Toward

an Aesthetic
of Reception
Hans Robert Jauss
Translation from German by Timothy Bahti
Introduction by Paul de Man
Theory and History of Literature !olume "
NEWCASTLE UNIVERSITY LIBRAR
205 01493 7
#ni$ersity of Minnesota Press
Minneapolis
Publication of this wor% has been made possible in part
by a &rant from the Andrew '( Mellon )oundation(
The #ni$ersity of Minnesota Press &ratefully ac%nowled&es
the support of Inter *ationes for the translation of this boo%(
+opyri&ht , -./" by the #ni$ersity of Minnesota(
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Published by the #ni$ersity of Minnesota Press
--- Third A$enue 0outh 0uite ".1 Minneapolis M* 2231-4"2"1
Printed in the #nited 0tates of America on acid4free paper(
0e$enth printin& "112
Library of +on&ress Cataloging in Publication Data
Jauss Hans Robert(
Toward an aesthetic of reception(
5Theory and history of literature6 $( "7
Includes inde8(
+ontents9 Literary history as a challen&e to literary
theory:History of art and pra&matic history:Theory
of &enres and medie$al literature: I etc(;
-( Reader4response criticism:Addresses essays
lectures( I( Title( --( 0eries(
P*./(R</J</ /G-=(.2 /-4->">1
I0B* 14/->>-1<34? AA+R"
I0B* 14/->>4-1<?4- 5pb%(7
The German te8ts of @Literary History as a +hallen&e to Literary Theory@ and @His 4
tory of Art and Pra&mat ic Theory@ are , -.?1 by 0uhr%amp !erla&( They appear
here in An&lish by courtesy of 0uhr%amp !erla&( A different An&lish $ersion of cer 4
tain sections of @Literary History as a +hallen&e to Literary Theory@ appeared in
New Literary History I 5-.>.7( )or permission to use the translat ion that appeared
in New Literary History the publisher is &rateful to that Bournal and its editor Ralph
+ohen( The An&lish translat ion of @History of Art and Pra&matic History@ appears
here throu&h the courtesy of Princeton #ni$ersity Press where it appeared in New
Perspectives in German Literary Criticism, edited by Richard Amacher and !ictor
Lan&c 5, -.?. by Princeton #ni$ersity Press7( @Theory of Genres and Medie$al Lit4
erature@ ori&inally appeared in German in Grundriss der Romantschen Literaturen
des Mittelalters, $olume si8 C, -.?" by +arl 'inter #ni$ersitats !erla&7 and appears
here by permission of +arl 'inter #ni$ersitats !erla&( @Goethe=s and !alery=s )aust9
Dn the Hermeneutics of Euestion and Answer@ ori&inally appeared in German in
Comparative Literature "/ 5-.?>7( The essay appears here throu&h the courtesy of
that Bournal and its editor Thomas Hart as well as throu&h the courtesy of 'ilhelm
)in% !erla&( @The Poetic Te8t within the +han&e of HoriFons of Readin&9 The A84
ample of Baudelaire=s =0pleen II=@ ori&inally appeared in German in Romantiscbe
Zeitscbrift fur Literaturescbicbte, Heft "G< 5-./17 and appears here in An&lish trans4
lation courtesy of the authoi(
The #ni$ersity of Minnesota is
an eHual4opportuniry educator
and employer(
+ontents
Introduction( Paul de Man $ii Translator=s
Preface( Timothy Bahti 88$ii
+hapter -( Literary History
as a +hallen&e to Literary Theory <
+hapter "( History of Art and Pra&matic History 3>
+hapter <( Theory of Genres and Medie$al Literature ?>
+hapter 3( Goethe=s and !alery=s !aust"
Dn the Hermeneutics of Euestion and Answer --1
+hapter 2( The Poetic Te8t within
the +han&e of HoriFons of Readin&9
The A8ample of Baudelaire=s @0pleen II@ -<.
*otes -/.
Inde8 ""-
Introduction
Paul de Man
By his own $olition the wor% of the German literary historian and
theorist Hans Robert Jauss has been associated with a study &roup
for which he is a spo%esman and which practices a specific way of in4
$esti&atin& and teachin& literature( In the field of literary theory the
e8istence of such &roups is not an unusual occurrence( They are at
times centered on a sin&le dominatin& personality and ta%e on all
the e8alted e8clusi$eness of a secret society with its rituals of initia4
tion e8clusion and hero4worship( *othin& could be more remote
from the spirit of the &roup of which Jauss is a prominent member(
The IonstanF school of literary studies so named because se$eral of
its members tau&ht or are teachin& at the newly founded #ni$ersity
of IonstanF in 0outhern Germany is a liberal association of scholars
informally united by methodolo&ical concerns that allow for con4
siderable di$ersity( It has the character of a continuin& research semi4
nar that includes some constant members 5of which H( R( Jauss is
one7 ne8t to more casual participants6 a somewhat comparable in4
stance of such a &roup in structure if not in content would ha$e
been in this country the +hica&o critics of the )orties and )ifties
who shared an interest in Aristotelian poetics( The concerns of such
&roups are methodolo&ical rather than as in the case of the *ew +rit4
icism or the )ran%furt 0chool cultural and ideolo&ical6 their influence
is didactic and @scientific@ rather than critical( Dne has to bear this
aspect of Jauss=s wor% in mind in readin& the essays included in this
$olume9 it accounts for their pro&rammatic and relati$ely impersonal
tone( 'hereas the @masters@ of an earlier &eneration in Germany and
elsewhere literary scholars such as !ossler 0pitFer +urtius Auer4
$iii J I*TRDK#+TID*
bach or e$en Lu%acs wrote as indi$idual talents en&a&ed in specula4
tions of their own Jauss sees himself as a participant in a team that
also is concerned with the professional aspects of literary instruction(
The attitude is typical for a &eneration whose approach to literature
has become more systematic6 it is by no means incompatible with
&enuine inno$ation nor with wider humanistic commitments( In read4
in& Jauss one is not readin& the wor% of a speculati$e philosopher a
literary critic or a pure theoretician of poetics( Dne is first of all
readin& the wor% of a specialist of )rench literature who has made
contributions to a remar%ably di$erse number of topics from medie4
$al &enre theory to Marcel Proust(= But beyond this one is also
readin& the wor% of a theoretically informed learned and enli&htened
e8pert whose wor% fully warrants e8tended theoretical discussion
and didactic application(
The methodolo&y of the IonstanF school is mostly referred to as
Re#eptionsdstbeti$, a word that does not lend itself easily to trans4
lation into An&lish( 'e spea% in this country of reader4response crit4
icism or more ima&inati$ely 5thou&h also more contro$ersially7 of
@affecti$e stylistics(@
"
These terms stress readin& as a constituti$e
element of any te8t but e8cept for the implicit connotations of
@stylistic@ or @poetics@ they put less emphasis on the far4reachin&
traditional word @aesthetics@ that remains of central importance to
Jauss and his associates( 'hat has to be called somewhat aw%wardly
the @aesthetics of reception@ has itself been well recei$ed in this
country( It has been a two4way process6 the #ni$ersity of IonstanF
may be as far remo$ed from a lar&e urban center as is possible in
today=s Germany but there is nothin& pro$incial about the IonstanF
school( )rom the start in -.>< the colloHuia of the &roup included
participants from the #nited 0tates and a recent antholo&y of their
main position papers includes contributions from Michael Riffaterre
and 0tanley )ish(
<
+on$ersely leadin& members of the IonstanF
&roup such as 'olf&an& Iser JuriB 0triedter and Hans Robert Jauss
himself often teach in this country some on a permanent basis(
Leadin& American Bournals publish and re$iew their papers6 the
boo%s of 'olf&an& Iser whose field is An&lish literature ha$e been
translated and are bein& e8tensi$ely used and debated by American
specialists of narrati$e fiction( 'ith the publication of this collection
of essays by Hans Robert Jauss the introduction of the IonstanF
school to American readers is made complete( It ma%es a$ailable
some of the most lucidly ar&ued theoretical documents to ha$e ori&i4
nated in the &roup( They are indeed so clear and con$incin& as to re4
Huire little introduction( 0ince they are rooted howe$er in a meth4
I*TRDK#+TID* K i8
odolo&ical and philosophical tradition only remotely comparable to
our own it may be useful to see how Jauss=s presuppositions are re4
$ealed and put into perspecti$e by approaches that de$eloped in
different circumstances(
The aim of the IonstanF theoreticians can be deri$ed from the
&eneral title &i$en to their main publication series9 Poetics and Her4
meneutics(
3
The and that appears in this combination is not as ob4
$ious as it mi&ht seem( Hermeneutics is by definition a process
directed toward the determination of meanin&6 it postulates a trans4
cendental function of understandin& no matter how comple8 de4
ferred or tenuous it mi&ht be and will in howe$er mediated a way
ha$e to raise Huestions about the e8tralin&uistie truth $alue of literary
te8ts( Poetics on the other hand is a metalin&uistic descripti$e or
prescripti$e discipline that lays claim to scientific consistency( It
pertains to the formal analysis of lin&uistic entities as such indepen4
dently of si&nification6 as a branch of lin&uistics it deals with theo4
retical models prior to their historical realiFation( Hermeneutics
belon&s traditionally to the sphere of theolo&y and its secular pro4
lon&ation in the $arious historical disciplines6 unli%e poetics which is
concerned with the ta8onomy and the interaction of poetic structures
hermeneutics is concerned with the meanin& of specific te8ts( In a
hermeneutic enterprise readin& necessarily inter$enes but li%e com4
putation in an al&ebraic proof it is a means toward an end a means
that should finally become transparent and superfluous6 the ultimate
aim of a hermeneutically successful readin& is to do away with read4
in& alto&ether(
2
It is not so easy to say how readin& is in$ol$ed if at
all in poetics( If4to abuse once more one of the most outworn e84
amples in literature4on notin& that Homer refers to Achilles as a
lion I conclude that Achilles is coura&eous this is a hermeneutic de4
cision6 if on the other hand I e8amine with Aristotle whether
Homer is usin& a simile or a metaphor
>
this is a consideration in the
sphere of poetics( The two procedures ha$e $ery little in common( It
is clear howe$er from this loaded e8ample 5loaded because by
selectin& a fi&ure of speech one has in fact pre4emptied the Huestion7
that one has to ha$e @read@ the te8t in terms of poetics to arri$e at a
hermeneutic conclusion( Dne has to ha$e become aware that it is a
fi&ure otherwise one would simply ta%e it to mean that Achilles has
chan&ed species or that Homer lias ta%en lea$e of his senses( But one
also has to read it hermeneutically to @understand@ it as poetics9 one
has to ac%nowled&e Achilles= coura&e as well as his humanity to notice
that somethin& occurs in the lan&ua&e that does not normally occur in
the natural or social world that a lion can be substituted for
\i
8 a I*TRDK#+TID*
a man( All that this hasty piece of impro$ised poetics is meant to su&4
&est is that hermeneutics and poetics different and distinct as they
are ha$e a way of becomin& entan&led as indeed they ha$e since
Aristotle and before( Dne can loo% upon the history of literary theory
as the continued attempt to disentan&le this %not and to record the
reasons for failin& to do so(
The boldness of the IonstanF school in callin& their approach a
poetics as well as a hermeneutics measures the scope and the burden
of its contribution( In practice the distribution of competences as
well as the rather comple8 methodolo&ical &enealo&y of the &roup
has di$ided the emphasis amon& its $arious members( 0ome &o bac%
to the structural analyses of the Pra&ue lin&uistic circle and find their
ancestry amon& the more technical aspects of phenomenolo&y in4
cludin& the wor% of the Polish philosopher Roman In&arden( In their
case the primary emphasis falls on poetics %&er$stru$tur' rather
than on hermeneutics %(nterpretationssystem') Dthers find their
antecedents amon& philosophers of history and interpretation rather
than in the structural analysis of lan&ua&e and of consciousness6 their
primary emphasis is on hermeneutics( The synthesis the articulation
of poetics with hermeneutics remains the common aim of all aesthe4
ticians of reception but the attempted solutions as well as the tech4
niHues of readin& that lead to these solutions $ary dependin& on the
startin& position( If mostly for the sa%e of con$enience one chooses
to di$ide the &roup into poeticians and hermeneuts then Hans Robert
Jauss undoubtedly belon&s amon& the latter( This may &i$e him the
appearance of bein& more traditional or at least more concerned
with tradition than some of his associates yet it ma%es his approach
particularly instructi$e for American readers whose le&itimate impa4
tience with the technicalities of formal analysis sends them in search
of models for historical understandin&(
Jauss=s relationship to the hermeneutic tradition is itself by no
means simple or uncritical( He fully shares in the stance that unites
all members of the &roup in their common reBection of @essentialist@
conception of literary art( The suspicion of essentialism arises when4
e$er the study of the production or of the structure of literary te8ts
is pursued at the e8pense of their reception at the e8pense of the in4
di$idual or collecti$e patterns of understandin& that issue from their
readin& and e$ol$e in time( In @Literary History as a +hallen&e to
Literary Theory 5+hapter - of this $olume7 the closest Jauss came to
writin& an actual manifesto the polemical thrust of the passa&es in
which he sets his methods apart from those of his predecessors allows
one to situate this new pra&matism or this new materialism within
I*TRDK#+TID* K 8i
rhe tradition of German scholarship( Jauss differentiates himself
diarol$ from both the formalistic and the Mar8ist tendencies that
were pre$alent at the time( The &rounds for his critical attitude to4
ward Mar8ism 5or to be more precise toward a certain type of social
realism7 as well as toward form turn out to be remar%ably similar(
Geore Lu%acs an a$owed Mar8ist is criticiFed for reasons that differ
little from those in$o%ed with re&ard to the anythin& but Mar8ist
Arnst Robert +urtius( )or all their ideolo&ical differences both ad4
here to the classical creed of the canonical wor% as the aesthetic in4
carnation of a uni$ersal essence( +urtius=s canon which is that of the
masterpieces of the 'estern neo4Latin tradition differs entirely from
Lu%acs=s which is that of nineteenth century realism as it culminates
in BalFac and dissol$es with )laubert( But the disa&reements between
$arious canons are less important to Jauss than the canonical concep4
tion itself in which the wor% is assumed to transcend history because
it encompasses the totality of its tensions within itself( Lu%acs and
+urtius both remain faithful to such a conception( A$en Hans4Geor&
Gadamer Jauss=s teacher at Heidelber& whom he has consistently
ac%nowled&ed as a determinin& influence is bein& reproached for his
commitment to a canonical idea of tradition which in Germany
often tends to coincide with the canoniFation of the A&e of Goethe(
Jauss=s wor% is part of a reaction a&ainst an orthodo8y an orthodo8y
that refuses to admit as He&el is supposed to ha$e stated in his *es+
thetics, that the end of classicism is also the end of art( Hence his
continued concern with modernity as the cru8 of literary history(
The Huestion remains to be considered whether Jauss=s own historical
procedure can indeed claim to free itself from the coercion of a
model that is perhaps more powerful and for less controllable reasons
than its assumed opponents belie$e(
The stren&th of Jauss=s method stems from a refinement of the
established rules for the historical understandin& of literature( His
interest is no lon&er directed toward the definition of an actual canon
but toward the dynamic and dialectical process of canon formation4
a notion that is familiar in this country to readers of T( 0( Aliot and
more recently and in a $ery different mode of Harold Bloom(
/
0uch a
critiHue of historical positi$ism coupled with a critiHue of essen4
tialism is not in itself new6 few historians still belie$e that a wor% of
the past can be understood by reconstructin& on the basis of recorded
e$idence the set of con$entions e8pectations and beliefs that e8isted
at the time of its elaboration( 'hat is different and effecti$e in the
approach su&&ested by Jauss are the reasons 5implicitly7 &i$en for this
impossibility9 the historical consciousness of a &i$en period can
8ii K I*TRDK#+TID*
ne$er e8ist as a set of openly stated or recorded propositions It
e8ists instead in Jauss=s terminolo&y as a @horiFon of e8pectation @
The term which deri$es from Husserl=s phenomenolo&y of perception
in its application to the e8perience of consciousness implies that
the condition of e8istence of a consciousness is not a$ailable to this
consciousness in a conscious mode Bust as in a perception conscious
attention is possible only upon a bac%&round or horiFon of
distraction(
.
