[HPforGrownups] Re: On the nature of theories/MAGIC DISHWASHER

[eloiseherisson at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 47700

I apologise for the lateness of this. Suffering from a surfeit of Real Life, 
I'm afraid.
And I've just missed Pip again. Ah well.

Pip:
<>> Eloise:
> > Well, that kind of depends on your opinion of authorial intent, 
> > whether it is of any meaning or not, doesn't it? ;-) (And I mean 
> > the intent of the authors of theories as much as that of the 
> > authors of books.)
> 
> Pip:
> Um, no, I would say it depended on what someone admitted as 'canon'.
> 
> My view is that any factual detail about the internal world of a 
> book or series of books that can be definitely attributed to the 
> author is canonical. Hogwarts has 1000 students. Jane Bennet's 
> favourite colour is yellow. Both of these points are not in the 
> respective books, the first case being from an interview with JKR, 
> the second case being from a private letter of Jane Austen's.
> 
> MD is an argument based on canon. JKR is the creator of canon, the 
> creator of the world of Harry Potter. It is her world, she created 
> it, we just get to play around in it. She has the last word.
> 
> If she wants it. :-)
> 
> [This is my personal view, not the official list view.]

And, obviously, not my view!
As I have stated in my reply to Grey Wolf, I do not regard that which an 
author says or writes but does not publish within the context of his/her 
books as canon.
I do think that your view rather confusingly mixes up canon with authorial 
intent. These are not the same thing.

> 
> Eloise:
> > I'm the first to admit that I don't understand the finer points  
> >of  MD, so this is probably completely wrong, but there's something 
> I don't get.
> > 
> > If you regarded MD invalidated by what JKR said, wouldn't that 
> > mean that you were taking into account authorial intent?
> 
> Pip:
> I don't know, because I haven't the foggiest idea what you mean by 
> authorial intent [grin]. It sounds suspiciously like some kind of 
> technical term? 
> 

Let me first assure you that I have no special claim to technical literary 
know-how, having not studied English beyond 'A' Level years and years ago.
Yes, it is a technical term, though not very obscure. It refers, 
unsurprisingly, to the author's intentions and more specifically their 
pre-eminence in the interpreting of a text. It's a term which comes from 
hermeneutics (the branch of knowledge which deals with interpretation, 
particularly of Scripture or literary texts and of which I know nothing), but 
is really quite easy to grasp. Quite a lot easier than "metathinking", I'd 
say. (They're both terms I first heard here).

I took this definition from a Christian hermeneutics site (if you do a search 
for "authorial intent" that's mostly what'll come up):

"Authorial intent. No reader has the right to impose his own ideas on the 
text. The only true meaning is what the author himself intended. This rule 
was first devised to combat allegorizing and other fanciful modes of 
interpretation which obscured rather than elucidated."

I confess that I laughed as I skimmed the page as the theological disputes it 
outlined were precisely the kind of ones we're having here. 

As I understand it, and certainly for some of us round here, the idea that a 
literary text's only true meaning is what the author intended is a little 
unfashionable.

The first discussions regarding authorial intent that I can remember on this 
site were back in February, in Elkins' "Where's the Canon" thread (34082ff). 
I picked up on it because the ideas tied in very much with what I had been 
taught regarding music and the invalidity of supposing that one has to seek 
to reproduce exactly what the composer had in mind. As I pointed out back 
then, music *depends* on interpretation. Similarly, literature essentially 
doesn't exist without the reader. The writer has no control over how the 
reader chooses to interpret his/her work. Indeed it is quite possible that 
what the author *writes* may not really be what s/he inteneded. I personally 
think that Draco very nearly comes into this category. I think JKR *intends* 
Draco to be a great deal more unpleasant than he is actually portrayed to be, 
though this is saved from being an issue of mere authorial intent by the fact 
that she tells us *within the books* that Dudley compares favourably with 
him.

*My* point of view is that what JKR *intends* is irrelevant. She has written 
what she has written and any theory or interpretation which is consonant with 
canon (viz. the published texts of the HP books) is legitimate.

So, as I said to Grey Wolf, if she said she didn't have MD in mind, but by 
the end of the series the canon still all fitted and there was nothing 
intrinsically to disprove it, then I would regard it still as a legitimate 
interpretation of what JKR had written.

I do find it rather ironic that I am stating that I would continue to defend 
as valid your theory, to which I don't adhere, whilst you're arguing that it 
could be so easily invalidated.

> Eloise:
> > 
> > Isn't taking authorial intent into account metathinking?
> > 
> > If JKR's authorial intent could theoretically retrospectively 
> >*invalidate*  MD, why, if I understand correctly, has it been 
> > sugggested that it is unfair *now* to use other 'metathinking' 
> critical tools when evaluating the theory?
> 
> Pip:
> Because I didn't use metathinking tools in creating it. As I said, 
> to me the author's factual knowledge of the world they have created 
> is canonical. If JKR says Dumbledore never had a plan about the 
> rebirthing potion, that is canon to me, whether it appears in the 
> printed books or not.


