It's all right for words to mean what they say

Eudora Welty:

It's all right, I want to say to the students who write to me, for things to be what they appear to be, for words to mean what they say. It's all right too for words and appearances to mean more than one thing — ambiguity is a fact of life. But it is not all right, not in good faith, for things not to mean what they say.

From Michael Leddy's Against “deep reading” at Orange Crate Art.