Re: Thinking with Jim and Robbie

From: <Omlor@aol.com>
Date: Wed Oct 30 2002 - 11:54:55 EST

Scottie,

I do not believe my words can be simply reduced to saying "we can never be sure." I believe I am also saying something about who produces meaning (rather than just who finds meaning) when they read (and how).

And, as I've said, I am speaking about complex literary utterances, not the sort of examples you keep offering. Yes, the sender makes a difference. But the difference the sender makes when we read "Before the Law" or "The Waste Land" or _Glas_ is much more problematic than the difference the sender makes in your example. And the notion that every author of a literary text had, in his or her head, every possible meaning for every possible reader for all time at the very moment they were composing the text they signed seems, to me, a truly impossible article of faith and counter to many, many personal experiences with written and read texts as described by many many authors throughout history, inlcuding those I have listed previously.

All the best,

--John
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Received on Wed Oct 30 12:00:25 2002

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