Subject: Re: (urth) Get a bigger hamme

From: Michael Straight <straight at email.unc.edu>
Date: Sat, 28 Dec 2002 22:56:39 +0000

On Mon, 23 Dec 2002, Roy C. Lackey wrote:

> I cannot agree. Authorial intent is not to be dismissed so casually.
> Propagandists of one stripe or another have historically cited respected,
> even revered, sources in support of their cause. The Bible is a good
> example. Verses can be (and have been) quoted from it that would seem to
> justify a whole host of evils, from slavery to war to genocide. The Nazis
> quoted Nietzsche. Madison and Jefferson are often cited in church/state
> debates by atheists and believers alike as authorities in support of
> opposing agenda. Authorial intent, where it can be discerned, has everything
> to do with it. Quotes out of context and those that are not representative
> of the whole distort the meaning of the work.

I have to say that this cracks me up.  The difference between a bunch of
folks sitting around talking about which interpretation of a story makes
for the most fun reading and the examples you cite is so vast, I feel like
we need totally different words to describe them.

Authorial intent matters when you care deeply about what the author was
trying to say.  (e.g. biblical interpretation for Christians).  You may
have a keen interest in what Wolfe was trying to do in the Short Sun
books, but maybe Chris has a keen interest in coming up with what he
thinks is a more fun reading.

The important part is that this is all for fun.  We're not gonna use the
results to decide who lives and who dies.

-Rostrum

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From: Josh Geller <dclxvi at dclxvi.best.vwh.net>
Date: Sat, 28 Dec 2002 23:03:37 +0000

> The important part is that this is all for fun.

For us, now.

>                                            We're not gonna use the

We're not. So far.

Hopefully no one ever will. But who can predict the future?

Give it time: another Thirty Years War might be fought over the opinions
expressed on this list.

Never understimate the power of human stupidity.

.

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From: Michael Straight <straight at email.unc.edu>
Date: Tue, 31 Dec 2002 07:38:41 +0000

> Give it time: another Thirty Years War might be fought over the opinions

Um....well.  Ok, even given that mind-bogglingly unlikely scenario, why
would it be more important that we talk about what Wolfe originally
intended instead of about interpretations sompe people like better than
his original intent?

-Rostrum

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From: Matthew Weber <mweber at library.berkeley.edu>
Date: Tue, 31 Dec 2002 17:15:32 +0000

>intended instead of about interpretations sompe people like better than

Assuming that "original intent" is a thing that can be known in the 
first place--even if the author's still alive, s/he may not tell the 
truth, or may have forgotten, might think it unimportant, etc.

The New Criticism is an established literary fact, and kicking 
against it will prove to be more trouble than it's worth.  Not to say 
that authorial intent is unimportant, but it's not the Grail:  nobody 
knows all the reasons why they do things (or psychotherapy wouldn't 
be necessary).  There's a lot in any author's work that they might 
not have consciously put there; why not take the time to tease it out?

Please note that the New Crit is NOT a free pass to spin isogeses 
about Severian as a drag queen, Herbert Hoover in disguise, or a 
Fungi from Yuggoth.

Matt

The fault is great in man or woman
Who steals a goose from off a common;
But what can plead that man's excuse
Who steals a common from a goose?
	The Tickler Magazine, 1 Feb. 1821

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From: Chris <rasputin_ at hotmail.com>
Date: Tue, 31 Dec 2002 17:57:21 +0000

There is also the general feeling going into it (not to say that it is the 
sole reason behind what you term "The New Criticism") that the work should 
stand on its own; the roots of what is to be interpreted from the text 
should be *in* the text (or, I suppose, body of texts) and if the author has 
anything further to say to explain what he meant, he should have somehow put 
that in the text in the first place.

There are plenty of arguments that can be made against this, and I won't 
dispute them. However, I suspect it's a sentiment that Wolfe himself shares. 
I've always gotten the feeling that he's been reluctant to answer these 
questions about his work because he wants them to stand on their own, and 
that he's made uncomfortable by the prospect of adding something that will 
alter or "fix" the reader's interpretation. This also helps account, I 
think, for how upset he gets about even the smallest unintentional error 
that he might make in the text (I seem to recall him talking about one in 
the end of the Long Sun series, in the afterword or thereabouts...) - 
perhaps he doesn't feel that his word, after the fact, is in itself a 
completely adequate fix.

