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January 21, 2005

Comments

David Fiore

I agree completely Marc--I have often waged war on interpretations that place too much weight upon the author's stated claims about the work, but I have even less interest in the pop culture as a "mirror of the times" argument--if "the culture" was actually capable of casting such perfect reflections, nothing would EVER change... every new contribution to the culture is filtered through the subjective consciousness of a fragment of that culture...nothing is ever "mere superstructure" (which is the way pop culture is often treated)...it's all part of whatever structure there is--regardless of how many minds contributed to its production.

Dave

Grotesqueticle

Often when readers claim they're looking for the author's intent they're really just working from the text, which is usually all we have to work with anyway and is, from my formalist biases, exactly where we usually ought to begin.

Exactly. All we have to work from is the text itstlf. Sometimes a story is just a story. I remember reading one of Stephen Kings prefaces to a short story. In it he wrote about taking a class in creative writing and having a particularly pretentious professor. They were at loggerheads regarding "authors intent". It was Kings assertion that telling a good story is the ultimate goal. To hell with allegory or anything else. King, of course had the last laugh. Say what you will about his place vis-a-vis American Story tellers, he HAS sold a butt-load of copies. I had the same reaction in the college literature classes I took. I don't give a flying leap what the author intended either A. while he was writing the work, or B. what he DECIDED he intended after reading the reviews. Was the story interesting? If not, were the characters interesting? If not, was the language put together in a lyrical way? Or, in that rarest of worlds, all three? Most authors are lucky to be batting .333.
Not trying to be snarky here, honestly. I just discovered your blog, and I love anyplace that talks seriously about comics. And if you get to reference Ellison in your class color me duly envious.

Dom

I should clarigy two points, as I agree with Marc(?). If one is looking for a comic that reflects the 90s, there are likely better examples than KC. But, I was saying that if the professor *really* liked KC, and by gum, wanted to teach it with any excuse, it would have been a bit better to argue KC was a reflection of the 90s' culture in general, rather than arguing it to be purely political. (The King example of course leaves open the problem of defining "good story".)

And, yes, I tend to think that Kingdom Come was Wade talking about comics as a specific field, and not about culture as a whole.

If I ever manage to get back into a classroom (as a TA again), I might assign some work on author intent. It would be fun if nothing else.


Arguing from author intent tends to involve speculation, as in many cases the author is dead. (To be honest, if you have a way to ask Charles Dickens, or Mark Gruenwald about their intent, I still do not want to know.) But, if one can reasonably determine the intent, then, there is a basis for evaluation. For example, a parody should have certain traits that a serious story should not. If something reads like a parody, but is intended to be serious, then it has failed.

Charles

Don't much care about KC as I found it particularly awful, but I agree with the sentiment behind the critique, even if a bit of possible intention is being overlooked. There's 3 intentions (cribbed from Eco): the author's, the reader's and the text's. These interact to form an interpretation that's not wholly reducible to any one source. Without a consideration of intention (or something very much like it), we get any sort of loopy interpretation of whatever's at hand. Eco takes Rorty apart on this very issue in "Role of a Reader".

Marc

If you mean a consideration of any kind of intention I might be inclined to agree, although if "intention" includes author, reader, and text then it's grown so large as to encompass the entire act of interpretation, and its utility as a term of analysis wanes.

The way your comments are phrased, though, seems to draw heavily on the old "culture war" arguments that exaggerated claims of the "death of the author" as a way of attacking critical theory. I think such arguments grossly overstated the importance of authorial intent, and the extent to which ignoring it can be blamed on those damned postmodern theorists - the "intentional fallacy" comes to us from the New Critics, after all, and they're the last people to throw the gates open to any loopy interpretation.

The original comments suggested the writer's intent and the writer's intent alone is the most important key to interpretation, and that just hasn't been acceptable for over a century (except perhaps to surly undergrads looking to get out of doing their own interpretive work).

Also, if the reflection theory is a better case for teaching KC than the strained political allegory, well, that's another good reason not to teach KC...

charles

No problem with the intentional fallacy, only the reductio ad absurdum version known as reader-response theory. So, we're not in disagreement. The intentional structure of a text is a necessary component if one wishes to get away from the reader vs. author dichotomy.

charles again

And does citing Eco really make one sound like a flag-waving anti-PC crusader?

Marc

Nah, it was the "we get any sort of loopy interpretation of whatever's at hand."

charles

Well, there's a reasonable concern with constraints and then there's conservatism.

Marc

True enough - nor is it exactly a fine line, as these days the prevailing conservative discourse about literary criticism would appear to be calling it all Stalinism.

Gotta love John's reply to that one, though...

Bernice

hello marc,

first of all, I would like to take this time to tell you that I think you are a awsome actor. I enjoyed beastmaster the most you were great. I was looking through your biograghy and I was pleased to find out that you are now a professor at a University in Washington. I understand that you did some research on homelessness in the past. Can you tell me if the homeless situation has been dealt with or is it getting worse in the USA. I know that the homeless situation in Toronto seems to be getting worse as the years pass. We still do not have any answers for this and the problem seems to be never really dealt with. I am a Social Service Worker and have worked in the field for over 12 years in the downtown area of Toronto. Our need here is mainly affordable housing and more jobs. Do you have any suggestions in how we can make this problem better. What is your housing situation in Washington for the homeless are there any real answers. I would like to know if you could help me in finding out. Can you send me some of your articles I would really enjoy reading some of them. Keep up the good work.

regards,

Bernice
Toronto, ON Canada

Bernice

hello marc,

first of all, I would like to take this time to tell you that I think you are a awsome actor. I enjoyed beastmaster the most you were great. I was looking through your biograghy and I was pleased to find out that you are now a professor at a University in Washington. I understand that you did some research on homelessness in the past. Can you tell me if the homeless situation has been dealt with or is it getting worse in the USA. I know that the homeless situation in Toronto seems to be getting worse as the years pass. We still do not have any answers for this and the problem seems to be never really dealt with. I am a Social Service Worker and have worked in the field for over 12 years in the downtown area of Toronto. Our need here is mainly affordable housing and more jobs. Do you have any suggestions in how we can make this problem better. What is your housing situation in Washington for the homeless are there any real answers. I would like to know if you could help me in finding out. Can you send me some of your articles I would really enjoy reading some of them. Keep up the good work.

regards,

Bernice
Toronto, ON Canada

Marc

This is sheer genius.

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