or, in defense of the literary critic.
literary criticism, and especially postmodern literary criticism, seems to be defended mostly by its practicioners and roundly given contempt by everyone else. it is often denigrated as "bullshit" or, more scathingly, as the critic reading him or herself into the author's work and not reading the author.
admittedly theories like "the death of the author" do not help this perception any.
as someone who has been trained in and practises literary criticism to a certain degree, it should not be surprising that i am defending it. but i do believe it is a valid method of inquiry, and it has important things to say. it is this belief that led me to where i am today, a graduate student. i started down this path one evening, standing under a tv monitor in the lobby where i was taking registrations for a conference and listening to the opening night speaker. he was condemning literary criticsm and postmodernism in general. at the time, i was only a few years out of my undergrad, which had heavily featured these theories, and as i was listening, i realized i was muttering at nearly every pause of the speaker, "no, that's wrong." i went and expressed my disagreement with one of the conference organizers, and 4 1/2 years later, i've just finished my first year in grad school. so i'm putting my money where my mouth is ;)
anyway. we've all seen cases (or we have if we follow this kind of thing) where a critic offers an opinion about what a book is about, or what ideas or themes or philosophies it might contain, and the author says, "no, that's all wrong." depending on who you like better, usually either you come away from the debate with the idea that the critic is an idiot or the author is a petulant control freak.
i would suggest neither of these are healthy.
is it not possible that both could be right? the author certainly had an intention in mind when writing (and only living authors have the ability to defend their intention), but intention is not everything. context, context, context. the author is a contextual being. the premise of literary criticism is that that context might inject itself into the work, whether the author meant to or not, whether the author was even aware of it or not. communication is a two-way street: you speak, i receive. you cannot, however, control
what i receive. you might use certain strategies to avoid ambiguity, but your context will dictate certain things to you, and mine will dictate things to me.
let us take an example. an author writes a science fiction novel. a feminist critic reads the novel and declares it to be a boorish defense of patriarchy. the author protests there was no intention to talk about patriarchy one way or another in the novel. the critic points out settings, language, characterisations, and plot devices which point to a worldview which views patriarchy as beneficial. the author complains the critic is a feminist, so he or she must be reading his or her own ideology into the critique. the critic claims that it is merely his or her background in feminist ideology shows the characteristics in the novel, but they are there regardless.
both people are probably right. we must believe the author when he or she says the intention was not there. however, his or her philosophical stance will colour the novel. someone who believes men have a natural right to rule will not (unless trying very hard or possibly as a challenge) write a novel where, say, an all-female society is given a positive assessment. there may have been no
intent to include gender views in the novel, but they will be there nonetheless, simply because they are the author's context.
at this point in the debate, the ethical thing is for the critic to accept the author's assertion of his or her own intentionality, but not necessarily to back down on the critique. sadly, too often in my experience, it is only the latter that happens. this is often easier because the author is dead (in the case of the literature i analyze, often long dead), and unable to contest the critic's reading. as valid as that reading is, i still think that the critic always ought to be prepared to admit that what he or she sees may not be what the author intended. however, this often gives power to the analysis. if the author did not intend the ideology betrayed in the writing, it means that it provides, perhaps, a clearer window into the author's context, society, culture, etc, since it is unshaped by concious intention. the conclusions of literary criticism are often accurate and valid. but they should also be humble.
see? i said i would come up with something interesting to post.