0imilarly the @horiFon of e8pectation@ brou&ht to a
wor% of art is ne$er a$ailable in obBecti$e or e$en obBectifiable form
neither to its author nor to its contemporaries or later recipients(
This complicates but also enriches the process of historical de4
scription to a considerable de&ree( A dialectic of understandin& as a
comple8 interplay between %nowin& and not4%nowin& is built within
the $ery process of literary history( The situation is comparable to
the dialo&ical relationship that de$elops between the analyst and his
interlocutor in psychoanalysis( *either of the two %nows the e8per4
ience bein& discussed6 they may indeed not e$en %now whether such
an e8perience e$er e8isted( The subBect is separated from it by mech4
anisms of repression defense displacement and the li%e whereas to
the analyst it is a$ailable only as a dubiously e$asi$e symptom( But
this difficulty does not pre$ent a dialo&ical discourse of at least some
interpretati$e $alue from ta%in& place( The two @horiFons@ that of
indi$idual e8perience and that of methodical understandin& can en4
&a&e each other and they will under&o modifications in the process
thou&h none of the e8periences may e$er become fully e8plicit(
The analo&y with psychoanalysis 5which Jauss does not use7 under4
scores the epistemolo&ical comple8ity of the historian=s tas%( Both
analyst and historian point to a co&nition that for reasons $ariously
identified as psycholo&ical epistemolo&ical or in the case of Heide&4
&er ontolo&ical is not a$ailable as an actual presence and therefore
reHuires a labor of interpretation or of readin& prior e$en to deter4
minin& whether it can e$er be reached( 'e ha$e come to e8pect this
de&ree of hermeneutic intricacy from any philosophical or psycho4
lo&ical analysis but surprisin&ly enou&h a similar subtlety is rarely
demanded from historians and amon& historians least of all from
literary historians:althou&h accordin& to the lo&ic of the situation
with its implied stress on readin& rather than %nowin& literary his4
tory rather than psychoanalysis or epistemolo&y should be the
pri$ile&ed e8ample the model case( This surprise is in fact not sur4
prisin& at all since the reluctance is itself the symptom of an an8iety
of not4%nowin& that may reach further than pra&matic historians
may wish to %now( Be this as it may in Jauss=s defense of a history
INTRODUCTION D xiii
and an aesthetics of reception the model for the historical under4
standin& of literature finally comes of a&e as it were by ways of the
ne&ati$e implications contained in the term @horiFon of e8pectation(
His critical descriptions of earlier literary histories draw their ener&y
from this insi&ht and with few e8ceptions these descriptions will be
found hard to refute( Jauss=s critiHue of the preconscious or uncon4
scious=
1
assumptions that underlie canonical literary history consti4
tutes a maBor contribution all the more rele$ant for us since the
same problem e8ists in this country in a less thematiFed more dif4
fused and therefore all the more coerci$e way(
The same point of departure the duplicitous epistemolo&y of the
historical consciousness allows Jauss to defend a far4reachin& synthe4
sis between the pri$ate and the public dimensions of the literary
wor%( This synthesis constitutes the pro&rammatic and forward4loo%4
in& as opposed to the critical aspects of his wor%( Thus the passa&e
from the indi$idual to the collecti$e or the social aspects of the wor%
is implicit in the model of the @horiFon@9 Bust as the anonymous
bac%&round of a perception is &eneral and nondifferentiated with re4
&ard to the indi$idual perception that stands fore&rounded and sil4
houetted@ a&ainst it the particular wor% at the moment of its pro4
duction stands out in its sin&ularity from the collecti$e &rayness of
recei$ed ideas and ideolo&ies( Preconscious or subconscious e8pecta4
tions are always collecti$e and therefore to a de&ree @recei$ed(@
They are the outcome of a reception by means of which the indi$i4
dual wor% becomes part of a landscape a&ainst which new wor%s will
in turn be silhouetted( Translated from spatial metaphors into epis4
temolo&ical cate&ories the process can be stated in terms of Huestion
and answer9 the Huestion occurs as an indi$idual disruption of an
answer that has become common %nowled&e but which under the ef4
fect of this new Huestion can now be seen to ha$e itself been an indi4
$idual response to an earlier collecti$e Huestion( As the answer meta4
morphoses into a Huestion it becomes li%e an indi$idual tree or
portrait set within a styliFed landscape and it re$eals by the same
to%en a li$e bac%&round behind its bac%&round in the form of a
Huestion from which it now can itself stand out, The Huestion4and4
answer structure li%e the fore&round4bac%&round or the conscious4
preconscious structures are abyssal frames that en&ender each other
without end or telos, In the process howe$er they create a seHuence of
apparent syntheses that con$ey an impression of methodolo&ical
mastery( Jauss can le&itimately claim that the @horiFon of e8pectation@
mediates between the pri$ate inception and the public reception of the
wor%( And he can also claim that it mediates between the
8i$ a I*TRDK#+TID*
self4enclosed structure and its outside effect or &ir$un, To the e8tent
that the bac%&round is collecti$e or @common@ it is at first
nondifferentiated and unstructured6 under the impact of the indi$i4
dually structured Huestions as understood and identified by the his4
torian4interpreter it becomes aware of itself as bac%&round and ac4
Huires in its turn the coherence necessary for its or&aniFation and
potential transformation( A clear e8ample of this process occurs on
pa&e "?9 Amma Bo$ary a character in a fictional construct whose
mind is li%e an amorphous bundle of aberrations a&ainst which the
beauty of her shape stands silhouetted en&enders in the mind of
her readers a critical awareness of social con$entions stron& enou&h
to put these con$entions in Huestion( The historical readin& as recep4
tion mediates between the formal structure and social chan&e(
In the final analysis the procedure pro$ides a model for the ar4
ticulation between structure and interpretation( At the moment of
its inception the indi$idual wor% of art stands out as unintelli&ible
with re&ard to the pre$ailin& con$entions( The only relation it has
to them is that of contemporaneity or of synchrony an entirely
contin&ent and synta&matic relationship between two elements that
happen to coincide in time but are otherwise entirely alien to each
other( The differentiation that separates the wor% from its settin&
is then inscribed in the historical diachronic motion of its under4
standin& %Hori#ontswandel', which ends in the disco$ery of proper4
ties held in common between the wor% and its proBected history(
#nli%e the relationship between the wor% and its historical present
the relationship between the wor% and its future is not purely arbi4
trary( It contains elements of &enuine paradi&matic similarity that
can circulate freely between the formal sin&ularity of the wor% and
the history of its reception( Put in somewhat more technical terms
one would say that in Jauss=s historical model a synta&matic dis4
placement within a synchronic structure becomes in its reception
a paradi&matic condensation within a diachrony( Attributes of dif4
ference and of similarity can be e8chan&ed than%s to the inter$en4
tion of temporal cate&ories9 by allowin& the wor% to e8ist in time
without complete loss of identity the alienation of its formal struc4
ture is suspended by the history of its understandin&( +hiasmic
patterns of this type ne$er fail to carry the promise of totaliFation(
Dne sees that the methodolo&ical rewards for the willin&ness to
&i$e up the illusion of unmediated understandin& are considerable(
*or are they purely theoretical9 Jauss is entirely willin& to submit
his hermeneutical model to the concrete test of practical interpre4
tation and to refine it in the process( The lac% of compatibility
I*TRDK#+TID* K 8$
between literary theory and practice that pla&ues the study of liter4
ature e$erywhere thus also seems to be on the way of bein& o$er4
come by a Budicious aesthetics of reception( The persuasi$eness of
the ar&ument the $alidity of the critiHue of traditional canonical
literary history the considerable contributions to the interpreta4
tion of particular te8ts combine to bear witness to the merits of a
method whose influence on the theory and the peda&o&y of literary
studies has been entirely beneficial( It is an impressi$e record( If one
wishes in the true spirit of the method to Huestion in turn the hori4
Fon of e8pectation of the aesthetics of reception then one should
be&in by ac%nowled&in& the merits of a theory that enables one to
as% such a Huestion within a producti$e conte8t(
0ome writers not $ery remote from Jauss in time and place ha$e
denied the efficacy of a theory of interpretation based on the public
reception of a wor% of literature and ha$e discarded it as a mere side4
effect de$oid of hermeneutic interest( 'alter BenBamin=s do&matic
pronouncement at the onset of his essay entitled @The Tas% of the
Translator@ is a rele$ant case in point9 @*owhere does a concern for
the reception of a wor% of art or of an artform a$er itself fruitful for
its understandin&( ( ( ( *o poem is addressed to a reader no paint4
in& to its beholder no symphony to its listeners(@
-"
The passa&e is
Huoted by Rainer 'arnin& to&ether with a passa&e from Adorno as
a prime e8ample of author or production oriented essentialism(
-<
But is this really the caseL 'hen Jauss identifies the power of canon4
ical essences in the writin&s of +urtius Lu%acs and Gadamer he is
on safe &round but when the same is bein& said about BenBamin
Adorno and Heide&&er4three names that for all that separates
them belon& to&ether in this conte8t4thin&s are not so simple( Ben4
Bamin for instance in the $ery essay from which the Bust4Huoted pas4
sa&e is ta%en could not be more e8plicit in his critiHue of Platonic
essences as a model for history when he reBects the $alidity of the no4
tion of copy or representation %*bbild' as an approach to literary
te8ts( *or could one be more eloHuently e8plicit than he is in the
same essay about the historicity of literary understandin&4althou&h
the notion of history that BenBamin here in$o%es certainly differs
considerably from Jauss=s( By in$o%in& the @translation@ rather than
the reception or e$en the readin& of a wor% as the proper analo&on
for its understandin& the ne&ati$ity inherent in the process is bein&
reco&niFed9 we all %now that translations can ne$er succeed and that
the tas% %*ufabe' of the translator also means as in the parlance of
competiti$e sports his ha$in& to &i$e up his defeat @by default(@ But
8$i E I*TRDK#+TID*
@translation@ also directs by implication the attention to lan&ua&e
rather than perception as the possible locus for this ne&ati$e mo4
ment( )or translation is by definition intralin&uistic not a relation4
ship between a subBect and an obBect or a fore&round and a bac%4
&round but between one lin&uistic function and another( Throu&hout
the essay BenBamin=s point is that translation as well as the insuper4
able difficulty that inhabits its proBect e8poses certain tensions that
pertain specifically to lan&ua&e9 a possible incompatibility between
proposition %-at#' and denomination %&ort' or between the literal
and what he calls the symbolic meanin& of a te8t or within the sym4
bolic dimension itself between what is bein& symboliFed and the
symboliFin& function( The conflict is stated in most &eneral terms
as e8istin& between what lan&ua&e means %das Gemeinte' and the
manner in which it produces meanin& %die *rt des Meinens', It is cer4
tainly true that in BenBamin=s essay and elsewhere in his writin&s
these tensions are to some de&ree suspended in what he refers to as
pure lan&ua&e9 die reine -prache, But it is eHually clear that this ap4
parent transcendence does not occur in the realm of art but in that
of the sacred( Between BenBamin=s reine -prache and !alery=s poesie
pure there is $ery little in common( )ar from bein& nostal&ia or a
prophecy of the sacred poetic lan&ua&e of which the inherent in4
adeHuacy is made e8plicit in its translation is what has to be for&ot4
ten to find access to the sacred9 in the poetic translations that
Holderlin made of 0ophocles @meanin& collapses from abyss to abyss
until it threatens to lose itself in the bottomless depths of lan&ua&e(@
In such a sentence @abyss@ should perhaps be read as technically and
neutrally as in any tri$ial @mise en abfme(@ The e8istential pathos is
counterbalanced by the fact that these @bottomless depths@ of lan4
&ua&e are also its most manifest and ordinary &rammatical dimensions
the specific lin&uistic cate&ories that BenBamin can list with some
precision( 'hat this does to BenBamin=s subseHuent claims of trans4
cendence 5or to their perhaps falacious understandin& as transcen4
dence7 is not our present concern( It establishes howe$er that as far
as poetry and its history are concerned there can be no Huestion of
essences( The reBection of a conception of poetry as messa&e or recep4
tion is not the result of an essentialist conception of literature but of
the critiHue of such a conception( 'ith numerous Hualifications
somethin& similar could be said of Heide&&er=s essay @Dn the Dri&in of
the 'or% of Art@ which Jauss summariFes 5and dismisses7 as an
assertion of a @timeless present@ or a @self sufficient presence@ 5p( ><7
of the wor% of art a simplification that does scant Bustice to Heide&4
&er=s dialectical concept of historical preser$ation %.ewahrun' on
I*TRDK#+TID* J 8$ii
which Jauss himself possibly by way of Gadamer is dependent(
The point is not to oppose to each other philosophical traditions
some of which Jauss could easily enlist on his side of the Huestion(
Rather the reference to BenBamin=s essay draws attention to the pos4
sibility that a concept such as @horiFon of e8pectation@ is not neces4
sarily applicable without further elaboration to the arts of lan&ua&e(
)or all the obstacles to understandin& mentioned by BenBamin belon&
specifically to lan&ua&e rather than to the phenomenal world6 con4
seHuently the e8pectation that they could be mastered by analo&y
with processes that stem from the psycholo&y of perception is by
no means certain( Husserl himself amon& others could be in$o%ed
to caution a&ainst the possibility of such a mistranslation(
-3
The her4
meneutics of e8perience and the hermeneutics of readin& are not
necessarily compatible( This does not imply that the solutions pro4
posed by Jauss are inadeHuate or that the recourse to perception can
or should be a$oided alto&ether6 the opposite is the case( It does
mean howe$er that the horiFon of Jauss=s methodolo&y li%e all
methodolo&ies has limitations that are not accessible to its own ana4
lytical tools( The limitation in this case has to do with lin&uistic
factors that threaten to interfere with the synthesiFin& power of the
historical model( And it also means that these same factors will then
e8ercise a more or less occult power o$er Jauss=s own discourse es4
pecially o$er the details of his te8tual interpretations(
At first si&ht this hardly seems to be the case( Jauss is by no
means ad$erse to ta%in& the lin&uistic aspects of te8ts into considera4
tion nor is he in any way on the defensi$e in dealin& with the wor%
of lin&uists( His preference howe$er &oes to lin&uists who attempt
to mediate between the communicati$e and the aesthetic function
of lan&ua&e to what one could call the stylists of communication
theory( Jauss has ar&ued from the start that the reco&nition of the
formal and aesthetic aspects of a te8t are not to be separated from
historical in$esti&ations ha$in& to do with its reception6 a &ood for4
malist by the stren&th of his own performance has to become a his4
torian( The +Fech lin&uist )eli8 !( !odic%a whose wor% is often
cited with appro$al by Jauss and other IonstanF theoreticians has
made this e8plicit in his conception of reception as the historical
@concretiFation@ of a lin&uistic structure( The element of ne&ati$ity
that in Jauss=s horiFon of e8pectation is located in the nonawareness
of the bac%&round resides in !odic%a and in the Pra&ue lin&uists
&enerally in the characteriFation of literary lan&ua&e as a lan&ua&e of
sins, Just as an element of not4%nowin& is built within the model or
the horiFon the concept of literary si&n implies an element of inde4
8$iii n I*TRDK#+TID*
terminacy and of arbitrariness( In the words of Jan Mu%aMo$s%y a
leadin& fi&ure of the Pra&ue Lin&uistic +ircle as Huoted by
!odic%=a4@Althou&h the wor% of literature is closely dependent in its
effect on communication by si&ns it depends on it in such a manner
that it is the dialectical ne&ation of an actual communication(@
-2
The
ensuin& polysemy is mastered by inscribin& it within the historical and
social continuum of particular receptions or @concretiFations(@
0tructural aesthetics as practiced by the Pra&ue circle are therefore
far from bein& a threat to Jauss( His historical concepts seem to
do$etail perfectly with their lin&uistic terminolo&y( This theoretical
alliance achie$es a &enuine synthesis between hermeneutics and
poetics( Is this to say that BenBamin=s an8ieties about the semantics
of poetic lan&ua&e are con$incin&ly laid to rest by the concerted
in$esti&ations of both lin&uists and historiansL
The answer will depend on a term that until now we were able to
%eep in abeyance( 'hen !odit%a spea%s of concretiFations he stron&ly
insists that these are aesthetic concretiFations Bust as Jauss=s reception
is an aesthetic reception an aesthetic process( How @aesthetic@ is to
be understood here is not self4e$ident( )or Mu%afo$s%y the aesthetic
Huality of the wor% of literature li%e its historical Huality is a
function of its si&n4structure( In the analysis of poetic diction @the
structure of the lin&uistic si&n holds the center of attention whereas
the 5nonpoetic7 functions are oriented toward e8tralin&uistic instances
and &oals e8ceedin& the lin&uistic si&n(@
->
The focus in poetic te8ts
on the process of si&nification rather than on si&nificance is what is
said to be specifically aesthetic( The arbitrary and con$entional as4
pects of the si&n thus acHuire $alue as aesthetic features and it is by
this same con$entionality that the collecti$e social and historical
dimensions of the wor% can be reinte&rated( This is the $ery point at
which the procedures of a historian such as Jauss and poeticians such
as !odif%a or Mu%aro$s%y con$er&e( It is Jauss=s considerable merit
to ha$e percei$ed and demonstrated the lin%a&e between reception
and semiotics( The condensation of literary history and structural
analysis occurs by ways of the cate&ory of the aesthetic and depends
for its possibility on the stability of this cate&ory(
This stability howe$er remains problematic for many philosophers(
A concatenation of the aesthetic with the meanin&4producin& powers
of lan&ua&e is a stron& temptation to the mind but precisely for that
reason it also opens up a Pandora=s bo8( The aesthetic is by defini4
tion a seducti$e notion that appeals to the pleasure principle a
eudaemonic Bud&ment that can displace and conceal $alues of truth
and falsehood li%ely to be more resilient to desire than $alues of
I*TRDK#+TID* K 8i8
pleasure and pain( *ietFsche who is acutely aware of aesthetic powers
as tools of the will warns that Bud&ments based on pleasure or on
pain @are the silliest e/pressions of Bud&ments ima&inable4by which
of course I 5*ietFsche7 do not mean to say that the Bud&ments
which become audible in this manner ha$e to be silly(@
-?
Aesthetic
reactions can ne$er be considered as central causes %0rsacben' but
only as tri$ial side4effects %Nebensachen'" @they are $alue Bud&ments
of the second order which are deri$ed from a centrally dominant
$alue6 they consider the useful and the harmful in a purely affecti$e
mode and are therefore absolutely $olatile and dependent((@
-/
The
considerable interest they hold for the historian or for the critical
philosopher is symptomatolo&ical rather than systematic9 they are
philosophically si&nificant to the e8tent that their power to mislead
points to other causes( He&el=s massi$ely misunderstood treatment of
the aesthetic as a pro$isional %vorlaufi, a word that also occurs in
BenBamin
-.
