File spoon-archives/phillitcrit.archive/phillitcrit_1997/phillitcrit.9709, message 175


Date: Fri, 26 Sep 1997 17:53:58 +0100
From: "Larbaud Jr." <larbaud-AT-mandic.com.br>
Subject: Re: PLC: Intentional Fallacy


George Trail wrote:
> 
> >The fallacy has to do, in literature, with the notion that while an author
> >may intend such-and-such an effect in a given work, a reader might perceive
> >the work in a way radically different.  The fallacy is assuming that what you
> >perceive is what the author intended.
> >
> >John Palcewski
> 
> I must intrude here that the above is incorrect. I quote directly from W &
> B's essay: ". . .the design or intention of the author is neither available
> nor desirable as a stndard for judging the success of a work of literary
> art." The fallacy is to judge a work by its fulfillment of that
> (unavailable) intention. The distinction between this and what John asserts
> is crucial.
> 
> g
> (aka g trail, engl. u. of houston)

 If the intention of an author is always unavailable, then it seems to
me that you just can't state that 'the above is incorrect'. This can be
a metaphor or a lyrical view on the issue, things that can't be
'incorrect'.
Without the assumption of any intention, communication seems to be
impossible.
 
Larbaud Jr.
-- 
"Eine Zeit missversteht die andere; und eine kleine Zeit missversteht
alle andern in ihrer eigenen hässlichen Weise."
http://www.geocities.com/Paris/LeftBank/2238/


   

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