Re: Thinking with Jim and Robbie

From: Jim Rovira <jrovira@drew.edu>
Date: Mon Oct 28 2002 - 01:47:37 EST

Again, Scottie, I'd say the two examples you choose are of a completely
different nature. The guy with the knife is Present with you. No
misunderstanding his intention there. The written word isn't always as
clear -- the author isn't ever present. A good essay, I believe, we can get
a good bit of clarity from (but there will still be some ambiguity as
well). A good novel, less so. Poetry, even less so. Poems like The Waste
Land, not at all.

I think it's important to recognize this is a matter of degree. In part,
this is a response to Robbie's post as well. I believe he completely
understands Achilles' rage. Or, at least, I'm willing to believe that for
the sake of argument -- I suspect with 2000 years of Christian moral
teaching about not being angry with your brother without cause we feel
differently about rage than Homer did -- without even being sure quite how.
But the thought that Robbie understands every word of Homer just the way
Homer understood it strains credibility.

Jim

Scottie Bowman wrote:

> '... against what do you check it in order to see if it corresponds
> to just what was going on in the author's mind ...'
>
> Doesn't this, in effect, do away with the usefulness of the idea
> of 'intention' itself ? Not just a chap writing his last testament,
> but also his brother coming at you with a knife & an unpleasant
> expression on his face?
>
> Which would seem, in turn, to do away with many other ideas:
> responsibility, good will, ill will, etc, etc, ETC.
>
> It's not actually how we live our lives. Not even, I imagine,
> literary scholars.
>
> Scottie B.
>
>
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Received on Mon Oct 28 01:47:47 2002

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