7 form of co&nition is entirely in the spirit of his continu4
ators Iier%e&aard and *ietFsche( This means amon& other thin&s
that whene$er the aesthetic is in$o%ed as an appeal to clarity and con4
trol whene$er in other words a symptom is made into a remedy for
the disorder that it si&nals a &reat deal of caution is in order( Jauss=s
strai&htforward eHuation of the aesthetic with the pleasure principle
as in the essay on !alery and Goethe or as is implicit in his sub4
seHuent boo% on *esthetic 1/perience and Literary Hermeneutics
23

is in itself symptomatic( And when this same principle is then made
to lin% up with the more obBecti$e properties of lan&ua&e re$ealed by
lin&uistic analysis the suspicion arises that aesthetic Bud&ment has
trespassed beyond its le&itimate epistemolo&ical reach( As is to be
e8pected in such a case the traces of this trans&ression become no4
ticeable by the omission rather than by the misrepresentation of
certain features of lan&ua&e(
+haracteristic of such omissions is Jauss=s lac% of interest border4
in& on outri&ht dismissal in any considerations deri$ed from what
has somewhat misleadin&ly come to be %nown as the @play@ of the
si&nifier semantic effects produced on the le$el of the letter rather
than of the word or the sentence and which therefore escape from
the networ% of hermeneutic Huestions and answers( 0uch a concern
with @the instances of the letter@ is particularly in e$idence as is well
%nown amon& certain )rench writers not &enerally included within
Jauss=s own critical canon of rele$ant !acbliteratur, He has always
treated such Parisian e8tra$a&ances with a measure of suspicion and
e$en when under the pressure of their persistence as well as of &enuine
affinities between their enterprise and his own he ac%nowled&ed
88 J I*TRDK#+TID*
some of their findin&s it has always been a &uarded and partial r
co&nition( There are &ood peda&o&ical and ideolo&ical reasons of
local rather than &eneral interest for this reser$e( The tactics of=e84
clusion on the other hand are so familiar as to constitute within
the community of literary scholarship a mass reaction9 in a lon& tra4
dition more familiar e$en in the world of haute couture than of
literary theory what is made in Paris is often thou&ht of as more
fashionable than sound( 'hat is in fashion in Paris is tolerable only
as window display not for e$eryday wear( Met as we %now from
Baudelaire fashion la mode, is itself a hi&hly si&nificant and pre4
cisely aesthetic and historical cate&ory that historians should not
underestimate( 'hen it becomes fashionable to dismiss fashion clearly
somethin& interestin& is &oin& on and what is bein& discarded as
mere fashion must also be more insistent and more threatenin& than
its fri$olity and transcience would seem to indicate( 'hat is bein&
dismissed in the conte8t of our Huestion is the play of the si&nifier
the $ery same topic 5if it can thus be called7 which )riedrich 0chle&ei
sin&led out when the displeasure of his readers the accusation of fri4
$olity forced him in -/11 to suspend publication of the *thenaum,
2(
In
the practice of his own te8tual interpretation Jauss pays little
attention to the semantic play of the si&nifier and when on rare oc4
casions he does so the effect is Huic%ly reaestheticiFed before any4
thin& unpleasant mi&ht occur:Bust as any word4play is so easily dis4
armed by assimilatin& it to the harmlessness of a mere pun or calem+
bour, Thus in a recent article that ma%es use of one of Baudelaire=s
0pleen poems as a te8tual e8ample
""
Jauss comments Budiciously on
the lines in which the name of the ei&hteenth4century painter Boucher
is made to pseudo4rhyme with the word @debouche@ 5uncor%ed7
un $ieu8 boudoir
Du les pastels plaintifs et les pales Boucher
0euls respirent l=odeur d=un flacon debouche(
In a rare Lacanian moment Jauss su&&ests that what he calls a
@&rotesHue@ effect of $erbal play4the rhyme4pair BoucherGdebouche
4is also somethin& more uncanny9 @The still harmonius representa4
tion of the last perfume escapin& from the uncor%ed bottle o$erturns
%$ippt urn' into the dissonant connotation of a =decapitated= rococo
painter Boucher@ 5p( -2?7( After ha$in& &one this far it becomes $ery
hard to stop( 0hould one not also notice that this bloody scene is
made &orier still by the presence of a proper name 5Boucher7 which
as a common name means butcher thus ma%in& the @pale Boucher@
the a&ent of his own e8ecutionL This pale and white te8t of recollec4
I*TRDK#+TID* a 88i
tion 5the first line of the poem is @J =ai plus de sou$enirs Hue si B=a$ais
mille ans@7 turns red with a brutality that ta%es us out of the inward4
ness of memory the ostensible theme of the poem into a $ery threat4
enin& literality to which an innocent art4term such as @dissonance@
hardly does Bustice( Much more apt is Jauss=s $ery concrete and unde4
corous almost colloHuial word @um%ippen@ 5to o$erturn7 which
@o$erturns@ the beheaded Boucher as if he were himself an uncor%ed
@flacon@ spillin& his blood( That this would happen to the proper
name of a painter and by means of a merely @&rotesHue@ and fri$o4
lous play on words tells us a &reat deal about the difficult4to4control
borderline 5or lac% of it7 between the aesthetics of homo ludens and
the literal incisi$eness of &ortwit#, )or reasons of decorum the &ap
that Jauss has opened by his own obser$ation in the aesthetic te84
ture of the lan&ua&e is at once reclosed as if the commentator felt
that he mi&ht betray the inte&rity of the te8t with which he is dealin&(
This hesitation this restraint before &i$in& in to the coarseness and
the potential $iolence of the si&nifier is by no means to be condemned
as a lac% of boldness( After all Baudelaire himself does not threaten
us or himself directly and by %eepin& the menace wrapped up as
it were within a play of lan&ua&e he does not actually draw blood(
He seems to stop in time to fence with a foil
"<
:for how could any4
one be hurt by a mere rhymeL Met the poetic restraint e8ercised by
Baudelaire differs entirely from the aesthetic restraint e8ercised by
Jauss( )or the play on words as we all %now from obscene Bo%es far
from preser$in& decorum dispenses with it Huite easily as Baudelaire
dispensed with it to the point of attractin& the attention of the po+
lice des moeurs, 'hat it does not dispense with unli%e decorum 5a
classical and aesthetic concept7 is the ambi&uity of a statement that
because it is a $erbal thrust and not an actual blow allows itself to
be ta%en fi&urally but in so doin& opens up the way to the perfor4
mance of what it only seems to fei&n or prefi&ure( The false rhyme
on #oucherGdebouchc is a fi&ure a paranomasis( But only after we
ha$e with the assistance of H( R( Jauss noticed and reco&niFed it as
such does the actual threat inherent in the fiction produced by the
actual hands of the painter 5who is also a butcher7 become manifest(
This no lon&er describes an aesthetic but a poetic structure a struc4
ture that has to do with what BenBamin identified as a noncon$er4
&ence of @meanin&@ with @the de$ices that produce meanin&@ or
what *ietFsche has in mind when he insists that eudaemonic Bud&4
ments are inadeHuate @means of e8pression@ of a co&nition( 0ince
this poetic 5as distin&uished from aesthetic7 structure has to do with
the necessity of decidin& whether a statement in a te8t is to be ta%en
88ii E I*TRDK#+TID*
as a fi&ure or a la lettre, it pertains to rhetoric( In this particular in4
stance Jauss has come upon the rhetorical dimension of lan&ua&e4 it
is si&nificant that he has to draw bac% in the face of his own disco$ery
But how can it be said that Jauss swer$es from the consideration of
rhetoric where he has so many percepti$e and rele$ant thin&s to say
about it and does so without any trace of the restraint for which -
am both praisin& and blamin& him in his &loss on Baudelaire=s poemL
An e8tended study of his writin&s &oin& well beyond the decorous
limits of an introduction would show that somethin& similar to what
happens in the essay on 0pleen occurs whene$er rhetorical cate&ories
are at sta%e( Dne hint may suffice( In a polemical e8chan&e with
Gadamer about the rhetoric of classicism 5p( <17 classical art is assimi4
lated to a rhetoric of mimesis 5the Aristotelian rhetorical cate&ory
par e8cellence7 and opposed to medie$al and modern art which are
said to be nonmimetic and nonrepresentational( A rhetorical trope
ser$es as the &round of a historical system of periodiFation that al4
lows for the correct understandin& of meanin&6 once a&ain a poetic
and a hermeneutic cate&ory ha$e been seamlessly articulated( But
if this assertion seems so reasonable is it not because it corresponds
to a recei$ed idea of literary history rather than bein& the result of
a ri&orous lin&uistic analysisL The alternati$e to mimesis would be
one assumes alle&ory which all of us associate with medie$al and at
least since BenBamin with modern art( If we then as% whether Jauss=s
own model for readin& the horiFon of e8pectation is classical or
modern one would ha$e to say that it is the former( )or it is certain4
ly li%e all hermeneutic systems o$erwhelmin&ly mimetic9 if literary
understandin& in$ol$es a horiFon of e8pectation it resembles a sense
of perception and it will be correct to the precise e8tent that it @imi4
tates@ such a perception( The ne&ati$ity inherent in the Husserlian
model is a ne&ati$ity within the sensory itself and not its ne&ation
let alone its @other(@ It is impossible to concei$e of a phenomenal
e8perience that would not be mimetic as it is impossible to concei$e
of an aesthetic Bud&ment that would not be dependent on imitation
as a constituti$e cate&ory also and especially when the Bud&ment as
is the case in Iant is interioriFed as the consciousness of a subBect(
The concept of nonrepresentational art stems from paintin& and
from a pictorial aesthetic that is firmly committed to the phenomen4
alism of art( The alle&ory or alle&oresis which Jauss opposes to
mimesis remains firmly rooted in the classical phenomenalism of an
aesthetics of representation(
@Alle&ory@ howe$er is a loaded term that can ha$e different im4
plications( A reference to 'alter BenBamin can a&ain be helpful all
INTRODUCTION D>
the more so since Jauss alludes to him in the same essay on Baude4
laire from which I ha$e been Huotin&( In his treatment of alle&ory
BenBamin plays by anticipation the part of Hamann in a debate in
which Jauss would be playin& the part of Herder( )or him alle&ory is
best compared to a commodity6 it has as he puts it in a term ta%en
from Mar8 &arencbam$ter, @matter that is death in a double sense
and that is=anor&anic(@ The @anor&anic@ Huality of alle&ory is how4
e$er not eHui$alent as Jauss=s commentary seems to su&&est 5p( -?.7
to the ne&ation of the natural world6 the opposition between or&anic
and anor&anic in BenBamin is not li%e the opposition between or+
aniscb and aoranisch, familiar from the terminolo&y of idealist phil4
osophy in 0chellin& and also in Holderlin( The commodity is anor4
&anic because it e8ists as a mere piece of paper as an inscription or a
notation on a certificate( The opposition is not between nature and
consciousness 5or subBect7 but between what e8ists as lan&ua&e and
what does not( Alle&ory is material or materialistic in BenBamin=s
sense because its dependence on the letter on the literalism of the
letter cuts it off sharply from symbolic and aesthetic syntheses(
@The subBect of alle&ory can only be called a &rammatical subBect@6
the Huotation is not from BenBamin but from one of the least $alued
sections of He&el=s Lectures on *esthetics,
244
the canonical bible still
for Heide&&er of the phenomenalism of art( Alle&ory names the rhe4
torical process by which the literary te8t mo$es from a phenomenal
world4oriented to a &rammatical lan&ua&e4oriented direction( It thus
also names the moment when aesthetic and poetic $alues part com4
pany( A$eryone has always %nown that alle&ory li%e the commodity
and unli%e aesthetic deli&ht is as He&el puts it @icy and barren(@
"2
If
this is so can one then still share Jauss=s confidence that @the al4
le&orical intention pursued to the utmost of rior mortis, can still
re$erse %umscblaen' this e8treme alienation into an appearance of
the beautiful@ 5"127L
">
If the return to the aesthetic is a turnin&
away from the lan&ua&e of alle&ory and of rhetoric then it is also a
turnin& away from literature a brea%in& of the lin% between poetics
and history(
The debate between Jauss and BenBamin on alle&ory is a debate be4
tween the classical position here represented by Jauss and a tradi4
tion
"-
that undoes it and that includes in the wa%e of Iant amon&
others I Iamann )riedrich 0chle&el Iier%e&aard and *ietFsche( The
debate occurs in the course of interpretin& Baudelaire=s poem @0pleen
I I @ The poem deals with history as recollection souvenir, He&el=s
!,rinnerun, Jauss=s precise and su&&esti$e readin& carefully traces
the manner in which an inner state of mind 5spleen7 is first compared
88i$ J I*TRDK#+TID*
to an outside obBect 5--( " and 27 then asserted to be such an obBect
5-( >7 then becomes the $oice of a spea%in& subBect that declares it4
self to be an obBect 5-( /7 and finally culminates in the dialo&ical re4
lationship of an apostrophe by this subBect to a material obBect that
has itself acHuired consciousness9
: Kesormais tu n=es plus > matierc $i$anteN Eu=un
&ranit entoure d=une $a&ue epou$ante O--( -.4"1-
"/
At the conclusion of the poem the eni&matic fi&ure of @#n $ieu8
sphin8@ appears and is said howe$er restricti$ely and ne&ati$ely to
be sin&in&
#n $ieu8 sphin8 ( ( (
*e chante Hu=au8 rayons du soleil Hui se couche( O--(
""4"37
Jauss con$incin&ly identifies this sphin8 as the fi&ure of the poetic
$oice and his son& as the production of the te8t of @0pleen II@ 5pp( ->.
-?17( 'e redisco$er the not unfamiliar specular 5that is to say solar and
phenomenal7 conception of a @poetry of poetry@
".
the self4referential
te8t that thematiFes its own in$ention prefi&ures its own reception
and achie$es as aesthetic co&nition and pleasure the reco$ery from the
most e8treme of alienations from the terror of encrypted death( @The
dissonance of the statement is aesthetically harmoniFed by the
assonance and the balance between the $arious te8tual layers@ 5p(
-/"7( @In a successfully elaborated form the literary representation of
terror and an8iety is always already than%s to aesthetic sublimation
o$ercome@ 5p( ->?7( The promise of aesthetic sublimation is powerful4
ly ar&ued in a manner that lea$es little room for further Huestionin&(
The assurance that further Huestionin& ne$ertheless should ta%e place
has little to do with one=s own spleen with pessimism nihilism or the
historical necessity to o$ercome alienation( It depends on powers of
poetic analysis which it is in no one=s power to e$ade( Dne of the
thematic te8tual @layers@ of @0pleen II@ that remain constant
throu&hout the te8t is that of the mind as a hollow container bo8
or &ra$e and the transformation of this container or of the corpse
contained in it into a $oice9
mon triste cer$eau(
+=est une pyramide un immense ca$eau Eui contient
plus de morts Hue la fosse commune( :Je suis un
cimetiere abhorre de la lune
: Kesormais tu n=es plus > matiere $i$anteN
I*TRDK#+TID* K P
Eu=un &ranit entoure d=une $a&ue epou$ante
Assoupi dans le fond d=un 0aharah brumeu86 #n
$ieu8 sphin8 i&nore du monde insoucieu8
Dublie sur la carte ct dont -=humeur farouche
*e chante Hu=au8 rayons du soleil Hui se couche(
The transformation occurs as one mo$es from mind 5as recollec4
tion7 to pyramid and to sphin8( It occurs in other words by an itin4
erary that tra$els by way of A&ypt( A&ypt in He&el=s *esthetics, is
the birthplace of truly symbolic art which is monumental and archi4
tectural not literary( It is the art of memory that remembers death
the art of history as 1rinnerun, The emblem for interioriFed mem4
ory in He&el is that of the buried treasure or mine %-chacht', or
perhaps a well(
<1
Baudelaire howe$er fond thou&h he is of well4
metaphors uses @pyramid@ which connotes of course A&ypt mon4
ument and crypt but which also connotes to a reader of He&el the
emblem of the si&n as opposed to the symbol(
<-
The si&n which per4
tains specifically to lan&ua&e and to rhetoric mar%s in He&el the pas4
sa&e from sheer inward recollection and ima&ination to thou&ht
%5en$en', which occurs by way of the deliberate for&ettin& of sub4
stantial aesthetic and pictorial symbols(
<"
Baudelaire who in all
li%elihood ne$er heard of He&el happens to hit on the same emblem4
atic seHuence
<<
to say somethin& $ery similar( The decapitated painter
lies as a corpse in the crypt of recollection and is replaced by the
sphin8 who since he has a head and a face can be apostrophiFed in
the poetic speech of rhetorical fi&uration( But the sphin8 is not an
emblem of recollection but li%e He&el=s si&n an emblem of for&et4
tin&( In Baudelaire=s poem he is not Bust @oublie@ but @oublie sur la
carte@ inaccessible to memory because he is imprinted on paper
because he is himself the inscription of a si&n( +ontrary to Jauss=s
assertion4@for who could say with more ri&ht than the sphin89 B=ai
P us de sou$enirs Huc si B=a$ais mille ans@4the sphin8 is the one least
able to say anythin& of the sort( He is the &rammatical subBect cut
oft from its consciousness the poetic analysis cut off from its herme4
neutic function the dismantlin& of tile aesthetic and pictorial world
==(=
L
Q
0
R=
5
6=
-

3ui

sc

couclle
@ by the ad$ent of poetry as alle&ory( 'hat ne
sin&s@ can ne$er be the poem entitled @0pleen@6 his son& is not the
sublimation but the for&ettin& by inscription of terror rhe dis4
memberment of the aesthetic whole into the unpredictable play of
the literary letter( 'e could not ha$e readied this understandin&
without the assistance of Jauss=s readin&( His wor% confronts us with
the eni&ma of the relationship between the aesthetic and the poetic and
by so doin& it demonstrates the ri&orof its theoretical Huestionin&(
Paul de Man
Translator=s Preface
6imothy .ahti
I recently came across a scholarly article 5in German7 on contem4
porary @aesthetics of reception@ that was utterly for&ettable e8cept
that within the space of ele$en pa&es it displayed no fewer than -1>
footnotes( This is an e8ample perhaps not only of a certain tendency
toward o$er%ill in German scholarship but also of the de&ree of
close attention and learned debate bein& &i$en to that de$elopment
in literary studies that is also %nown as the IonstanF 0chool( As
Paul de Man notes in his Introduction Hans Robert Jauss and his
collea&ues are en&a&ed in rethin%in& the methods of literary study
and this is more an enterprise of literary scholarship than it is a pro4
Bect in literary theory or a part of today=s myriad debates on the
philosophical and ideolo&ical assumptions of the human sciences( It
is in this spirit of literary scholarship :rather than one of partisan af4
filiation:that I ha$e translated the essays collected here and would
ma%e se$eral prefatory remar%s(
'idely discussed in both 'est and Aast Germany since its or&ani4
Fation as a loosely collecti$e position in the late 0i8ties and increas4
in&ly well %nown to the Germanophonic audience in )rance and
America the IonstanF 0chool is for the most part un%nown to
An&lish4spea%in& audiences and has until now been lar&ely limited to
two translated boo%s by 'olf&an& Iser( As a scholar of An&lish litera4
ture and a theorist wor%in& in lar&e part within the An&lo4American
philosophic tradition Iser could appeal to this audience on its nati$e
&round( *ow with the appearance of this wor% by Jauss in An&lish
the more historical position of the other leadin& +onstance represen4
tati$e can finally be broadly appreciated( - belie$e that Jauss=s posi4
98$iii J TRA*0LATDR=0 PRA)A+A
a&ainst the @affecti$e fallacy@ or other essays of the *ew +riticism
4and Jauss does both precisely throu&h his en&a&ement of the histori4
cal dimension of literary understandin&( In this he belon&s to a line
of twentieth4century German critics that includes 'alter BenBamin
Arich Auerbach Theodor Adomo and Peter 0Fondi and that con4
stitutes the bac%bone of Germany=s contribution to literary studies
in this century distin&uishin& it from the more ahistorical contribu4
tions of )rench An&lish and American theory and criticism( Gi$en
this difference in intellectual conte8ts then Jauss=s wor% deser$es
not a loose translation that mi&ht ma%e it all too easily assimilable
into our current critical situation but rather a precise translation
that would allow for a close ri&orous truly critical reception( It is
such a translation that I ha$e tried to pro$ide(
Jauss=s German is often not easy and I ha$e not attempted to
simplify it when transposin& it into An&lish( His terminolo&ies and
conceptual framewor%s on the other hand can perhaps be made
more accessible throu&h se$eral brief references( Jauss was trained
within the German tradition of Romance philolo&y a tradition fa4
