Well, given some of the answers I’ve received, my guess would be “Depends”. I’ll try illustrating with an example.

When in Moby Dick, they talk about the pungent smell of codfish or saltwater, do you imagine the smell of codfish, or Ishmael and Queequeg clamming up their nostrils? Or do you just understand that the cook was a bad chef? And, more importantly, do you do that automatically? For everything you read?

Like when you read the phrase “Toe the line”, do you imagine runners inching their toes forward to get the most minimal of advantages? Or you do understand it as just a figure of speech, meant to denote anticipation of something?

I’m still very much young, so I can see why my view would differ from yours, but while reading, I found myself really irritated with the tug-of-war between “My heart” and “Reason” or “Principle”. Your principles are instilled into you by your society’s normative values, they aren’t inherently better or worth value. My personal guiding factor is “If it doesn’t harm anyone, you should be free to do it”, so I struggle with the idea that she couldn’t do the thing at one point because it’s ‘decadent’ or whatnot, but she could do that SAME THING by the end of it for some reason WHILE things have gotten worse off. (I’m on mobile I don’t know how to do spoilers but if you’ve read it, you can understand what I’m talking about.)

Reading reviews, though, I can understand how people respect her views. I understand thinking she’s right, but I still don’t agree with them in any capacity. The writer’s hand is the only thing that made the leap into the dark an overall passable decision.