Re: brouhaha

Responses below:

"L. Manning Vines" wrote:

> Jim writes:
>
> I agree that this is a question for the philosophical mind to consider --
> though I'm not so sure that it "needs" to be considered or justified by the
> casual reader, or even critic.

I'd say it's definitely a question for the critic, but not for the casual
reader. I'll talk more about the casual reader below:

> I do suspect, however, that anyone who would
> immediately dismiss a reading of Moby Dick that puts Ishmael's place in the
> program of providence in Bush's presidency (perhaps making the Arab
> harpooner out to be bin Laden), or who would be reluctant about a reading of
> Shakespeare that requires in the word "gay" a suggestion of homosexuality,
> yet who claims to be dubious about the preference you mention -- I do
> suspect that this person rather needs to consider it.

Unfortunately, the examples you provide are more the types of mistakes a casual
reader would make, and not a literary critic. You use very poor examples of the
work of literary critics, if that's your intent.

A better representation of the work critics actually do might suggest looking at
the function Middle Eastern characters serve in Shakespeare or Melville and
making inferences about the relationship between East and West via those
characters. This is a lot less cartoonish than imagining someone past the
undergraduate stage would think the word "gay" means "homosexual" in
Shakespeare's work.

Which it does, of course, to modern readers who aren't familiar with Elizabethan
English. Even sticking closely to the verbal conventions of Elizabethan
English, Shakespeare's plays can mean more than he intended.

Jim

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Received on Mon Apr 21 19:53:33 2003