauty.

There is nothing wrong with having favorite quotes — I have many. But there is definitely a problem with letting quotes hold the same power as the works they’re taken from. This demeans the source material and denies people the full strength they possess. A full work requires more effort, but can yield a more powerful return.

If projects like Strayed’s “Brave Enough” continue, we will have many quotes, but very few great books.

Mark DiBona is a senior television, radio and film major. His column appears weekly. He can be reached at mdibona@syr.edu and followed on Twitter @NoPartyNoDisco.

Published on November 4, 2015 at 12:34 am