Manifesto?

[Barry Arrowsmith]

--- In the_old_crowd at yahoogroups.com, "nrenka" <nrenka at y...> wrote:
> 
> 
> You may find it too fancy, but I like the lit crit term 
> of "intersubjective details", which adds up to much the same thing--
> which features of a text can be agreed upon by a fairly wide 
> community.
> 

Kneasy:
We're  talking about  different things, I think.
By undescribed detail that the reader fills in I'm referring to background 
stuff that no writer bothers with unless they have significance; room 
dimensions, colour schemes, full descriptions of minor characters, for example.
When the name 'Pansy Parkinson' is mentioned readers will form an image
of a person, but because there is minimal detail provided in the text, each
reader will fill in the gaps and form an idea of what they think she may look 
like. It's highly unlikely that any two images so formed will be the same,
even though based on the same few canon details. They're the bits that
don't matter, even if readers disagree about them. 

> 
> Here's the problem; you seem to be advancing the proposition that 
> there is One Thing which the author has put in to be comprehended, 
> the 'meaning' of the text, as it were.  However, you've already noted 
> that an author can't define everything, but requires the active 
> participation of the reader to make a text work.  We fill in any 
> number of gaps of various kinds when we read.
>  
> That seems to be what you're saying with the analogy; the idea that 
> the image is 'aberrant' could be taken as stating that there is 
> indeed an exact image.
> 

Kneasy:
Any author that puts in just one thing isn't much of an author IMO.
To extend my colour-blind analogy - a half-way decent writer weaves
a tapestry, many threads, all of different colours woven into an
harmonious whole - or comprehensible whole, anyway. If we fail to
distinguish (or ignore) subtle changes of tone, decide that we find
one or more of the colours inimical, or decide that we'll dwell on
the red bits, does that change the tapestry?
No, I don't think so.
 
> 
> The text as in the printed words upon the page may not change, but 
> the story itself is not so fixed a thing as that--unless you want to 
> argue that all the different readings of 'the story', all the 
> different possible patterns that we as readers pick up on are all 
> simply projections and we're all missing the point.  

Kneasy:
Yes. I'm saying exactly that.
A written work is an attempt at communication, to transmit ideas
to others. But reception may not be perfect for one reason or
another. To suggest that 'mishearing' produces a valid interpretation
is to argue that a game of Chinese Whispers is a good way to transmit
specific information. 

> 
> On the level of plain fact and events, there is, in a sense, one 
> story--X happened and Y did not.  On the level of everything else, 
> it's considerably more complex.  I'm frankly a little surprised that 
> you elide the reader out to such an extent.  Works of literature are, 
> these days, thought of more as things which engage the activity of a 
> reader rather than being lectures from author to reader that can be 
> reduced down to indisputable meaning.
> 

Kneasy:
Why so? Are you so sure that the apparent complexity isn't a result of 
your own incomprehension? Missed cues, faulty interpretation, incorrect
conclusions drawn?

One of the (to me) unwelcome consequences of the modern fashion of
the individual over just about everything else is the strange idea that
just because someone can form an opinion, then that opinion is worth-
while. Absolute load of cobblers. Most of us, on most subjects, offer
opinions based on information varying from incomplete to totally
without foundation. And yes, I include Kneasy on subjects like this one.
(It's particularly heart-warming when 'experts' make a complete balls-up,
comforting confirmation that we are not alone in our ineptitude.)
That may seem contradictory after doggedly pushing my own ideas so
firmly. In actuality I'm expressing an instinctive belief that a writers
intentions are paramount. A mob of individuals claiming that what they 
see, what they want to see, must be well-founded because their opinion 
is as good as anyone else's, right? - is no more than yet another manifestation
of the cult of pandering to the unknowingly inadequate.

When discussing works most sensible comment is prefaced by, or understood
to be modified by, phrases like "As I see it" or "My take on it" - which
includes the possibility of uncertainty or error on the part of the
speaker. Others may then offer dissent or support. In either case it is,
consciously or unconsciously an exercise to define/determine the guts of
the story. Isn't that the author's intention? For us to ferret out the golden 
thread? But if we don't, if we give primacy to our own individual constructs,
we end up with a stunted (or mutant) offspring that crawls feebly within the 
confines of our own limitations. I read to find out what the writer's
limitations are, not my  own - those're all too evident. 


> > Mind you, that doesn't mean we can't or shouldn't interpret 
> > authorial intention according to our every whim. 
> 
> Maybe then I am misreading you, but it seems to me that your 
> differentiation between the projections that readers make (naughty 
> foolish readers) and (the position you like) interpreting authorial 
> intention by our whims is a distinction without a difference.  It's 
> not like interpretation isn't a personal thing too.  It can involve 
> just as much projection as the above; responsibly relegated, perhaps, 
> but the nature of interpretation is that it's not reducable to 
> truth.  Don't you resist the idea that there's one true way, after 
> all?
>

Not quite. In  fact not all -  you're ignoring the fact that the work is 
incomplete. That makes a hell of a difference. No one can at this moment
be totally sure what Jo's intentions are. Right now I can postulate anything
that doesn't conflict with existing canon. Hell, some fans go further,
that Sirius lives, for example. Outside of fanon this will not be possible
once the conclusion is reached. 

Kneasy
who is of the opinion that no opinion is worth a damn unless it's backed
by reproducible experimental results. Doesn't stop him offering them, though.