miliar to American readers in the wor% of Auerbach A( R( +urtius
and Leo 0pitFer and one to which Jauss has remained e$er faithful(
His other maBor trainin& was under the philosopher Hans4Geor&
Gadamer who was himself a student of Heide&&er( If it too% .ein
and 6ime more than thirty years to find its An&lish translation Ga4
damer=s 6ruth and Method appeared in An&lish within fifteen years
of its German publication and thus the historical hermeneutics that
it represents and that Jauss de$elops further4both drawin& upon the
wor% of the An&lish philosopher R( G( +ollin&wood 4 can be sup4
posed to meet with a ready and potentially informed audience( In
the essays collected here Jauss=s other main theoretical resources are
Iant=s critiHue of aesthetic Bud&ment Husserl=s phenomenolo&y and
Russian )ormalism to&ether with Pra&ue 0tructuralism( Iant has
lon& been adopted by An&lo4American thou&ht4indeed he remains
almost the last German philosopher ta%en seriously by analytic phil4
osophy( Husserlian phenomenolo&y has been widely disseminated in
some American uni$ersity circles especially its e8tension into
social phenomenolo&y 50chiitF=s concept of the Lebenswelt or @life4
tion ob$iates or at least reformulates in more interestin& and nro4
ducti$e ways many of the difficulties of the $arious An&lo4American
theories of @reader response@ 5from I( A( Richards to the present7 or
TRA*0LATDR=0 PRA)A+A K 88i8
world@7 that Jauss finds particularly useful( And Russian )ormalism
and Pra&ue 0tructuralism ha$e become parts of mainstream American
literary theory and criticism throu&h the efforts of Rene 'elle%
!ictor Arlich and others( Thus Jauss=s wor% ou&ht to find a recepti$e
audience here in America e$en if his own combination of $arious in4
tellectual sources represents a maBor new position within the compet4
in& methodolo&ies that characteriFe the current pluralism of our dis4
cipline( 'hene$er possible I ha$e sou&ht to assist this reception
throu&h reference in the notes to e8istin& An&lish translations of his
sources althou&h I ha$e in each case translated Huoted material from
the ori&inal $ersions(
The portions of the first essay @Literary History as a +hallen&e to
Literary 0tudies@ that ori&inally appeared in translation in New
Literary History 5-.?17 ha$e been thorou&hly retranslated for the
sa%e of accuracy and completeness( Dn the other hand - am &rateful
for permission to ha$e li&htly retouched Ka$id 'ilson=s e8cellent
translation of @History of Art and Pra&matic History@ 5in New Per+
spectives in German Literary Criticism, ed( Richard A( Amacher and
!ictor Lan&e OPrinceton *(J( -.?.;7 in order to ensure termino4
lo&ical and stylistic consistency within the $olume( All the other es4
says collected here ha$e been translated from the German by myself
for the first time( I am &rateful for the encoura&ement of Hans Robert
Jauss Paul de Man and 'lad GodFich in underta%in& this transla4
tion as well as for the patient efforts of the editors at the #ni$ersity
of Minnesota Press in seein& this $olume into print( The shortcomin&s of
the translation of course remain my own(
Timothy Bahti
Ithaca *ew Mor%
Toward an Aesthetic of Reception
Chapter 4
Literary History as
a +hallen&e to Literary Theory
In our time literary history has increasin&ly fallen into disrepute and
not at all without reason( The history of this worthy discipline in the
last one hundred and fifty years unmista%ably describes the path of a
steady decline( Its &reatest achie$ements all belon& to the nineteenth
century( To write the history of a national literature counted in the
times of Ger$inus and 0cherer Ke 0anctis and Lanson as the crown4
in& life=s wor% of the philolo&ist( The patriarchs of the discipline saw
their hi&hest &oal therein to represent in the history of literary
wor%s 75ichtwer$e8 the idea of national indi$iduality on its way to
itself( This hi&h point is already a distant memory( The recei$ed form
of literary history scarcely scratches out a li$in& for itself in the intel4
lectual life of our time( It has maintained itself in reHuirements for
e8aminations by the state system of e8aminations that are them4
sel$es ready for dismantlin&( As a compulsory subBect in the hi&h
school curriculum it has almost disappeared in Germany( Beyond
that literary histories are still to be found only if at all on the
boo%shel$es of the educated bour&eoisie who for the most part opens
them lac%in& a more appropriate literary dictionary to answer
literary HuiF Huestions(
-
In uni$ersity course catalo&s literary history is clearly disappear4
in&( It has lon& been no secret that the philolo&ists of my &eneration
e$en rather pride themsel$es in ha$in& replaced the traditional pre4
sentation of their national literature by periods and as a whole with
lectures on the history of a problem or with other systematic ap4
proaches( 0cholarly production offers a correspondin& picture9
I
3 K LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
collecti$e proBects in the form of handboo%s encyclopedias and 5as
the latest offshoot of the so4called @publisher=s synthesis@7 series of
collected interpretations ha$e dri$en out literary histories as unser4
ious and presumptuous( 0i&nificantly such pseudohistorical collec4
tions seldom deri$e from the initiati$e of scholars rather most often
from the whim of some restless publisher( 0erious scholarship on the
other hand precipitates into mono&raphs in scholarly Bournals and
presupposes the stricter standard of the literary critical methods of
stylistics rhetoric te8tual philolo&y semantics poetics morphol4
o&y historical philolo&y and the history of motifs and &enres Phil4
olo&ical scholarly Bournals today are admittedly in &ood part still
filled with articles that content themsel$es with a literary historical
approach( But their authors find themsel$es facin& a twofold cri4
tiHue( Their formulations of the Huestion are from the perspecti$e of
nei&hborin& disciplines Hualified publicly or pri$ately as pseudo4
problems and their results put aside as mere antiHuarian %nowled&e(
The critiHue of literary theory scarcely sees the problem any more
clearly( It finds fault with classical literary history in that the latter
pretends to be only one form of history writin& but in truth oper4
ates outside the historical dimension and thereby lac%s the founda4
tion of aesthetic Bud&ment demanded by its obBect:literature as one
of the arts(
"
This critiHue should first be made clear( Literary history of the
most con$enient forms tries to escape from the dilemma of a mere
annal4li%e linin&4up of the facts by arran&in& its material accordin& to
&eneral tendencies &enres and what4ha$e4you in order then to treat
within these rubrics the indi$idual wor%s in chronolo&ical series( In
the form of an e8cursis the authors= bio&raphy and the e$aluation of
their oeu$re pop up in some accidental spot here in the manner of
an occasional aside( Dr this literary history arran&es its material uni4
linearly accordin& to the chronolo&y of &reat authors and e$aluates
them in accordance with the schema of @life and wor%s@6 the lesser
authors are=here o$erloo%ed 5they are settled in the interstices7 and
the de$elopment of &enres must thereby also una$oidably be dis
membered( The second form is more appropriate to the canon ot
authors of the classics6 the first is found more often n the modern
literatures that ha$e to stru&&le with the difficulty4&rowin& upto
and in the present4of ma%in& a selection from a scarcely sur$eyable
list of authors and wor%s( ST6SS(H
But a description of literature that follows an already sanct(oned
canon and simply sets the life and wor% of the writers one after
another in a chronolo&ical series is as Ger$inus already remar%ed
i
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA J 2
@no history6 it is scarcely the s%eleton of a history(@
<
By the same
to%en no historian would consider historical a presentation of literature
by &enres that re&isterin& chan&es from wor% to wor% followed the
uniHue laws of the forms of de$elopment of the lyric drama and
no$el and merely framed the unclarified character of the literary
de$elopment with a &eneral obser$ation 5for the most part borrowed
from historical studies7 concernin& the Zeiteist and the political
tendencies of the a&e( Dn the other hand it is not only rare but
almost forbidden that a literary historian should hold Bud&ments of
Huality concernin& the wor%s of past a&es( Rather he prefers to
appeal to the ideal of obBecti$ity of historio&raphy which only has to
describe @how it really was(@ His aesthetic abstinence has &ood
&rounds( )or the Huality and ran% of a literary wor% result neither
from the bio&raphical or historical conditions of its ori&in 71ntsteh+
un' nor from its place in the seHuence of the de$elopment of a
&enre alone but rather from the criteria of influence reception and
posthumous fame criteria that are more difficult to &rasp( And if a
literary historian bound by the ideal of obBecti$ity limits himself to
the presentation of a closed past lea$in& the Bud&ment of the litera4
ture of his own still4unfinished a&e to the responsible critics and
limitin& himself to the secure canon of @masterpieces@ he remains in
his historical distance most often one to two &enerations behind the
latest de$elopment in literature( At best he parta%es of the contem4
porary en&a&ement with literary phenomena of the present as a
passi$e reader and thereby becomes in the formation of his Bud&4
ment a parasite of a criticism that he silently despises as @unscholar4
ly(@ 'hat then should a historical study of literature still be today a
study that4ta%in& up a classical definition of the interest in history
that of )riedrich 0chiller4can promise so little instruction to the
@thou&htful obser$er@ no imitati$e model at all to the @acti$e man
of the world@ no important information to the @philosopher@ and
e$erythin& else but a @source of the noblest pleasure@ to the readerL
3
+itations customarily call upon an authority to sanction a step in the
process of scholarly reflection( But they can also remind us of a former
'ay of posin& a Huestion to pro$e that an answer that has become
classic is no lon&er satisfactory that it has itself become historical
a&ain and demands of us a renewal of the process of Huestion and
answer( 0chiller=s answer to the Huestion of his inau&ural lecture at
Jena on "> May -?/. @'hat Is and Toward 'hat And Koes Dne
> K LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
0tudy #ni$ersal History@ is not only representati$e of the historical
understandin& of German idealism6 it is also illuminatin& for a critical
sur$ey of the history of our discipline( )or it indicates the e8pecta4
tions under which the literary history of the nineteenth century
sou&ht to fulfill the le&acy of the idealist philosophy of history in
competition with &eneral historio&raphy( At the same time it lets one
reco&niFe why the epistemolo&ical ideal of the historicist school had
to lead to a crisis and also why it had to draw the decline of literary
history alon& with it(
Ger$inus can ser$e as our chief witness( He authored not only the
first scholarly presentation of a History of the Poetic National Litera+
ture of the Germans 7Geschichte der poetischen Nationalliteratur der
5eutscben8%49:;*2', but also the first 5and only7 theory of histori4
o&raphy 7Histori$8 written by a philolo&ist(
2
His !undamentals of
the 6heory of Historioraphy de$elop the main thou&hts of 'ilhelm
$on Humboldt=s te8t <n the 6as$ of the Historian 70ber die *uf+
abe des Geschichtsschreibers8 5-/"-7 into a theory with which
Ger$inus elsewhere also established the &reat tas% of a history of
@hi&h@ literature( The literary historian will only then become a
writer of history when researchin& his obBect of study he has found
@the one basic idea that permeates precisely that series of e$ents that
he too% upon himself as his obBect that appears in them Oand;
brin&s them into connection with world e$ents(@
>
This &uidin& idea:
for 0chiller still the &eneral teleolo&ical principal that allows us to
concei$e of the world4historical pro&ress of humanity:already
appears in Humboldt in the separate manifestations of the @idea of
national indi$iduality(@
?
And when Ger$inus then ma%es this @ideal
mode of e8planation@ of history his own he implicitly places Hum4
boldt=s @historical idea@
/
in the ser$ice of nationalist ideolo&y9 a
history of German national literature ou&ht to show how @the wise
direction in which the Gree%s had led humanity and toward which
the Germans 5in accordance with their particular characteristics7 had
always been disposed was ta%en up a&ain by these OGermans; with
free consciousness(@
.
The uni$ersal idea of enli&htened philosophy
of history disinte&rated into the multiplicity of the history of na4
tional indi$idualities and finally narrowed itself to the literary myth
that precisely the Germans were called to be the true successors of
the Gree%s4for the sa%e of that idea @that the Germans alone in
their purity were created to realiFe(@
-1
The process made e$ident by the e8ample of Ger$inus is not only
a procedure typical of the Geisteseschichte of the nineteenth cen4
tury( It also contained a methodolo&ical implication for literary
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA n ?
history as for all historio&raphy when the historicist school brou&ht
the teleolo&ical model of idealist philosophy of history into disre4
pute( 'hen one reBected the solution of the philosophy of history4to
comprehend the course of e$ents from an @end an ideal hi&h
point@ of world history:as unhistorical@ how then was the coher4
ence of history ne$er &i$en as a whole to be understood and repre4
sentedL The ideal of uni$ersal history thereby became as Hans4
Geor& Gadamer showed a dilemma for historical research(
-"
In
Ger$inus=s formulation the historian @can only wish to represent
complete series of e$ents for he cannot Bud&e where he does not
ha$e the final scenes before him(@
-<
*ational histories could ser$e as
closed series so lon& as one saw them pea% politically in the fulfilled
moment of national unification or literarily in the hi&h point of a
national classic( Met their pro&ression toward the @final scene@ must
ine$itably brin& bac% the old dilemma( Thus in the last analysis
Ger$inus only made a $irtue of necessity when:in notable a&ree4
ment with He&el=s famous dia&nosis of @the end of the artistic
period@:he dispensed with the literature of his own post4classical
a&e as merely a symptom of decline and &a$e to the @talents that
now lac% a &oal@ the ad$ice that they would better occupy them4
sel$es with the real world and the state(
-3
But the historicist historian seemed to be freed from the dilemma
of the closure and continuation of history where$er he limited him4
self to periods that he could place before him up throu&h the @final
scene@ and describe in their own completeness without re&ard for
that which followed from them( History as the representation of
periods thus also promised to fulfill the methodolo&ical ideal of the
historicist school to the fullest e8tent( Thereafter when the unfold4
in& of national indi$iduality was no lon&er satisfactory as a &uidin&
thread literary history chiefly strun& closed periods one after another(
The @fundamental law of writin& history accordin& to which the
historian should disappear before his obBect which should itself step
forward in full obBecti$ity@
-2
could be obser$ed most immediately
with the period an indi$idual meanin&ful whole 7-innan#en8 set off
by itself( If @full obBecti$ity@ demands that the historian i&nore the
standpoint of his present time the $alue and si&nificance of a past
a&e must also be reco&niFable independent of the later course of
history( Ran%e=s famous utterance of -/23 &i$es a theolo&ical foun4
dation to this postulate9 @But I maintain that each period is immediate
$is4a4$is God and that its $alue depends not at all on what followed
from it but rather on its own e8istence on its own self(@
->
This new
answer to the Huestion as to how the concept of @pro&ress@
/ K LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
in history is to be concei$ed assi&ns the tas% of a new theodicy to
the historian9 when the historian considers and represents @each
period as somethin& $alid for itself@ he Bustifies God before the phil4
osophy of history as pro&ress a philosophy that $alues periods only
as steps for the followin& &eneration and thereby presupposes a
preference for later periods4in other words an @inBustice of the &od4
head(@
-?
Ran%e=s solution to the problem left behind by the philoso4
phy of history was nonetheless purchased at the e8pense of cuttin&
the thread between history=s past and present4between the period
@as it really was@ and that @which followed from it(@ In its turnin&
away from the Anli&htenment philosophy of history historicism
sacrificed not only the teleolo&ical construction of uni$ersal history
but also the methodolo&ical principle that accordin& to 0chiller first
and foremost distin&uishes the uni$ersal historian and his method9
namely @to Boin the past with the present@
-/
4an inalienable under4
standin& only ostensibly speculati$e that the historicist school could
not brush aside without payin& for it
-.
as the further de$elopment
in the field of literary history also indicates(
The achie$ement of nineteenth4century literary history stood and
fell with the con$iction that the idea of national indi$iduality was
the @in$isible part of e$ery fact@
"1
and that this idea made the
@form of history@
"-
representable e$en in a series of literary wor%s(
To the e8tent that this con$iction disappeared the thread connectin&
e$ents had to disappear as well past and present literature fall apart
into separate spheres of Bud&ment
""
and the selection determina4
tion and e$aluation of literary facts become problematic( The turn
toward positi$ism is primarily conditioned by this crisis( Positi$ist
literary history belie$ed it could ma%e a $irtue of its necessity if it
borrowed the methods of the e8act natural sciences( The result is
only too well %nown9 the application of the principle of pure causal
e8planation to the history of literature brou&ht only e8ternally
determinin& factors to li&ht allowed source study to &row to a
hypertrophied de&ree and dissol$ed the specific character of the
literary wor% into a collection of @influences@ that could be in4
creased at will( The protest was not lon& in comin&( Geistes&eschichte
armed itself with literature set an aesthetics of irrational creation in
opposition to the causal e8planation of history and sou&ht the
coherence of literature 75ichtun8 in the recurrence of atemporal
ideas and motifs(
"<
In Germany Geistes&eschichte allowed itself to be
drawn into the preparation and foundation of the @people=s 7vol$+
ischen8 literary studies of *ational 0ocialism( After the war new
methods relie$ed it and completed the process of de4ideolo&iFation
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA J .
but did not thereby ta%e upon themsel$es the classical tas% of
literary history( The representation of literature in its immanent
history and in its relation to pra&matic history lay outside the interests
of the history of ideas and concepts as well as outside the interests of
research into tradition that flourished in the wa%e of the 'arbur&
0chool( The history of ideas stro$e secretly for a renewal of the
history of philosophy in the mirror of literature4
"3
the research into
tradition neutraliFed the li$ed pra8is of history when it sou&ht the
focal point of %nowled&e in the ori&in or in the atemporal
continuity of tradition and not in the presence and uniHueness of a
literary phenomenon(
"2
The reco&nition of the endurin& within
perpetual chan&e released one from the labor of historical under4
standin&( The continuity of the classical herita&e raised to the
hi&hest idea appeared in Arnst Robert +urtius=s monumental wor%
5which set a le&ion of epi&onal Jopoi4researchers to wor%7 in the
tension between creation and imitation between @&reat literature@
OKichtun&; and @mere literature@ that is immanent in the literary
tradition and not historically mediated9 a timeless classicism of
masterpieces raised itself abo$e that which +urtius called the @un4
brea%able chain the tradition of mediocrity@
">
and left history behind
as a terra inconita,
The &ap between the historical and the aesthetic consideration of
literature is no more spanned here than it already was in Benedetto
Grace=s literary theory with its di$ision of poetry and nonpoetry held
ad absurdum, The anta&onism between pure literature OKichtun&;
and time4bound literature was only to be o$ercome when its found4
in& aesthetics was put into Huestion and it was reco&niFed that the
opposition between creation and imitation characteriFes only the
literature of the humanist period of art but can no lon&er &rasp
modern literature or e$en already medie$al literature( Literary
sociolo&y and the wor%4immanent method
"?
