Re: Ideas, finite and infinite

William Hochman (wh14@is9.nyu.edu)
Wed, 18 Aug 1999 12:35:16 -0400 (EDT)

Frank Kermode said that a classic book was classic because it yielded
polysemantic meaning over time.  In other words, books like Catcher adapt
to readers lives in new and meaningful ways.  An example of this may be
that Catcher's language has gone from being "realistic" to "historic"
while still being able to reflect something insightful about the way
adolescents speak. will

On Wed, 18 Aug 1999, Camille Scaysbrook wrote:

> 
> Perhaps what I'm saying is that great pieces of art have some amount of
> adaptability built into them, either consciously or subconsciously - which
> goes back to what Scottie is saying. Catcher, while set in the 50's, will
> always be a resonant story, whereas, say, `Absolute Beginners', a book that
> is often compared to it, will not. The best comparison would be
> Shakespeare, whose works, while firmly and obdurately set in and produced
> for English Elizabethans, is infinitely adaptable and will never lose its
> overall meaning to the ages.
> 
> Camille
> verona_beach@geocities.com