Tangentially, I tend to read what an author has to say about his work 
anyway. With Wolfe I find it rewarding. The worst experience I had with it, 
though, was reading what Faulkner had to say about "The Sound and the Fury" 
and finding out that some of the things I found most masterful were in fact 
completely incidental, and that if he'd had his full way with the story (the 
printer imposed certain limitations on him) I would have been keenly 
disappointed with the result. Sometimes, you just don't want to know what 
the author really meant.

>Assuming that "original intent" is a thing that can be known in the first 
>place--even if the author's still alive, s/he may not tell the truth, or 
>may have forgotten, might think it unimportant, etc.
>
>The New Criticism is an established literary fact, and kicking against it 
>will prove to be more trouble than it's worth.  Not to say that authorial 
>intent is unimportant, but it's not the Grail:  nobody knows all the 
>reasons why they do things (or psychotherapy wouldn't be necessary).  
>There's a lot in any author's work that they might not have consciously put 
>there; why not take the time to tease it out?
>
>Please note that the New Crit is NOT a free pass to spin isogeses about 
>Severian as a drag queen, Herbert Hoover in disguise, or a Fungi from 
>Yuggoth.
>
>
>
>Matt
>

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From: Joe Cilluffo <cilluff1 at optonline.net>
Date: Tue, 31 Dec 2002 19:54:43 +0000

Chris wrote:

<<> There are plenty of arguments that can be made against this, and I won't
> alter or "fix" the reader's interpretation.>>

I seem to recall that UOTNS is an example of this, that his editor talked
him into the volume to explain the prior four books, and that GW acquiesced
to this against his own judgment.

> disappointed with the result. Sometimes, you just don't want to know what

I tend to agree with Chris and those listmembers who have voiced similar
feelings that it depends on what you are reading the work for.  If you are
reading or analyzing for your personal enjoyment, then the author's "true"
intent is irrelevant -- one of my favorite Yeats poems resonates with me
deeply on a personal level even though the genesis of the poem for Yeats
himself was civil unrest in his beloved Ireland.

Even when you are analyzing a work, the author's intent isn't necessarily
relevant to a cogent or valid analysis.  For example, it is possible to
enjoy The Picture of Dorian Gray and to find textual support for the
respective superiority of each of Basil, Lord Henry and Dorian despite which
of them Wilde himself thought and intended to be most admirable.  Another
fine example of how irrelevant authorial intent may sometimes be would be
propagandistic works -- the filmakers who helmed Birth of a Nation or
Triumph of the Will certainly intended them to portray the South and Nazi
Germany respectively in great lights but that doesn't preclude analysts from
holding them and saying "see, here is a fine example of what was wrong the
South," despite the fact that the authors intended them to be the opposite.

However, one area in which you pretty much cannot ignore authorial intent is
if you are trying to determine what "really" happened in a fictional work --
if you are trying to determine whether Severian is really Jesus and GW says
"no, he's a Christian, but not Christ," if your concern is determining the
"truth" of what "really" happened in the work the author is the only
potentially valid source of truth.  Two points here.  First, if you are not
trying to determine what "really" happened then what the author intended is
irrelevant.  For example, if what you are interested in is whether Severian
*can be viewed* as a Christ figure, then whether Gene Wolfe meant him to be
one is irrelevant.  The difference being whether you are looking at the
fictional universe in which the story takes place (is Severian Jesus?) or
whether you are just looking at the work from a literary standpoint (is
Severian a Christ figure).  If literay analysis is what you are reading for
then whether the author intended something to be allegorical or humorous is
irrelevant to whether something indeed serves as an allegory or source of
humor (hence all those awful sitcoms on TV...).  The second point is that I
say the author is only a potentially valid source because it may be the case
that there is no ultimate source of the truth, even when considering the
fictional universe, because at the time of putting pen to paper the author
may not have planned out the matter at issue, in which case he or she is
making a guess just as much as you are.  For example, would Severian have
slept with Dorcas anyway if he had known who she was?   Or are there any
people left on Lune during Severian's time or Typhon's reign?  These are
questions about the fictional universe but which may not have an answer b/c
GW never pondered them or never included them in the text (and anything not
in the text, at least by reference or implication, for all intents and
purposes does not exist).

Anyway, that's my two cents.

Happy New Year to all!

- Joe a/k/a Shell

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