disassociated themsel$es
from the approaches of the positi$ist and idealist schools( They
widened e$en further the &ap between history and literature OKicht4
un&; ( This is most clearly seen in the opposed literary theories of the
Mar8ist and )ormalist schools that must stand at the center of this
critical sur$ey of the prehistory of contemporary literary studies(
Ill
Both schools ha$e in common the turnin& away from positi$ism=s
blind empiricism as well as from the aesthetic metaphysics of Geist4
es&eschichte( They sou&ht in opposite ways to sol$e the problem of
& nce of #teri
ture and once a&ain be producti$ely concei$ed as e$idence of the
social process or as a moment of literary e$olution( But there is as
yet still no &reat literary history that could be identified as a product
of these two attempts that would ha$e retold the old histories of
national literatures from the new Mar8ist or )ormalist premises
reformed their sanctioned canon and represented world literature as
a process with a $iew toward its emancipatory social or perceptually
formati$e 7wabmehmunsbildende8 function( Throu&h their one4
sidedness the Mar8ist and the )ormalist literary theories finally
arri$ed at an aporia the solution to which demanded that historical
and aesthetic considerations be brou&ht into a new relationship(
The ori&inal pro$ocation of Mar8ist literary theory that is also
always renewed is that it denies their own histories to art and to the
correspondin& forms of consciousness of ethics reli&ion or meta4
physics( The history of literature li%e that of art can no lon&er
maintain the @appearance of its independence@ when one has real4
iFed that its production presupposes the material production and
social pra8is of human bein&s that e$en artistic production is a part
of the @real life4process@ of the appropriation of nature that deter4
mines the history of human labor or de$elopment( Dnly when this
@acti$e life4process@ is represented @does history stop bein& a collec4
tion of dead facts(@
"/
Thus literature and art can be $iewed as a
process @only in relation to the pra8is of historical human bein&s@
in their @social function@ 5'erner Irauss7
".
concei$ed as one of the
coe$al @%inds of human appropriation of the world@ and represented
as part of the &eneral process of history in which man o$ercomes the
natural condition in order to wor% his way up to bein& human 5Iarl
Iosi%7(
<1
This pro&ram reco&niFable in 6he German (deoloy 5-/32G3>7
and other(early writin&s of Iarl Mar8 only in its initial tendencies
still awaits its realiFation at least for the history of art and literature(
Already shortly after its birth with the -ic$inen debate of -/2. =
Mar8ist aesthetics was drawn under the spell of an approach condi4
tioned by the concepts of periods and &enres an approach that still
dominates the ar&uments between Lu%acs Brecht and others in the
A8pressionism debate of -.<34</9
<"
literary realism=s problem of
imitation or reflection 7&iederspieelun8, *ineteenth4century real4
ist art theory4pro$ocati$ely directed a&ainst the romantics who
%ept their distance from reality by literary fi&ures for&otten today
5+hampfleury Kuranty76 ascribed post festum by literary history to
-1 K LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
how the isolated literary fact or the seemin&ly autonomous literary
wor% could be brou&ht bac% into the historical coherence of #teri
i b dil
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA E --
the &reat no$elists 0tendhal BalFac and )laubert6 and raised to the
do&ma of socialist realism in the twentieth century durin& the
0talinist era :arose and remained in a noteworthy dependence on the
classical aesthetics of imitatio naturae, At the same time as the
modern concept of art as the @si&nature of creati$e man@ as the
realiFation of the unrealiFed as a potential constructi$e or formati$e
of reality was bein& ad$anced a&ainst the @metaphysical tradition of
the identity of bein& and nature and the determination of the wor%
of man as the =imitation of nature= @
<<
Mar8ist aesthetics still or
a&ain belie$ed it must le&itimate itself with a theory of copyin&( To
be sure in its concept of art it puts @reality@ in the place of @na4
ture@ but it then once a&ain endows the reality placed before art
with characteristic features of that nature that was apparently o$er4
come with e8emplary obli&ation and essential completeness(
<3
Measured a&ainst the ori&inal antinaturalist position of Mar8ist
theory
<2
its contraction upon the mimetic ideal of bour&eois realism
can only be adBud&ed as a throwbac% to a substantialist materialism(
)or be&innin& with Mar8=s concept of labor and with a history of art
understood within the dialectic of nature and labor the material
horiFon of conditions and obBecti$e pra8is Mar8ist aesthetics did not
ha$e to shut itself off from the modern de$elopment of art and
literature which its doctrinaire criticism has up to the most recent
past put down as decadent because @true reality@ is missin&( The
ar&ument of the last years in which this $erdict has been canceled
step by step is to be interpreted at once as a process in which Mar84
ist aesthetics sets to wor% with secular tardiness a&ainst the reduction
of the wor% of art to a merely copyin function in order finally to
do Bustice to the lon&4supressed insi&ht into art=s character us forma+
tive of reality(
The orthodo8 theory of reflection stands in the way of this &en4
uine tas% of a dialectical4materialist literary history and in the way of
the solution of the correlati$e problem of how one is to determine
the achie$ement and influence of literary forms as an independent
%ind of obBecti$e human pra8is( The problem of the historical and
processli%e connection of literature and society was put aside in an
often repro$in& manner by the &ames of Plechano$=s
<>
method9 the
reduction of cultural phenomena to economic social or class eHui$4
alents that as the &i$en reality are to determine the ori&in of art and
literature and e8plain them as a merely reproduced reality( @'ho4
e$er be&ins with the economy as somethin& &i$en and not further
deducible as the deepest fundamental cause of all and the uniHue
reality that suffers no further inHuiry :he transforms the economy
-" D LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
y p e historical phenom4
enon of literary production in its diachrony as well as its synchrony
continually refutes( = =
Literature in the fullness of its forms allows itself to be referred
bac% only in part and not in any e8act manner to concrete conditions
of the economic process( +han&es in the economic structure and
rearran&ements in the social hierarchy happened before the present
a&e mostly in lon& drawn4out processes with scarcely $isible caesurae
and few spectacular re$olutions( 0ince the number of ascer4tainable
determinants in the @infrastructure@ remained incomparably smaller
than the more rapidly chan&in& literary production of the
@superstructure@ the concrete multiplicity of wor%s and &enres had to
be traced bac% to always the same factors or conceptual hyposta4ses
such as feudalism the rise of the bour&eois society the cuttin&4bac% of
the nobility=s function and early hi&h or late capitalist modes of
production( Also literary wor%s are $ariously permeable of e$ents in
historical reality accordin& to their &enre or to the forirT pertainin& to
their period which led to the conspicuous ne&lectin& ofU nonmimetic
&enres as opposed to the epic( In searchin& for social eHui$alents
sociolo&ism not accidentally held to the traditional series of
masterpieces and &reat authors since their ori&inality seemed to be
interpretable as immediate insi&ht into the social process or :in the
case of insufficient insi&ht:as in$oluntary e8pression of chan&es
occurrin& in the @basis(@
</
The dimensions specific to the historicity of
literature are thereby ob$iously diminished( )or an important wor%
one that indicates a new direction in the literary process is surrounded
by an unsur$eyable production of wor%s that correspond to the
traditional e8pectations or ima&es concernin& reality and that thus in
their social inde8 are to be no less $alued than the solitary no$elty of
the &reat wor% that is often comprehended only later( This
dialectical relationship between the production of the new and the
reproduction of the old can be &rasped by the theory of reflection
only when it no lon&er insists on the homo&eneity of the contemporary
in the temporal misrepresentation of a harmoniFin& arran&ement of
social conditions and the literary phenomena reflectin& them side by
side( 'ith this step howe$er Mar8ist aesthetics arri$es at a difficulty
that Mar8 already foresaw9 @the uneHual relationship of the de$elopment
of the material production ( ( ( to the artistic(@
<.
This difficulty
behind which the specific historicity of
uit
Q4Tiiui@i$ #LI#I tiiai rTttnnuMn LH#0 taIes tocourt torcedthe
history of literature into a parallelism that the historical phenom
enon of literary production in its diachrony a ll i h
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA K - :
literature hides itself can be sol$ed by the theory of reflection only
at the cost of its self4cancellation 7-etbstaufhebun8,
The claim to formulate dialectically the theory of reflection thus
entan&led its leadin& representati$e Geor& Lu%acs in stri%in& contra4
dictions(
31
They come into $iew with his e8planation of the normati$e
$alue of classical art as well as with his canoniFation of BalFac for
modern literature but also with his concept of totality and its
correlate the @immediacy of reception(@ 'hen Lu%acs relies on
Mar8=s famous fra&ment on classical art and claims that e$en Ho4
mer=s influence today is @inseparably bound to the a&e and the
means of production in which or respecti$ely under which Homer=s
wor% arose@
3-
he once a&ain implicitly presupposes as answered that
which accordin& to Mar8 was still to be e8plained9 why a wor% @can
still pro$ide Ous; aesthetic pleasure@
3"
when as the mere refle8 of a
lon&4o$ercome form of social de$elopment it would still be ser$in&
only the historian=s interest( How can the art of a distant past sur$i$e
the annihilation of its socioeconomic basis if one denies with Lu%acs
any independence to the artistic form and thus also cannot e8plain
the on&oin& influence of the wor% of art as a process formati$e of
historyL Lu%acs helps himself alon& in this dilemma with the time4
honored concept of the @classical@ that is nonetheless transcendent
of history that can brid&e the &ap between past art and present
influence e$en in the case of its content only with determinations
of a timeless ideality
3<
4and thus precisely not in a dialectical4
materialist mediation( )or modern literature as is well %nown
Lu%acs raised BalFac and Tolstoy to the classical
no )rom this $iewpoint the history of modern
literatun
itselt in the artistic modes of decadence that are alien to reality and
is to re&ain its ideality to the e8tent that it reproduces the modern
social reality in forms such as typification indi$idualiFation or
or&anic narration@4forms that ha$e already become historical and
been canoniFed by Lu%acs(
33
The historicity of literature that is concealed by the classicism of
orthodo8 Mar8ist aesthetics is also missed by Lu%acs where he seem4
acti$ely ta%es a position for or a&ainst the old or
How are literature and art as superstructure suV
norm of realism
e ta%es on the
the new basis(@
3
pposed to be able
-3 a LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
@acti$ely@ to ta%e a position $is4a4$is their social basis when on th
other hand accordin& to An&els in this @reciprocal influence@
economic necessity will @in the last instance@ nonetheless pre$ail and
- f l l . , . 1 ~-w-^- u* an 11ICVI-
tably altered economic basisL This undialectical one4sidedness is also
not eliminated when with Lucien Goldmann one reforms the con4
nection between literature and social reality alon& the @homolo&y@
of structures instead of contents(
Goldmann=s attempts toward a literary history of )rench classi4
cism and a sociolo&y of the no$el postulate a series of @world $iews@
that are class4specific then de&raded by late capitalism since the
nineteenth century and finally reified6 these must4here the not4yet4
o$ercome classicism betrays itself4satisfy the ideal of @coherent
e8pression@ that he allows only for &reat writers(
3/
0o here too as
already with Lu%acs literary production remains confined to a
secondary function always only reproducin& in harmonious parallel
with the economic process( This harmoniFation of @obBecti$e si&nifi4
cation@ and @coherent e8pression@ of &i$en social structure and
imitati$e artistic phenomenon implicitly presupposes the classic4
idealist unity of content and form essence and appearance
3.
:only
now in place of the idea the material side that is the economic
factor is e8plained as substance( This has as its conseHuence that the
social dimension of literature and art with respect to their reception
is li%ewise limited to the secondary function of only allowin& an
already pre$iously %nown 5or ostensibly %nown7 reality to be once
aain reconi#ed,
21
'hoe$er confines art to reflection also restricts
its influence:here the disowned herita&e of Platonic mimesis ta%es
its re$en&e:to the reco&nition of the already %nown( But it is pre4
cisely at this point that the possibility of &raspin& the re$olutionary
character of art is foreclosed to Mar8ist aesthetics9 the characteristic
that it can lead men beyond the stabiliFed ima&es and preBudices of
their historical situation toward a new perception of the world or an
anticipated reality(
Mar8ist aesthetics can only escape from the aporias of the theory
of reflection and once a&ain become aware of the specific historicity
of literature when it ac%nowled&es with Iarl Iosi% that9 @Aach
wor% of art has a doubled character within an indi$isible unity9 it is
the e8pression of reality but it also forms the reality that e8ists not
ne8t to the wor% nor before the wor% but precisely only in the
wor%(@
2-
)irst attempts to win bac% the dialectical character of
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA K -2
historical pra8is for art and literature stand out in the literary theories
of 'erner Irauss Ro&er Garaudy and Iarl Iosi%( Irauss who in his
studies of Anli&htenment literary history rehabilitated the con4
sideration of literary forms since in them @a &reat measure of social
influence Ohas; stored itself@ defines the socially formative function
of literature as follows9 @Literature OKichtun&; mo$es in the direc4
tion of an awareness 7=emebmen8, Therefore the society that is
addressed produces itself within the literature9 style is its law4
throu&h the co&niFance of the style the literature=s address can also
be deciphered(@
2"
Garaudy turns a&ainst that @realism closed within
itself to redefine the character of the wor% of art as @realism without
bounds@ from the perspecti$e of the human present open
toward the future as wor% and myth9 @)or reality when it includes
human bein&s is no lon&er Bust that which it is but also e$erythin&
that is missin& in it e$erythin& that it must still become(@
2<
Iosi%
sol$es the dilemma of Mar8=s fra&ment on classical art:how and why
a wor% of art can sur$i$e the conditions under which it ori&inated :
with a definition of the character of art that historically mediates the
essence and influence of a wor% of art and brin&s them into a dia4
lectical unity9 @The wor% li$es to the e8tent that it has influence(
Included within the influence of a wor% is that which is accom4
plished in the consumption of the wor% as well as in the wor% itself(
That which happens with the wor% is an e8pression of what the wor%
is( ( ( ( The wor% is a wor% and li$es as a wor% for the reason that it
demands an interpretation and >wor$s> Oinfluences wir$t8 in many
meanin&s(@
23
The insi&ht that the historical essence of the wor% of art lies not
only in its representational or e8pressi$e function but also in its
influence must ha$e two conseHuences for a new foundin& of literary
history( If the life of the wor% results @not from its autonomous
e8istence Tbut rather from the reciprocal interaction of wor% and
man%ind@
22
this perpetual labor of understandin& and of the acti$e
reproduction of the past cannot remain limited to the sin&le wor%(
Dn the contrary the relationship of wor% to wor% must now be
brou&ht into this interaction between wor% and man%ind and the
historical coherence of wor%s amon& themsel$es must be seen in the
interrelations of production and reception( Put another way9 literature
and art only obtain a history that has the character of a process when
the succession of wor%s is mediated not only throu&h the producin&
subBect but also throu&h the consumin& subBect4throu&h the
interaction of author and public( And if on the other hand @human
reality is not only a production of the new but also a
-> D LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
5critical and dialectical7 reproduction of the past@
2>
the function of
art in the process of this perpetual totaliFin& can only come into $iew
in its independence when the specific achie$ement of artistic form as
well is no lon&er Bust mimetically defined but rather is $iewed dia4
lectically as a medium capable of formin& and alterin& perception in
which the @formation of the senses@ chiefly ta%es place(
2?
Thus formulated the problem of the historicity of artistic forms is
a belated disco$ery of Mar8ist literary studies( )or it had already
posed itself forty Ofifty; years a&o to the )ormalist school that they
were fi&htin& at that moment when it was condemned to silence by
the pre$ailin& holders of power and dri$en into the diaspora(
I!
The be&innin&s of the )ormalists who as members of the @0ociety
for the 0tudy of Poetic Lan&ua&e@ %<poya#' came forth with pro4
&rammatic publications from -.-> on stood under the ae&is of a
ri&orous fore&roundin& of the artistic character of literature( The
theory of the formal method
2/
raised literature once a&ain to an
independent obBect of study when it detached the literary wor% from
all historical conditions and li%e the new structural lin&uistics defined
its specific result purely functionally as @the sum4total of all the
stylistic de$ices employed in it(@
s.
The traditional distinction
between @poetry@ OKichtun&; and literature thus becomes dispens4
able( The artistic character of literature is to be ascertained solely
from the opposition between poetic and practical lan&ua&e( Lan&ua&e
in its practical function now represents as @a nonliterary series@ all
remainin& historical and social conditionin& of the literary wor%6 this
wor% is described and defined as a wor% of art precisely in its specific
differentiation %ecart poeti?ue', and thus not in its functional
relationship to the nonliterary series( The distinction between poetic
and practical lan&ua&e led to the concept of @artistic perception@
which completely se$ered the lin% between literature and li$ed
pra8is( Art now becomes the means of disruptin& the automatiFation
of e$eryday perception throu&h @estran&ement@ or @defamihariFa4
tion@ %ostraneniye', It follows that the reception of art also can no
lon&er e8ist in the nai$e enBoyment of the beautiful but rather
demands the differentiation of form and the reco&nition of the
operation Thus the process of perception in art appears as an end in
itself the @tan&ibility of form@ as its specific characteristic and the
@disco$ery of the operation@ as the principle of a theory( This theory
made art criticism into a rational method in conscious renunciation
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA J -?
of historical %nowled&e and thereby brou&ht forth critical achie$e4
ments of lastin& $alue(
Another achie$ement of the )ormalist school meanwhile cannot
be o$erloo%ed( The historicity of literature that was at first ne&ated
returned with the e8tension of the )ormalist method and placed it
before a problem that forced it to rethin% the principles of diach4
rony( The literariness of literature is conditioned not only synchron4
ically by the opposition between poetic and practical lan&ua&e but
also diachronically by the opposition to the &i$ens of the &enre and
the precedin& form of the literary series( 'hen the wor% of art is
@percei$ed a&ainst the bac%&round of other wor%s of art and in asso4
ciation with them@ as !i%tor 0h%lo$s%y formulates it
>1
the inter4
pretation of the wor% of art must also ta%e into consideration its
relation to other forms that e8isted before it did( 'ith this the
)ormalist school be&an to see% its own way bac% into history( Its
new proBect distin&uished itself from the old literary history in that
it &a$e up the former=s fundamental ima&e of a &radual and contin4
uous process and opposed a dynamic principle of literary evolution
to the classical concept of tradition, The notion of an or&anic conti4
nuity lost its former precedence in art history and the history of
style( The analysis of literary e$olution disco$ers in the history of
literature the @dialectical self4production of new forms@
>-
describin&
the supposedly peaceful and &radual course of tradition 70ber+
lieferun8 as a procession with fracturin& chan&es the re$olts of new
schools and the conflicts of competin& &enres( The @obBecti$e spirit@
of unified periods was thrown out as metaphysical speculation(
Accordin& to !i%tor 0h%lo$s%y and JuriB TynBano$ there e8ists in
each period a number of literary schools at the same time @wherein
one of them represents the canoniFed hei&ht of literature@6 the
canoniFation of a literary form leads to its automatiFation and
demands the formation of new forms in the lower stratum that
@conHuer the place of the older ones@ &row to be a mass phenome4
non and finally are themsel$es in turn pushed to the periphery(
>"
'ith this proBect that parado8ically turned the principle of
literary evolution a&ainst the or&anic4teleolo&ical sense of the classi4
cal concept of e$olution the )ormalist school already came $ery
close to a new historical understandin& of literature in the realm of
the ori&in canoniFation and decay of &enres( It tau&ht one to see the
wor% of art in its history in a new way that is in the chan&es of the
systems of literary &enres and forms( It thus cut a path toward an
understandin& that lin&uistics had also appropriated for itself9
the understandin& that pure synchrony is illusory since in the
formulation of Roman Ja%obson and JuriB TynBano$ @each s$ste
necessarily comes forth as e$olution and on the other hand e$olution
ine$itably carries with it the character of a system(@
><
To see th
wor% in its history that is comprehended within literary histor$
defined as @the succession of systems@
>3
is howe$er not yet the
same as to see the wor% of art in history, that is in the historical
horiFon of its ori&ination social function and historical influence
The historicity of literature does not end with the succession of
aesthetic4formal systems6 the e$olution of literature li%e that of
lan&ua&e is to be determined not only immanently throu&h its own
uniHue relationship of diachrony and synchrony but also throu&h its
relationship to the &eneral process of history(
>2
)rom this perspecti$e on the reciprocal dilemma of )ormalist and
Mar8ist literary theory a conseHuence can be seen that was not
drawn by either of them( If on the one hand literary e$olution can be
comprehended within the historical chan&e of systems and on the
other hand pra&matic history can be comprehended within the
processli%e lin%a&e of social conditions must it not then also be
possible to place the @literary series@ and the @nonliterary series@
into a relation that comprehends the relationship between literature
and history without forcin& literature at the e8pense of its character
as art into a function of mere copyin& or commentaryL
In the Huestion thus posed I see the challen&e to literary studies of
ta%in& up once a&ain the problem of literary history which was left
unresol$ed in the dispute between Mar8ist and )ormalist methods(
My attempt to brid&e the &ap between literature and history be4
tween historical and aesthetic approaches be&ins at the point at
which both schools stop( Their methods concei$e the literary fact
within the closed circle of an aesthetics of production and of repre4
sentation( In doin& so they depri$e literature of a dimension that
inalienably belon&s to its aesthetic character as well as to its social
function9 the dimension of its reception and influence( Reader
listener and spectator:in short the factor of the audience4play an
e8tremely limited role in both literary theories( Drthodo8 Mar8ist
aesthetics treats the reader:if at all :no differently from the author9
it inHuires about his social position or see%s to reco&niFe him in the
structure of a represented society( The )ormalist school needs the
reader only as a percei$in& subBect who follows the directions in the
te8t in order to distin&uish the Oliterary; form or disco$er the
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA K -.
