Monday, September 14, 2009
Oh, Now I See It.
I think that Augustine makes a very interesting statement in the opening paragraph of the first excerpt. He says that discussions of Scripture require to posses the, “means of discovering what the thought may be, and the means of expressing what the thought is” (4.1). I think that he makes a very clear distinction here that will be important as we begin to move from these ancient theorists into the more modern realm of literary theory. Augustine claims that the first step to discussing the Scriptures (literature) is the ability to discover what the thought might be. He does not say that you must find a truth within the texts. He does not even suggest that there is only one possibility for what the text is saying. He leaves it open to a number of readings. The key is that the reader has the means to discover some thought within the text. His second point is that the reader must be able to not only discover the thought, but must also be able express that thought. This seems to be the basis for literary theory. The theorists must be able to find a thought within a text and then tell his reader/ listener what that thought is, and how the text supports it. We are no longer looking for Plato’s single truth, or even the words of a “good man.” We are using a text to discover a thought and then discussing that thought. Welcome to lit theory.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
As arguments against "Truth" abound, Augustine does the academic community a great service in suggesting that we should focus "first on the discovery of thought, then its expression" (361). However, is difficult to square this argument with the edict that "it is the duty, then, of the student and teacher of the Holy Scriptures, who is the defender of the true Faith, and the opponent of error, both to teach what is right and to correct what is wrong..." (362).
ReplyDeleteThis concept of interpreting text, reminds me of Rosentblatt's Transactional Reading Theory. "...to see the reading act as an event involving a particular individual and a particular text, happening at a particular time, under particular circumstances, in a particular social and cultural setting, and as part of the ongoing life of the individual and the group" (Rosenblatt, 1985). In other words, no two people will experience a text in the exact same way—much like what you stated about Augustine: the reader is left to interpret the work, then they must articulate the meaning to the audience (like Scripture in your Augustine example—“He does not even suggest that there is only one possibility for what the text is saying.”)
ReplyDelete