Jeff,
No, there's no change of perspective nor any contradiction. The question
of "this" not necessarily having to be "so problematic" has a specific
context: "Interpretations are not absolute ...etc".
In the second instance, I might not have phrased it as you do, but I do
agree that how we interpret poems is problematic - it's a very complex,
multi-layered process and I don't see how it could be anything other than
that. Nothing I have said in this whole exchange made the claim that
interpretation was a simple affair. What I've been arguing all along is that
it's the quite the opposite. Perhaps you don't mean to be nit-picking but
this just slows up all conversation.
Likewise your second question confuses everything I've written. It was you
who introduced the phrase "value judgments" and told me they were
irrelevant. I wasn't making any reference to them, except to sweep them away
from the present context. I don't argue that 'texts can "contain" value
judgments and ideological attitudes'. I suppose they can, but one way or the
other I can see no relevance this might have to the present discussion.
Both these responses, intentionally or not, are of the "straw man" variety -
in that something which only vaguely resembles it has been substituted for
what I wrote.
I don't at all mind disagreement but it's very frustrating to have so much
of what I say misrepresented, and then to have it superfluously refuted.
Only at end of your post can I see any advance in the discussion. You can
accept that other people's views might be more persuasive on novels and
films, but not on poems. It seems odd, and very arbitrary, that you make
this distinction, but somehow it doesn't surprise me. Your explanation via
Keats sheds no illumination on why this should be the case. If it's true,
I'd consider it quite a sad state of affairs, but it leaves me perplexed as
to why you should bother to write any critical essays or articles.
Presumably if all of your readers held the same immobility of response, they
would remain obdurately unconvinced by anything you argue unless it
coincided exactly with their own established view. The whole activity would
be futile.
I'm beginning to feel that futility.
Jamie
-----Original Message-----
From: Jeffrey Side
Sent: Tuesday, July 16, 2013 7:12 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: "Multiple Registers, Intertextuality and Boundaries of
Interpretation in Veronica Forrest-Thompson"
Jamie,
You say that you agree with me about "the problematical nature of poetic
language when it meets individual readers", but this is the first time you
have said this unequivocally. Up to now, I got the impression that you didn’t
think this, mainly when you said:
“Interpretations are not absolute, but they can be more or less persuasive.
Why, I wonder, especially in discussions of poetry does this seem so
problematic?”
This seemed to be to be saying that the problematical nature of language can
ultimately be made unproblematic, in some sense, by some sort of consensus
or appeal to some sort of authority—possibly the text itself—which, of
course, is the point at issue. Are you now going beyond this by agreeing
with me about "the problematical nature of poetic language when it meets
individual readers"?
Regarding “value judgments” in criticism. Yes, they do occur, amongst
critics. But are not present in the text itself. You might argue that texts
can “contain” value judgments and ideological attitudes but that would be to
assume as fact that which has yet to be demonstrated. If you are saying
this, then I obviously disagree. Your following statement,
“Unless you mean my point that some arguments about literature are more
persuasive than others, which of course implies a value judgment. I take
them (value judgments) to be universal - in the weak sense that we can't
help making them. So perhaps I was right to use the word "pretend"...?”
seems to suggest that you are saying this.
When you ask:
“Have you never had your personal response to a poem (or novel or film etc.)
changed by contact with another person's opinion or argument? For the
present discussion, let's say by a critical essay. If so, what has happened
to this "problematical" meeting of text and reader?”
My answer is, yes, regarding novels, films, essays etc., but not with poems,
which become for me, to paraphrase Keats, “almost wordings of my highest
thoughts”.
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