Oliteraryl procedure( It assumes that the reader has the theoretical
understandin& of the philolo&ist who can reflect on the artistic
de$ices already %nowin& them6 con$ersely the Mar8ist school
candidly eHuates the spontaneous e8perience of the reader with the
scholarly interest of historical materialism which would disco$er
relationships between superstructure and basis in the literary wor%(
Howe$er as 'alther Bulst has stated @no te8t was e$er written to be
read and interpreted philolo&ically by philolo&ists@
>>
nor may -
add historically by historians( Both methods lac% the reader in his
&enuine role a role as unalterable for aesthetic as for historical %nowl4
ed&e9 as the addressee for whom the literary wor% is primarily destined(
)or e$en the critic who Bud&es a new wor% the writer who con4
cei$es of his wor% in li&ht of positi$e or ne&ati$e norms of an earlier
wor% and the literary historian who classifies a wor% in its tradition
and e8plains it historically are first simply readers before their
refle8i$e relationship to literature can become producti$e a&ain( In
the trian&le of author wor% and public the last is no passi$e part no
chain of mere reactions but rather itself an ener&y formati$e of
history( The historical life of a literary wor% is unthin%able without
the acti$e participation of its addressees( )or it is only throu&h the
process of its mediation that the wor% enters into the chan&in&
horiFon4of4e8perience of a continuity in which the perpetual in$er4
sion occurs from simple reception to critical understandin& from
passi$e to acti$e reception from reco&niFed aesthetic norms to a new
production that surpasses them( The historicity of literature as well
as its communicati$e character presupposes a dialo&ical and at once
processli%e relationship between wor% audience and new wor% that
can be concei$ed in the relations between messa&e and recei$er as
well as between Huestion and answer problem and solution( The
closed circle of production and of representation within which the
methodolo&y of literary studies has mainly mo$ed in the past must
therefore be opened to an aesthetics of reception and influence if the
problem of comprehendin& the historical seHuence of literary wor%s
as the coherence of literary history is to find a new solution(
The perspecti$e of the aesthetics of reception mediates between
passi$e reception and acti$e understandin& e8perience formati$e of
norms and new production( If the history of literature is $iewed in
this way within the horiFon of a dialo&ue between wor% and audi4
ence that forms a continuity the opposition between its aesthetic
and its historical aspects is also continually mediated( Thus the
thread from the past appearance to the present e8perience of litera4
ture which historicism had cut is tied bac% to&ether(
"1 J LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
The relationship of literature and reader has aesthetic as well as
historical implications( The aesthetic implication lies in the fact that
the first reception of a wor% by the reader includes a test of its
aesthetic $alue in comparison with wor%s already read @ The ob
$ious historical implication of this is that the understandin& of the
first reader will be sustained and enriched in a chain of receptions
from &eneration to &eneration6 in this way the historical si&nificance
of a wor% will be decided and its aesthetic $alue made e$ident( In this
process of the history of reception which the literary historian can
only escape at the price of lea$in& unHuestioned the presuppositions
that &uide his understandin& and Bud&ment the reappropriation of
past wor%s occurs simultaneously with the perpetual mediation of
past and present art and of traditional e$aluation and current literary
attempts( The merit of a literary history based on an aesthetics of
reception will depend upon the e8tent to which it can ta%e an acti$e
part in the on&oin& totaliFation of the past throu&h aesthetic e8per4
ience( This demands on the one hand :in opposition to the obBecti$4
ism of positi$ist literary history:a conscious attempt at the forma4
tion of a canon which on the other hand :in opposition to the
classicism of the study of traditions4presupposes a critical re$ision
if not destruction of the recei$ed literary canon( The criterion for the
formation of such a canon and the e$er necessary retellin& of literary
history is clearly set out by the aesthetics of reception( The step
from the history of the reception of the indi$idual wor% to the
history of literature has to lead to seein& and representin& the histori4
cal seHuence of wor%s as they determine and clarify the coherence of
literature to the e8tent that it is meanin&ful for us as the prehistory
of its present e8perience(
>/
)rom this premise the Huestion as to how literary history can
today be methodolo&ically &rounded and written anew will be
addressed in the followin& se$en theses(
!I
Thesis -( A renewal of literary history demands the remo$al of the
preBudices of historical obBecti$ism and the &roundin& of the tradi4
tional aesthetics of production and representation in an aesthetics
of reception and influence( The historicity of literature rests not on
an or&aniFation of @literary facts@ that is established post festum,
but rather on the precedin& e8perience of the literary wor% by its
readers(
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA K"-
R( G( +ollin&wood=s postulate posed in his critiHue of the pre$ailin&
ideolo&y of obBecti$ity in history :@History is nothin& but the re4
enactment of past thou&ht in the historian=s mind@
>.
:is e$en more
$alid for literary history( )or the positi$istic $iew of history as the
@obBecti$e@ description of a series of e$ents in an isolated past
ne&lects the artistic character as well as the specific historicity of
literature( A literary wor% is not an obBect that stands by itself and
that offers the same $iew to each reader in each period(
-1
It is not a
monument that monolo&ically re$eals its timeless essence( It is much
more li%e an orchestration that stri%es e$er new resonances amon& its
readers and that frees the te8t from the material of the words and
brin&s it to a contemporary e8istence9 @words that must at the same
time that they spea% to him create an interlocutor capable of under4
standin& them(@
?-
This dialo&ical character of the literary wor% also
establishes why philolo&ical understandin& can e8ist only in a per4
petual confrontation with the te8t and cannot be allowed to be
reduced to a %nowled&e of facts(
?"
Philolo&ical understandin& always
remains related to interpretation that must set as its &oal alon& with
learnin& about the obBect the reflection on and description of the
completion of this %nowled&e as a moment of new understandin&(
History of literature is a process of aesthetic reception and pro4
duction that ta%es place in the realiFation of literary te8ts on the
part of the recepti$e reader the reflecti$e critic and the author in his
continuin& producti$ity( The endlessly &rowin& sum of literary
@facts@ that winds up in the con$entional literary histories is merely
left o$er from this process6 it is only the collected and classified past
and therefore not history at all but pseudo4history( Anyone who
considers a series of such literary facts as a piece of the history of
literature confuses the e$entful character of a wor% of art with that
of historical matter4of4factness( The Perceval of +hretien de Troyes
as a literary e$ent is not @historical@ in the same sense as for e8am4
ple the Third +rusade which was occurrin& at about the same
time(
?<
It is not a @fact@ that could be e8plained as caused by a
series of situational preconditions and moti$es by the intent of a
historical action as it can be reconstructed and by the necessary
and secondary conseHuences of this deed( The historical conte8t in
which a literary wor% appears is not a factical independent series of
e$ents that e8ists apart from an obser$er( Perceval becomes a literary
e$ent only for its reader who reads this last wor% of +hretien with a
memory of his earlier wor%s and who reco&niFes its indi$iduality in
comparison with these and other wor%s that he already %nows so
"" D LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
that he &ains a new criterion for e$aluatin& future wor%s( In contrast
to a political e$ent a literary e$ent has no una$oidable conseHuences
subsistin& on their own that no succeedin& &eneration can e$er
escape( A literary e$ent can continue to ha$e an effect only if those
who come after it still or once a&ain respond to it :if there are
readers who a&ain appropriate the past wor% or authors who want to
imitate outdo or refute it( The coherence of literature as an e$ent is
primarily mediated in the horiFon of e8pectations of the literary
e8perience of contemporary and later readers critics and authors
'hether it is possible to comprehend and represent the history of
literature in its uniHue historicity depends on whether this horiFon of
e8pectations can be obBectified(
!II
Thesis "( The analysis of the literary e8perience of the reader a$oids
the threatenin& pitfalls of psycholo&y if it describes the reception
and the influence of a wor% within the obBectifiable system of
e8pectations that arises for each wor% in the historical moment of its
appearance from a pre4understandin& of the &enre from the form
and themes of already familiar wor%s and from the opposition
between poetic and practical lan&ua&e(
My thesis opposes a widespread s%epticism that doubts whether an
analysis of aesthetic influence can approach the meanin& of a wor%
of art at all or can produce at best more than a simple sociolo&y of
taste( Rene 'elle% in particular directs such doubts a&ainst the
literary theory of I A( Richards( 'elle% ar&ues that neither the
indi$idual state of consciousness since it is momentary and only
personal nor a collecti$e state of consciousness as Jan Mu%aro$s%y
assumes the effect a wor% of art to be can be determined by empir4
ical means(
?3
Roman Ja%obson wanted to replace the @collecti$e
state of consciousness@ by a @collecti$e ideolo&y@ in the form of a
system of norms that e8ists for each literary wor% as lanue and
that is actualiFed as parole by the recei$er:althou&h incompletely
and ne$er as a whole(
?2
This theory it is true limits the subBecti$ity
of the influence but it still lea$es open the Huestion of which data
can be used to comprehend the influence of a particular wor% on a
certain public and to incorporate it into a system of norms( In the
meantime there are empirical means that had ne$er been thou&ht of
before :literary data that allow one to ascertain a specific disposition
of the audience for each wor% 5a disposition that precedes the
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA K "<
psycholo&ical reaction as well as the subBecti$e understandin& of the
indi$idual reader7( As in the case of e$ery actual e8perience the first
literary e8perience of a pre$iously un%nown wor% also demands a
@fore%nowled&e which is an element of the e8perience itself and on
the basis of which anythin& new that we come across is a$ailable to
e8perience at all i(e( as it were readable in a conte8t of e8per4
ience(@
?>
A literary wor% e$en when it appears to be new does not present
itself as somethin& absolutely new in an informational $acuum but
predisposes its audience to a $ery specific %ind of reception by
announcements o$ert and co$ert si&nals familiar characteristics or
implicit allusions( It awa%ens memories of that which was already
read brin&s the reader to a specific emotional attitude and with its
be&innin& arouses e8pectations for the @middle and end@ which can
then be maintained intact or altered reoriented or e$en fulfilled
ironically in the course of the readin& accordin& to specific rules of
the &enre or type of te8t( The psychic process in the reception of a
te8t is in the primary horiFon of aesthetic e8perience by no means
only an arbitrary series of merely subBecti$e impressions but rather
the carryin& out of specific instructions in a process of directed
perception which can be comprehended accordin& to its constituti$e
moti$ations and tri&&erin& si&nals and which also can be described
by a te8tual lin&uistics( If alon& with '( K(0tempel one defines
the initial horiFon of e8pectations of a te8t as paradi&matic isotopy
which is transposed into an immanent synta&matic horiFon of
e8pectations to the e8tent that the utterance &rows then the process
of reception becomes describable in the e8pansion of a semiotic
system that accomplishes itself between the de$elopment and the
correction of a system(
??
A correspondin& process of the continuous
establishin& and alterin& of horiFons also determines the relationship
of the indi$idual te8t to the succession of te8ts that forms the &enre(
The new te8t e$o%es for the reader 5listener7 the horiFon of e8pecta4
tions and rules familiar from earlier te8ts which are then $aried
corrected altered or e$en Bust reproduced( !ariation and correc4
tion determine the scope whereas alteration and reproduction
determine the borders of a &enre4structure(
?/
The interpretati$e
reception of a te8t always presupposes the conte8t of e8perience of
aesthetic perception9 the Huestion of the subBecti$ity of the interpre4
tation and of the taste of different readers or le$els of readers can be
as%ed meanin&fully only when one has first clarified which transsub4
Becti$e horiFon of understandin& conditions the influence of the te8t(
The ideal cases of the obBecti$e capability of such literary4historical
"3 J LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
frames of reference are wor%s that e$o%e the reader=s horiFon of
e8pectations formed by a con$ention of &enre style or form only
in order to destroy it step by step:which by no means ser$es a
critical purpose only but can itself once a&ain produce poetic
effects( Thus +er$antes allows the horiFon of e8pectations of the
fa$orite old tales of %ni&hthood to arise out of the readin& of 5on
@ui/ote, which the ad$enture of his last %ni&ht then seriously paro4
dies(
?.
Thus Kiderot at the be&innin& of Aac?ues le !ataliste, e$o%es
the horiFon of e8pectations of the popular no$elistic schema of the
@Bourney@ 5with the ficti$e Huestions of the reader to the narrator7
alon& with the 5Aristotelian7 con$ention of the romanesHue fable and
the pro$idence uniHue to it so that he can then pro$ocati$ely
oppose to the promised Bourney4 and lo$e4no$el a completely unro4
manesHue @$erite de l=histoire@9 the biFarre reality and moral casu4
istry of the enclosed stories in which the truth of life continually
denies the mendacious character of poetic fiction(
/1
Thus *er$al in
the Cbimeres cites combines and mi8es a Huintessence of well4
%nown romantic and occult motifs to produce the horiFon of
e8pectations of a mythical metamorphosis of the world only in order
to si&nify his renunciation of romantic poetry( The identifications
and relationships of the mythic state that are familiar or disclosable
to the reader dissol$e into an un%nown to the same de&ree as the
attempted pri$ate myth of the lyrical @I@ fails the law of sufficient
information is bro%en and the obscurity that has become e8pressi$e
itself &ains a poetic function(
/-
There is also the possibility of obBectifyin& the horiFon of e8pecta4
tions in wor%s that are historically less sharply delineated( )or the
specific disposition toward a particular wor% that the author antici4
pates from the audience can also be arri$ed at e$en if e8plicit
si&nals are lac%in& throu&h three &enerally presupposed factors9
first throu&h familiar norms or the immanent poetics of the &enre6
second throu&h the implicit relationships to familiar wor%s of the
literary4historical surroundin&s6 and third throu&h the opposition
between fiction and reality between the poetic and the practical
function of lan&ua&e which is always a$ailable to the reflecti$e
reader durin& the readin& as a possibility of comparison( The third
factor includes the possibility that the reader of a new wor% can
percei$e it within the narrower horiFon of literary e8pectations as
well as within the wider horiFon of e8perience of life( - shall return
to this horiFonal structure and its ability to be obBectified by means
of the hermeneutics of Huestion and answer in the discussion of the
relationship between literature and li$ed pra8is 5see WII7(
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA K "2
!III
Thesis <( Reconstructed in this way the horiFon of e8pectations of a
wor% allows one to determine its artistic character by the %ind and
the de&ree of its influence on a presupposed audience( If one char4
acteriFes as aesthetic distance the disparity between the &i$en hori4
Fon of e8pectations and the appearance of a new wor% whose
reception can result in a @chan&e of horiFons@ throu&h ne&ation of
familiar e8periences or throu&h raisin& newly articulated e8periences
to the le$el of consciousness then this aesthetic distance can be
obBectified historically alon& the spectrum of the audience=s reactions
and criticism=s Bud&ment 5spontaneous success reBection or shoc%
scattered appro$al &radual or belated understandin&7(
The way in which a literary wor% at the historical moment of its
appearance satisfies surpasses disappoints or refutes the e8pecta4
tions of its first audience ob$iously pro$ides a criterion for the
determination of its aesthetic $alue( The distance between the
horiFon of e8pectations and the wor% between the familiarity of
pre$ious aesthetic e8perience and the @horiFonal chan&e@
/"
de4
manded by the reception of the new wor% determines the artistic
character of a literary wor% accordin& to an aesthetics of reception9
to the de&ree that this distance decreases and no turn toward the
horiFon of yet4un%nown e8perience is demanded of the recei$in& con4
sciousness the closer the wor% comes to the sphere of @culinary@
or entertainment art 70nterhaltuns$unst8, This latter wor% can be
characteriFed by an aesthetics of reception as not demandin& any
horiFonal chan&e but rather as precisely fulfillin& the e8pectations
prescribed by a rulin& standard of taste in that it satisfies the desire
for the reproduction of the familiarly beautiful6 confirms familiar
sentiments6 sanctions wishful notions6 ma%es unusual e8periences
enBoyable as @sensations@6 or e$en raises moral problems but only to
@sol$e@ them in an edifyin& manner as predecided Huestions(
/<
If
con$ersely the artistic character of a wor% is to be measured by the
aesthetic distance with which it opposes the e8pectations of its first
audience then it follows that this distance at first e8perienced as a
pleasin& or alienatin& new perspecti$e can disappear for later readers
to the e8tent that the ori&inal ne&ati$ity of the wor% has become
self4e$ident and has itself entered into the horiFon of future aesthetic
e8perience as a henceforth familiar e8pectation( The classical
character of the so4called masterwor%s especially belon&s to this
second horiFonal chan&e6
/3
their beautiful form that has become
self4e$ident and their seemin&ly unHuestionable @eternal meanin&@
the accustomed e8perience to catch si&ht of their artistic character
once a&ain 5see section W7(
The relationship between literature and audience includes more
than the facts that e$ery wor% has its own specific historically and
sociolo&ically determinable audience that e$ery writer is dependent
on the milieu $iews and ideolo&y of his audience and that literary
success presupposes a boo% @which e8presses what the &roup e84
pects a boo% which presents the &roup with its own ima&e(@
/2
This
obBecti$ist determination of literary success accordin& to the con4
&ruence of the wor%=s intention with the e8pectations of a social
&roup always leads literary sociolo&y into a dilemma whene$er later
or on&oin& influence is to be e8plained( Thus R( Ascarpit wants to
presuppose a @collecti$e basis in space or time@ for the @illusion of
the lastin& Huality@ of a writer which in the case of Moliere leads to
an astonishin& pro&nosis9 @Moliere is still youn& for the )renchman
of the twentieth century because his world still li$es and a sphere of
culture $iews and lan&ua&e still binds us to him( ( ( ( But the
sphere becomes e$er smaller and Moliere will a&e and die when the
thin&s which our culture still has in common with the )rance of
Moliere die@ 5p( --?7( As if Moliere had only mirrored the @mores
of his time@ and had only remained successful throu&h this supposed
intentionN 'here the con&ruence between wor% and social &roup
does not e8ist or no lon&er e8ists as for e8ample with the reception
of a wor% in a forei&n lan&ua&e Ascarpit is able to help himself by
insertin& a @myth@ in between9 @myths that are in$ented by a later
world for which the reality that they substitute for has become
alien@ 5p( ---7( As if all reception beyond the first socially deter4
mined audience for a wor% were only a @distorted echo@ only a
result of @subBecti$e myths@ and did not itself ha$e its obBecti$e
a priori once a&ain in the recei$ed wor% as the limit and possibility of
later understandin&N The sociolo&y of literature does not $iew its
obBect dialectically enou&h when it determines the circle of author
wor% and audience so one4sidedly(
/>
The determination is re$ersible9
there are wor%s that at the moment of their appearance are not yet
directed at any specific audience but that brea% throu&h the familiar
horiFon of literary e8pectations so completely that an audience can
only &radually de$elop for them(
/?
