Not necessary, because even if there are some criteria to distinguish the validity of different interpretations, there can still be many equally valid interpretations, and making those interpretations can still involve imposing meaning on a work. The author never took the position that every interpretation is equally valid — what she said was that there can be “a number of equally valid interpretations.” That leaves open the possibility that there can also be many invalid interpretations.

Necessary, because if it were not true — if a meaning imposed on a literary work does NOT reflect facts about the interpreter — then we have no reason to think that an interpretation tells us more about the critic who made the interpretation than it does the writer. Perhaps the interpretation simply tells us nothing about either the critic or the writer.

Not necessary, because the author never connects a writer’s intentions to validity of an interpretation. The author does assume that an author’s intentions are relevant to whether an interpretation can reveal something about the writer; but this doesn’t imply a relationship between intentions and validity.

Not necessary, because whether a critic can ever know the true intentions of the writer is not relevant. What matters is that a critic’s INTERPRETATION does not need to consider a writer’s intent. A critic might personally know the writer’s intention; but a critic’s interpretation of a work doesn’t need to consider it.

Not necessary, because the “deepest understanding” of a work has no connection to the reasoning. Nothing in the argument relates to understanding a work or the depth of that understanding.