Which we cannot agree over as we have different views on what constitutes 
canon.
And at the time of writing you didn't know what I meant by authorial intent.


> 
> >  Grey Wolf:
> > >>I want to make this perfectly clear, because I have the feeling 
> > that  people have been misunderstanding me: I don't like 
> > metathinking  myself,  especially against MAGIC DISHWASHER, which 
> > is based in internal  evidence (and thus it is not Fair Play), but 
> >there is  *nothing*  wrong with metathinking per-se (and I hope 
> >I've never implied anything else).<<
> > 
> 
> Eloise:
> > If the internal evidence could still support MD, why should JKR's 
> > authorial intent matter one jot?
> 
> > OTOH, would it be unfair for me to suggest that I disputed what I 
> > *think* is the whole basis of MD on the grounds that books, 
> > particularly adventure/mystery/thriller type books frequently 
> > depend on the coming together of all sorts of apparent 
> > coincidences and chains of events of the most improbable nature.  
> > It's just literary convention (and convenience) and does not imply 
> > any orchestrating hand in the background but that of the author.
> 
> Pip:
> One could say 'unfair', but mainly one could say 'it's completely 
> irrelevant'.

Eloise:
I must remember that argument! ;-)

Pip:
> 
> I suspect [I've said this before] that we're coming from completely 
> different theoretical backgrounds. The analysis of canon that 
> created the Dishwasher is probably closest in theory to a 
> Stanislavskian approach, if you want to use one of *my* technical 
> terms [grin].
> 
> 
> 
Eloise:
At least you admit that you *have* a theoretical background. I thought that 
sort of stuff was just for highfalutin English prof types. ;-)
So the adoption of a theoretical framework isn't intrinsically metathinking, 
then?

<Snip explanation of Stanislavskian interpretation and a lot of stuff which 
Charis Julia has admirably covered>

Thank you. I now understand where you're coming from a lot better.
I can see how that approach is if great value to the actors playing the parts 
of the Potterverse characters and also to the writers of Fan Fic.

It is also, as Charis has pointed out, an approach many of us adopt ourseves 
- but not in isolation. George, Diana and the Sirius Apologist all approach 
canon by taking an inside view of the character concerned, but end up taking 
the view that the characters are acting honestly, at least on the emotional 
level. To start theorising based on the notion that the characters might be 
lying about their emotions (I'm thinking, naturally, of Snape, as always ;-) 
) seems to me to be much more dangerous than taking them at face value. 

And of course, there is Pippin's point about JKR's view of Dumbledore as the 
epitome of goodness, which you presumably take as canon and which seems 
terribly compromised by the lengths of moral relativism to which MD drives 
him.

Pip:
> <>Dumbledore lives *within* the books. 
> And you can look at him from the outside.
> Or you can try and analyse him from the inside.
> 
> But you'll find it awfully difficult to do both simultaneously.
> 
> And that's why 'metathinking is not fair play'. You're asking me to 
> look in two directions simultaneously.
> 
> And I go cross-eyed ;-)

Eloise:

Even if we concentrate on what is before us, we can still be informed by our 
peripheral vision. Unless we decide to adopt blinkers ;-)

As Charis says, one of the strengths of this community is that mutually 
incompatible theories *can* live happily side by side. Take Diana and 
Banging.

Now Diana is born precisely from trying to get inside the head of a 
character, treating him as a real person, trying understand his emotions and 
to work out his possible motivations. Big Bang, OTOH is a product of studying 
the nature of the narrative in the HP series and is thus, I presume 
metathinking(?) But I do not regard Big Bang's criticisms of Diana as unfair 
or...what's that word?... irrelevant. They are perfectly fair and perfectly 
relevant as the character that I like to think of and try to understand as a 
'real' person is, in fact the creation of a writer and his words, actions, 
emotions and motivations are not, in reality, under his own control. Both 
approaches are valid and each may inform the other. Maybe Cindy's right and 
JKR *has* established a pattern whereby every major turning point in the 
story is accompanied by a Bang and I need to bear that in mind. OTOH, maybe 
George and Diana's assessment of Snape's character indicates that Bangs are 
not an *inevitable* accompaniment to *every* turning point.

I originally got involved in this because of what I saw as a logical 
contradicion between MD's stated view of being a purely internal, canon-based 
theory and your willingness to embrace what I see as (external) authorial 
intent. I still see that contradiction, though I now understand why you do 
not.

But I still have difficulty understanding how you are at the same time able 
to reconcile acknowledging that HP has an author and is therefore a piece of 
fictional writing, with the contention that its must be interpreted without 
reference to that fictional framework, as if its characters were real and had 
autonomous control of their own actions. I'd say *that's* not fair play. ;-) 

Though I suppose I've got it wrong again <sigh> ;-)

~Eloise

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You think that just because it's already happened, the past is finished and 
unhangeable? Oh no, the past is cloaked in multi-colored taffeta and every 
time we look at it we see a different hue.

(Milan Kundera, Life is Elsewhere)


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]