'hen then the new horiFon of
e8pectations has achie$ed more &eneral currency the power of the
altered aesthetic norm can be demonstrated in that the audience
"> < LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA K "?
e8periences formerly successful wor%s as outmoded and withdraws
its appreciation( Dnly in $iew of such horiFonal chan&e does the
analysis of literary influence achie$e the dimension of a literary
history of readers
//
and do the statistical cur$es of the bestsellers
pro$ide historical %nowled&e(
A literary sensation from the year -/2? may ser$e as an e8ample(
Alon&side )laubert=s Madame .ovary, which has since become world4
famous appeared his friend )eydeau=s !anny, today for&otten(
Althou&h )laubert=s no$el brou&ht with it a trial for offendin& public
morals Madame .ovary was at first o$ershadowed by )eydeau=s
no$el9 !anny went throu&h thirteen editions in one year achie$in& a
success the li%es of which Paris had not e8perienced since +hateau4
briand=s *tala, Thematically considered both no$els met the e84
pectations of a new audience that :in Baudelaire=s analysis:had
foresworn all romanticism and despised &reat as well as nai$e pas4
sions eHually9
/.
they treated a tri$ial subBect infidelity in a bour4
&eois and pro$incial milieu( Both authors understood how to &i$e to
the con$entional ossified trian&ular relationship a sensational twist
that went beyond the e8pected details of the erotic scenes( They put
the worn4out theme of Bealousy in a new li&ht by re$ersin& the
e8pected relationship between the three classic roles9 )eydeau has
the youthful lo$er of the femme de trente ans beome Bealous of his
lo$er=s husband despite his ha$in& already fulfilled his desires and
perishin& o$er this a&oniFin& situation6 )laubert &i$es the adulteries
of the doctor=s wife in the pro$inces:interpreted by Baudelaire as a
sublime form of dandysmeBthe surprise endin& that precisely the
lau&hable fi&ure of the cuc%olded +harles Bo$ary ta%es on di&nified
traits at the end( In the official criticism of the time one finds $oices
that reBect !anny as well as Madame .ovary as a product of the new
school of realtime, which they reproach for denyin& e$erythin& ideal
and attac%in& the ideas on which the social order of the 0econd
Ampire was founded(
.1
The audience=s horiFon of e8pectations in
-/2? here only $a&uely s%etched in which did not e8pect anythin&
&reat from the no$el after BalFac=s death
.-
e8plains the different
success of the two no$els only when the Huestion of the effect of
their narrati$e form is posed( )laubert=s formal inno$ation his
principle of @impersonal narration@ %impassibilite'+attac$ed by
Barbey d=Aure$illy with the comparison that if a story4tellin& ma4
chine could be cast of An&lish steel it would function no differently
than Monsieur )laubert
."
:must ha$e shoc%ed the same audience
that was offered the pro$ocati$e contents of !anny in the in$itin&
tone of a confessional no$el( It could also find incorporated in
"/ K LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
)eydeau=s descriptions the modish ideals and surpressed desires of a
stylish le$el of society
.<
and could deli&ht without restraint in the
lasci$ious central scene in which )anny 5without suspectin& that her
lo$er is watchin& from the balcony7 seduces her husband4for the
moral indi&nation was already diminished for them throu&h the
reaction of the unhappy witness( As Madame .ovary, howe$er
became a worldwide success when at first it was understood and
appreciated as a turnin&4point in the history of the no$el by only a
small circle of connoisseurs the audience of no$el4readers that was
formed by it came to sanction the new canon of e8pectations6 this
canon made )eydeau=s wea%nesses4his flowery style his modish
effects his lyrical4confessional cliches:unbearable and allowed
!anny to fade into yesterday=s bestseller(
IW
Thesis 3( The reconstruction of the horiFon of e8pectations in the
face of which a wor% was created and recei$ed in the past enables
one on the other hand to pose Huestions that the te8t &a$e an answer
to and thereby to disco$er how the contemporary reader could
ha$e $iewed and understood the wor%( This approach corrects the
mostly unreco&niFed norms of a classicist or moderniFin& under4
standin& of art and a$oids the circular recourse to a &eneral @spirit of
the a&e(@ It brin&s to $iew the hermeneutic difference between the
former and the current understandin& of a wor%6 it raises to con4
sciousness the history of its reception which mediates both posi4
tions6 and it thereby calls into Huestion as a platoniFin& do&ma of
philolo&ical metaphysics the apparently self4e$ident claims that in
the literary te8t literature OKichtun&; is eternally present and that
its obBecti$e meanin& determined once and for all is at all times
immediately accessible to the interpreter(
The method of historical reception
.3
is indispensable for the
understandin& of literature from the distant past( 'hen the author of
a wor% is un%nown his intent undeclared and his relationship to
sources and models only indirectly accessible the philolo&ical Hues4
tion of how the te8t is @properly@ :that is @from its intention and
time@4to be understood can best be answered if one fore&rounds it
a&ainst those wor%s that the author e8plicitly or implicitly presup4
posed his contemporary audience to %now( The creator of the oldest
branches of the Roman de Renart, for e8ample assumes4as his
prolo&ue testifies:that his listeners %now romances li%e the story of
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA a 2C
Troy and 6ristan, heroic epics %chansons de este', and $erse fables
%fabliau/', and that they are therefore curious about the @unprece4
dented war between the two barons Renart and Msen&rin@ which
is to o$ershadow e$erythin& already %nown( The wor%s and &enres
that are e$o%ed are then all ironically touched on in the course of the
narrati$e( )rom this horiFonal chan&e one can probably also e8plain
the public success reachin& far beyond )rance of this rapidly
famous wor% that for the first time too% a position opposed to all
the lon&4rei&nin& heroic and courtly poetry(
.0
Philolo&ical research lon& misunderstood the ori&inally satiric
intention of the medie$al Reine$e !uchs and alon& with it the ironic4
didactic meanin& of the analo&y between animal and human natures
because e$er since Jacob Grimm it had remained trapped within the
romantic notion of pure nature poetry and nai$e animal tales( Thus
to &i$e yet a second e8ample of moderniFin& norms one could also
ri&htly reproach )rench research into the epic since Bedier for
li$in&:unconsciously:by the criteria of Boileau=s poetics and
Bud&in& a nonclassical literature by the norms of simplicity
harmony of part and whole probability and still others(
.>
The
philolo&ical4critical method is ob$iously not protected by its histori4
cal obBecti$ism from the interpreter who supposedly brac%etin&
himself nonetheless raises his own aesthetic preconceptions to an
unac%nowled&ed norm and unreflecti$ely moderniFes the meanin& of
the past te8t( 'hoe$er belie$es that the @timelessly true@ meanin& of
a literary wor% must immediately and simply throu&h one=s mere
absorption in the te8t disclose itself to the interpreter as if he had a
standpoint outside of history and beyond all @errors@ of his prede4
cessors and of the historical reception :whoe$er belie$es this @con4
ceals the in$ol$ement of the historical consciousness itself in the
history of influence(@ He denies @those presuppositions :certainly
not arbitrary but rather fundamental :that &o$ern his own under4
standin&@ and can only fei&n an obBecti$ity @that in truth depends
upon the le&itimacy of the Huestions as%ed(@
.?
In 6ruth and Method Hans4Geor& Gadamer whose critiHue of
historical obBecti$ism I am assumin& here described the principle of
the history of influence which see%s to present the reality of history
in understandin& itself
./
as an application of the lo&ic of Huestion
and answer to the historical tradition( In a continuation of +ollin&4
wood=s thesis that @one can understand a te8t only when one has
understood the Huestion to which it is an answer@
..
Gadamer
demonstrates that the reconstructed Huestion can no lon&er stand
within its ori&inal horiFon because this historical horiFon is always
<1 E LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
already en$eloped within the horiFon of the present9 @#nderstandin& is
always the process of the fusion of these horiFons that we suppose to
e8ist by themsel$es(@
-11
The historical Huestion cannot e8ist for itself6
it must mer&e with the Huestion @that the tradition is for us(@
-1-
Dne
thereby sol$es the Huestion with which Rene 'elle% described the
aporia of literary Bud&ment9 should the philolo&ist e$aluate a literary
wor% accordin& to the perspecti$e of the past the standpoint of the
present or the @$erdict of the a&es@L
-1"
The actual standards of a past
could be so narrow that their use would only ma%e poorer a wor%
that in the history of its influence had unfolded a rich semantic
potential( The aesthetic Bud&ment of the present would fa$or a
canon of wor%s that correspond to modern taste but would unBustly
e$aluate all other wor%s only because their function in their time is
no lon&er e$ident( And the history of influence itself as instructi$e
as it mi&ht be is as @authority open to the same obBections as the
authority of the author=s contemporaries(=@
1<
'elle%=s conclusion:
that there is no possibility of a$oidin& our own Bud&ment6 one must
only ma%e this Bud&ment as obBecti$e as possible in that one does
what e$ery scholar does namely @isolate the obBect@
-13
:is no
solution to the aporia but rather a relapse into obBecti$ism( The
@$erdict of the a&es@ on a literary wor% is more than merely @the
accumulated Bud&ment of other readers critics $iewers and e$en
professors@6
-12
it is the successi$e unfoldin& of the potential for
meanin& that is embedded in a wor% and actualiFed in the sta&es of
its historical reception as it discloses itself to understandin&
Bud&ment so lon& as this faculty achie$es in a controlled fashion the
@fusion of horiFons@ in the encounter with the tradition( The
a&reement between my attempt to establish a possible literary history
on the basis of an aesthetics of reception and H(4G( Gada4mer=s
principle of the history of influence nonetheless reaches its limit
where Gadamer would li%e to ele$ate the concept of the classical to
the status of prototype for all historical mediation of past with
present( His definition that @what we call =classical= does not first
reHuire the o$ercomin& of historical distance4for in its own constant
mediation it achie$es this o$ercomin&@
-1>
falls out of the relationship
of Huestion and answer that is constituti$e of all historical tradition( If
classical is @what says somethin& to the present as if it were actually
said to it@
-1?
then for the classical te8t one would not first see% the
Huestion to which it &i$es an answer( Koesn=t the classical which
@si&nifies itself and interprets itself@
-1/
merely describe the result of
what I called the @second horiFonal chan&e@9 the unHuestioned self4
e$ident character of the so4called @masterwor%@ which
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA K <-
conceals its ori&inal ne&ati$ity within the retrospecti$e horiFon of an
e8emplary tradition and which necessitates our re&ainin& the @ri&ht
horiFon of Huestionin&@ once a&ain in the face of the confirmed
classicismL A$en with the classical wor% the recei$in& consciousness
is not relie$ed of the tas% of reco&niFin& the @tensional relationship
between the te8t and the present(@
-1.
The concept of the classical
that interprets itself ta%en o$er from He&el must lead to a re$ersal of
the historical relationship of Huestion and answer
--1
and contradicts
the principle of the history of influence that understandin& is @not
merely a reproducti$e but always a producti$e attitude as well(@
---
This contradiction is e$idently conditioned by Gadamer=s holdin&
fast to a concept of classical art that is not capable of ser$in& as a
&eneral foundation for an aesthetics of reception beyond the period
of its ori&ination namely that of humanism( It is the concept of
mimesis, understood as @reco&nition@ as Gadamer demonstrates in
his ontolo&ical e8planation of the e8perience of art9 @'hat one
actually e8periences in a wor% of art and what one is directed toward
is rather how true it is that is to what e8tent one %nows and reco&4
niFes somethin& and oneself(@
--"
This concept of art can be $ali4
dated for the humanist period of art but not for its precedin&
medie$al period and not at all for its succeedin& period of our
modernity in which the aesthetics of mimesis has lost its obli&atory
character alon& with the substantialist metaphysics 5@%nowled&e of
essence@7 that founded it( The epistemolo&ical si&nificance of art
does not howe$er come to an end with this period4chan&e whence
it becomes e$ident that art was in no way bound to
the classical
reco&nition(=
-<
The wor% of art can also mediate %nowl4
ed&e that does not fit into the Platonic schema if it anticipates paths
of future e8perience ima&ines as4yet4untested models of perception
and beha$ior or contains an answer to newly posed Huestions(
--3
It
is precisely concernin& this $irtual si&nificance and producti$e func4
tion in the process of e8perience that the history of the influence of
literature is abbre$iated when one &athers the mediation of past art
and the present under the concept of the classical, If accordin& to
Gadamer the classical itself is supposed to achie$e the o$ercomin& of
historical distance throu&h its constant mediation it must as a
perspecti$e of the hypostatiFed tradition displace the insi&ht that
classical art at the time of its production did not yet appear @classi4
cal@9 rather it could open up new ways of seein& thin&s and preform
new e8periences that only in historical distance4in the reco&nition
of what is now familiar:&i$e rise to the appearance that a timeless
truth e8presses itself in the wor% of art(
function of
<" a LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
The influence of e$en the &reat literary wor%s of the past can be
compared neither with a self4mediatin& e$ent nor with an emanation9
the tradition of art also presupposes a dialo&ical relationship of the
present to the past accordin& to which the past wor% can answer and
@say somethin&@ to us only when the present obser$er has posed the
Huestion that draws it bac% out of its seclusion( 'hen in 6ruth and
Method, understandin& is concei$ed : analo&ous to Heide&&er=s
@e$ent of bein&@ 7-einsescbehen8 4as @the placin& of oneself within
a process of tradition in which past and present are constantly
mediated@
--2
the @producti$e moment which lies in understandin&@
-->
must be shortchan&ed( This producti$e function of pro&ressi$e
understandin& which necessarily also includes criticiFin& the tradition
and for&ettin& it shall in the followin& sections establish the basis for
the proBect of a literary history accordin& to an aesthetics of reception(
This proBect must consider the historicity of literature in a threefold
manner9 diachronically in the interrelationships of the reception of
literary wor%s 5see W7 synchronically in the frame of reference of
literature of the same moment as well as in the seHuence of such
frames 5see WI7 and finally in the relationship of the immanent
literary de$elopment to the &eneral process of history 5see WII7(
Thesis 2( The theory of the aesthetics of reception not only allows
one to concei$e the meanin& and form of a literary wor% in the
historical unfoldin& of its understandin&( It also demands that one
insert the indi$idual wor% into its @literary series@ to reco&niFe its
historical position and si&nificance in the conte8t of the e8perience
of literature( In the step from a history of the reception of wor%s to
an e$entful history of literature the latter manifests itself as a
process in which the passi$e reception is on the part of authors( Put
another way the ne8t wor% can sol$e formal and moral problems left
behind by the last wor% and present new problems in turn(
How can the indi$idual wor% which positi$istic literary history
determined in a chronolo&ical series and thereby reduced to the status
of a @fact@ be brou&ht bac% into its historical4seHuential realtionship
and thereby once a&ain be understood as an @e$ent@L The theory of
the )ormalist school as already mentioned would sol$e this problem
with its principle of @literary e$olution@ accordin& to which the new
wor% arises a&ainst the bac%&round of precedin& or competin& wor%s
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA K <<
reaches the @hi&h point@ of a literary period as a successful form is
Huic%ly reproduced and thereby increasin&ly automatiFed until
finally when the ne8t form has bro%en throu&h the former $e&e4
tates on as a used4up &enre in the Huotidian sphere of literature( If
one were to analyFe and describe a literary period accordin& to this
pro&ram :which to date has hardly been put into use@
?
:one could
e8pect a representation that would in $arious respects be superior to
that of the con$entional literary history( Instead of the wor%s stand4
in& in closed series themsel$es standin& one after another and
unconnected at best framed by a s%etch of &eneral history:for
e8ample the series of the wor%s of an author a particular school or
one %ind of style as well as the series of $arious &enres:the )ormalist
method would relate the series to one another and discover the
evolutionary alternatin relationship of functions and formsD
n
The
wor%s that thereby stand out from correspond to or replace one
another would appear as moments of a process that no lon&er needs
to be construed as tendin& toward some end point since as the
dialectical self+production of new forms it reHuires no teleolo&y(
0een in this way the autonomous dynamics of literary e$olution
would furthermore eliminate the dilemma of the criteria of selection9
the criterion here is the wor% as a new form in the literary series and
not the self4reproduction of worn4out forms artistic de$ices and
&enres which pass into the bac%&round until at a new moment in the
e$olution they are made @perceptible@ once a&ain( )inally in the
)ormalist proBect of a literary history that understands itself as
@e$olution@ and :contrary to the usual sense of this term:e8cludes
any directional course the historical character of a wor% becomes
synonymous with literature=s historical character9 the @e$olutionary@
si&nificance and characteristics of a literary phenomenon presuppose
inno$ation as the decisi$e feature Bust as a wor% of art is percei$ed
a&ainst the bac%&round of other wor%s of art( @
.
The )ormalist theory of @literary e$olution@ is certainly one of
the most si&nificant attempts at a reno$ation of literary history( The
reco&nition that historical chan&es also occur within a system in the
field of literature the attempted functionaliFation of literary de$el4
opment and not least of all the theory of automatiFation :these
are achie$ements that are to be held onto e$en if the one4sided
canoniFation of chan&e reHuires a correction( +riticism has already
displayed the wea%nesses of the )ormalist theory of e$olution9 mere
opposition or aesthetic $ariation does not suffice to e8plain the
&rowth of literature6 the Huestion of the direction of chan&e of liter4
ary forms remains unanswerable6 inno$ation for itself does not alone
<3 D LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
ma%e up artistic character6 and the connection between literary
e$olution and social chan&e does not $anish from the face of the
earth throu&h its mere ne&ation(
-"1
My thesis WII responds to the last
Huestion6 the problematic of the remainin& Huestions demands that
the descripti$e literary theory of the )ormalists be opened up
throu&h an aesthetics of reception to the dimension of historical
e8perience that must also include the historical standpoint of the
present obser$er that is the literary historian(
The description of literary e$olution as a ceaseless stru&&le be4
tween the new and the old or as the alternation of the canoniFation
and automatiFation of forms reduces the historical character of
literature to the one4dimensional actuality of its chan&es and limits
historical understandin& to their perception( The alterations in the
literary series nonetheless only become a historical seHuence when
the opposition of the old and new form also allows one to reco&niFe
their specific mediation( This mediation which includes the step
from the old to the new form in the interaction of wor% and recipi4
ent 5audience critic new producer7 as well as that of past e$ent and
successi$e reception can be methodolo&ically &rasped in the formal
and substantial problem @that each wor% of art as the horiFon of the
=solutions= which are possible after it poses and lea$es behind(@
-"-
The mere description of the altered structure and the new artistic
de$ices of a wor% does not necessarily lead to this problem nor
therefore bac% to its function in the historical series( To determine
this that is to reco&niFe the problem left behind to which the new
wor% in the historical series is the answer the interpreter must brin&
his own e8perience into play since the past horiFon of old and new
forms problems and solutions is only reco&niFable in its further
mediation within the present horiFon of the recei$ed wor%( Literary
history as @literary e$olution@ presupposes the historical process of
aesthetic reception and production up to the obser$er=s present as
the condition for the mediation of all formal oppositions or @differ4
ential Hualities@ EF5ifferen#?ualitiitenF8 ,>
22
)oundin& @literary e$olution@ on an aesthetics of reception thus
not only returns its lost direction insofar as the standpoint of the
literary historian becomes the $anishin& point4but not the &oalN 4of
the process( It also opens to $iew the temporal depths of literary
e8perience in that it allows one to reco&niFe the $ariable distance
between the actual and the $irtual si&nificance of a literary wor%(
LITIRABM HI0TDRM A0+IIALLA*GA K <2
horiFon of its first appearance let alone that it could then also
already be e8hausted in the pure opposition between the old and the
new form( The distance between the actual first perception of a wor%
and its $irtual si&nificance or put another way the resistance that
the new wor% poses to the e8pectations of its first audience can be
so &reat that it reHuires a lon& process of reception to &ather in that
which was une8pected and unusable within the first horiFon( It can
thereby happen that a $irtual si&nificance of the wor% remains lon&
unreco&niFed until the @literary e$olution@ throu&h the actualiFa4
tion of a newer form reaches the horiFon that now for the first time
allows one to find access to the understandin& of the misunderstood
older form( Thus the obscure lyrics of Mallarme and his school
prepared the &round for the return to baroHue poetry lon& since
unappreciated and therefore for&otten and in particular for the
philolo&ical reinterpretation and @rebirth@ of Gon&ora( Dne can
line up the e8amples of how a new literary form can reopen access to
for&otten literature( These include the so4called @renaissances@ : so4
called because the word=s meanin& &i$es rise to the appearance of an
automatic return and often pre$ents one from reco&niFin& that
literary tradition can not transmit itself alone( That is a literary
past can return only when a new reception draws it bac% into the
present whether an altered aesthetic attitude willfully reaches bac%
to reappropriate the past or an une8pected li&ht falls bac% on for&ot 4
ten literature from the new moment of literary e$olution allowin&
somethin& to be found that one pre$iously could not ha$e sou&ht in
it(
-"<
The new is thus not only an aesthetic cate&ory( It is not absorbed
into the factors of inno$ation surprise surpassin& rearran&ement or
alienation to which the )ormalist theory assi&ned e8clusi$e impor4
tance( The new also becomes a historical cate&ory when the dia4
chronic analysis of literature is pushed further to as% which historical
moments ar(e really the ones that first ma%e new that which is new in
a literary phenomenon6 to what de&ree this new element is already
perceptible in the historical instant of its emer&ence6 which distance
path or detour of understandin& were reHuired for its realiFation in
content6 and whether the moment of its full actualiFation was so
influential that it could alter the perspecti$e on the old and thereby
the canoniFation of the literary past(
-"3
How the relationship of
poetic theory to aesthetically producti$e pra8is is represented in this
li&ht has already been discussed in another conte8t(
-"2
The possibilities
of the interaction between production and reception in the historical
chan&e of aesthetic attitudes are admittedly far from
<> J LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
e8hausted by these remar%s( Here they should abo$e all illustrate the
dimension into which a diachronic $iew of literature leads when it
would no lon&er be satisfied to consider a chronolo&ical series of
literary facts as already the historical appearance of literature(
WI
Thesis >( The achie$ements made in lin&uistics throu&h the distinc4
tion and methodolo&ical interrelation of diachronic and synchronic
analysis are the occasion for o$ercomin& the diachronic perspecti$e:
pre$iously the only one practiced:in literary history as well( If the
perspecti$e of the history of reception always bumps up a&ainst the
functional connections between the understandin& of new wor%s and
the si&nificance of older ones when chan&es in aesthetic attitudes are
considered it must also be possible to ta%e a synchronic cross4section
of a moment in the de$elopment to arran&e the hetero&eneous multi4
plicity of contemporaneous wor%s in eHui$alent opposin& and
hierarchical structures and thereby to disco$er an o$erarchin& system
of relationships in the literature of a historical moment( )rom this
the principle of representation of a new literary history could be de4
$eloped if further cross4sections diachronically before and after were
so arran&ed as to articulate historically the chan&e in literary struc4
tures in its epoch4ma%in& moments(
0ie&fried Iracauer has most decisi$ely Huestioned the primacy of
the diachronic perspecti$e in historio&raphy( His study @Time and
History@
-">
disputes the claim of @General History@ to render com4
prehensible e$ents from all spheres of life within a homo&eneous
medium of chronolo&ical time as a unified process consistent in
each historical moment( This understandin& of history still standin&
under the influence of He&el=s concept of the @obBecti$e spirit@ pre4
supposes that e$erythin& that happens contemporaneously is eHually
informed by the si&nificance of this moment and it thereby conceals
the actual noncontemporaneity of the contemporaneous(
-"?
)or the
multiplicity of e$ents of one historical moment which the uni$ersal
historian belie$es can be understood as e8ponents of a unified content
are de facto moments of entirely different time4cur$es conditioned
by the laws of their @special history@
-"/
as becomes immediately
e$ident in the discrepancies of the $arious @histories@ of the arts law
economics politics and so forth9 @The shaped times of the di$erse
areas o$ershadow the uniform flow of time( Any historical period
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA J <?
must therefore be ima&ined as a mi8ture of e$ents which emer&e at
different moments of their own time(@
-".
It is not in Huestion here whether this state of affairs presupposes
a primary inconsistency to history so that the consistency of &eneral
history always only arises retrospecti$ely from the unifyin& $iewpoint
and representation of the historian6 or whether the radical doubt
concernin& @historical reason@ which Iracauer e8tends from the
pluralism of chronolo&ical and morpholo&ical courses of time to the
fundamental antinomy of the &eneral and the particular in history in
fact pro$es that uni$ersal history is philosophically ille&itimate today(
)or the sphere of literature in any case one can say that Iracauer=s
insi&hts into the @coe8istence of the contemporaneous and non4con4
temporaneous@
-<1
far from leadin& historical %nowled&e into an
aporia rather ma%e apparent the necessity and possibility of dis4
co$erin& the historical dimension of literary phenomena in synchronic
cross4sections( )or it follows from these insi&hts that the chronolo&i4
cal fiction of the moment that informs all contemporaneous pheno4
mena corresponds as little to the historicity of literature as does the
morpholo&ical fiction of a homo&eneous literary series in which all
phenomena in their seHuential order only foilow immanent laws( The
purely diachronic perspecti$e howe$er conclusi$ely it mi&ht e8plain
chan&es in for e8ample the histories of &enres accordin& to the im4
manent lo&ic of inno$ation and automatiFation problem and solution
nonetheless only arri$es at the properly historical dimension when it
brea%s throu&h the morpholo&ical canon to confront the wor% that
is important in historical influence with the historically worn4out
con$entional wor%s of the &enre and at the same time does not i&4
nore its relationship to the literary milieu in which it had to ma%e
its way alon&side wor%s of other &enres(
The historicity of literature comes to li&ht at the intersections of
diachrony and synchrony( Thus it must also be possible to ma%e the
literary horiFon of a specific historical moment comprehensible as
that synchronic system in relation to which literature that appears
contemporaneously could be recei$ed diachronically in relations of
noncontemporaneity and the wor% could be recei$ed as current or
not as modish outdated or perennial as premature or belated(
-<-
)or
if from the point of $iew of an aesthetics of production literature
that appears contemporaneously brea%s down into a hetero&eneous
multiplicity of the noncontemporaneous that is of wor%s informed by
the $arious moments of the @shaped time@ of their &enre 5as the
seemin&ly present hea$enly constellations mo$e apart astro4
</ J LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
nomically into points of the most different temporal distance7 this
multiplicity of literary phenomena nonetheless when seen from the
point of $iew of an aesthetics of reception coalesces a&ain for the
audience that percei$es them and relates them to one another as
wor%s of its present in the unity of a common horiFon of literary
e8pectations memories and anticipations that establishes their
si&nificance(
0ince each synchronic system must contain its past and its future
as inseparable structural elements
-<"
the synchronic cross4section of the
literary production of a historical point in time necessarily implies
further cross4sections that are diachronically before and after
Analo&ous to the history of lan&ua&e constant and $ariable factors
are thereby brou&ht to li&ht that can be localiFed as functions of a
system( )or literature as well is a %ind of &rammar or synta8 with
relati$ely fi8ed relations of its own9 the arran&ement of the tradi4
tional and the uncanoniFed &enres6 modes of e8pression %inds of
style and rhetorical fi&ures6 contrasted with this arran&ement is the
much more $ariable realm of a semantics9 the literary subBects
archetypes symbols and metaphors( Dne can therefore see% to
erect for literary history an analo&y to that which Hans Blumenber&
has postulated for the history of philosophy elucidatin& it throu&h
e8amples of the chan&e in periods and in particular the successional
relationship of +hristian theolo&y and philosophy and &roundin& it
in his historical lo&ic of Huestion and answer9 a @formal system of
the e8planation of the world ( ( ( within which structure the re4
shufflin&s can be localiFed which ma%e up the process4li%e character
of history up to the radicality of period4chan&es(@
-<<
Dnce the sub4
stantialist notion of a self4reproducin& literary tradition has been
o$ercome throu&h a functional e8planation of the processli%e rela4
tionships of production and reception it must also be possible to
reco&niFe behind the transformation of literary forms and contents
those reshufflinG in a literary system of world4understandin& that
ma%e the horiFonal chan&e in the process of aesthetic e8perience
comprehensible(
)rom these premises one could de$elop the principle of represen4
tation of a literary history that would neither ha$e to follow the all
too familiar hi&h road of the traditional &reat boo%s nor ha$e to lose
itself in the lowlands of the sum4total of all te8ts that can no
lon&er be historically articulated( The problem of selectin& that
which is important for a new history of literature can be sol$ed with
the help of the synchronic perspecti$e in a manner that has not yet
been attempted9 a horiFonal chan&e in the historical process ot
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA K <.
@literary e$olution@ need not be pursued only throu&hout the web
of all the diachronic facts and filiations but can also be established
in the altered remains of the synchronic literary system and read out
of further cross4sectional analyses( In principle a representation of
literature in the historical succession of such systems would be
possible throu&h a series of arbitrary points of intersection between
diachrony and synchrony( The historical dimension of literature its
e$entful continuity that is lost in traditionalism as in positi$ism can
meanwhile be reco$ered only if the literary historian finds points of
intersection and brin&s wor%s to li&ht that articulate the processli%e
character of @literary e$olution@ in its moments formati$e of history
as well as its caesurae between periods( But neither statistics nor the
subBecti$e willfulness of the literary historian decides on this histori4
cal articulation but rather the history of influence9 that @which re4
sults from the e$ent@ and which from the perspecti$e of the present
constitutes the coherence of literature as the prehistory of its present
manifestation(
WII
Thesis ?( The tas% of literary history is thus only completed when
literary production is not only represented synchronically and dia4
chronically in the succession of its systems but also seen as @special
history@ in its own uniHue relationship to @&eneral history(@ This
relationship does not end with the fact that a typified idealiFed
satiric or #topian ima&e of social e8istence can be found in the
literature of all times( The social function of literature manifests
itself in its &enuine possibility only where the literary e8perience of
the reader enters into the horiFon of e8pectations of his li$ed pra8is
preforms his understandin& of the world and thereby also has an
effect on his social beha$ior(
lhe functional connection between literature and society is for
the most part demonstrated in traditional literary sociolo&y within
the narrow boundaries of a method that has only superficially re4
placed the classical principle of imitatio naturae with the determina4
tion that literature is the representation of a pre&i$en reality which
therefore must ele$ate a concept of style conditioned by a particular
period:the @realism@ of the nineteenth century:to the status of the
hterary cate&ory par e8cellence( But e$en the literary @structuralism@
now fashionable=
<3
which appeals often with dubious Bustification to
the archetypal criticism of *orthrop )rye or to the structural an4
31 K LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
By interpretin& the findin&s of lin&uistic and literary structuralism as
archaic anthropolo&ical constants dis&uised in literary myths: which
it not infreHuently mana&es only with the help of an ob$ious
alle&oriFation of the te8t
-<2
4it reduces on the one hand historical
e8istence to the structures of an ori&inal social nature on the other
hand literature to this nature=s mythic or symbolic e8pression( But
with this $iewpoint it is precisely the eminently social i(e( socially
formative function of literature that is missed( Literary structuralism
:as little as the Mar8ist and )ormalist literary studies that came
before it:does not inHuire as to how literature @itself turns around
to help inform ( ( ( the idea of society which it presupposes@ and
has helped to inform the processli%e character of history( 'ith
these words Gerhard Hess formulated in his lecture on @The Ima&e
of 0ociety in )rench Literature@ 5-.237 the unsol$ed problem of a
union of literary history and sociolo&y and then e8plained to what
e8tent )rench literature in the course of its modern de$elopment
could claim for itself to ha$e first disco$ered certain law4&o$erned
characteristics of social e8istence(
-<>
To answer the Huestion of
the socially formati$e function of literature accordin& to an aesthet4
ics of reception e8ceeds the competence of the traditional aesthetics
of representation( The attempt to close the &ap between literary4his4
torical and sociolo&ical research throu&h the methods of an aesthetics
of reception is made easier because the concept of the hori#on of e/+
pectations that - introduced into literary4historical interpretation
-<?
also has played a role in the a8iomatics of the social sciences since
Iarl Mannheim(
-</
It li%ewise stands in the center of a methodo4
lo&ical essay on @*atural Laws and Theoretical 0ystems@ by Iarl R(
Popper who would anchor the scientific formation of theory in the
prescientific e8perience of li$ed pra8is( Popper here de$elops the
problem of obser$ation from out of the presupposition of a @horiFon
of e8pectations@ thereby offerin& a basis of comparison for my
attempt to determine the specific achie$ement of literature in the
&eneral process of the formation of e8perience and to delimit it $isa4
$is other forms of social beha$ior(
-<.
Accordin& to Popper pro&ress in science has in common with
prescientific e8perience the fact that each hypothesis li%e each ob4
ser$ation always presupposes e8pectations @namely those that con4
stitute the horiFon of e8pectations which first ma%es those obser4
$ations si&nificant and thereby &rants them the status of obser$a4
tions(@
-31
)or pro&ress in science as for that in the e8perience
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA P 3-
of life the most important moment is the @disappointment of e84
pectations@9 @It resembles the e8perience of a blind person who
runs into an obstacle and thereby e8periences its e8istence( Throu&h
the falsification of our assumptions we actually ma%e contact with
=reality(= The refutation of our errors is the positi$e e8perience that
we &ain from reality(@
-3-
This model certainly does not sufficiently
e8plain the process of the scientific formation of theory
-3"
and yet it
can well illustrate the @producti$e meanin& of ne&ati$e e8perience@ in
li$ed pra8is
-3<
as well as shed a clearer li&ht upon the specific
function of literature in social e8istence( )or the reader is pri$ile&ed
abo$e the 5hypothetical7 nonreader because the reader:to stay with
Popper=s ima&e:does not first ha$e to bump into a new obstacle to
&ain a new e8perience of reality( The e8perience of readin& can liber4
ate one from adaptations preBudices and predicaments of a li$ed
pra8is in that it compels one to a new perception of thin&s( The
horiFon of e8pectations of literature distin&uishes itself before the
horiFon of e8pectations of historical li$ed pra8is in that it not
only preser$es actual e8periences but also anticipates unrealiFed
possibility broadens the limited space of social beha$ior for new
desires claims and &oals and thereby opens paths of future
e8perience(
The pre4orientation of our e8perience throu&h the creati$e capa4
bility of literature rests not only on its artistic character which by
$irtue of a new form helps one to brea% throu&h the automatism of
e$eryday perception( The new form of art is not only @percei$ed
a&ainst the bac%&round of other art wor%s and throu&h association
with them(@ In this famous sentence which belon&s to the core of
the )ormalist credo
-33
!i%tor 0h%lo$s%y remains correct only in4
sofar as he turns a&ainst the preBudice of classicist aesthetics that de4
fines the beautiful as harmony of form and content and accordin&ly
reduces the new form to the secondary function of &i$in& shape to a
pre&i$en content( The new form howe$er does not appear Bust @in
order to relie$e the old form that already is no lon&er artistic(@ It
also can ma%e possible a new perception of thin&s by preformin& the
content of a new e8perience first brou&ht to li&ht in the form of
literature( The relationship between literature and reader can actual4
iFe itself in the scnsorial realm as an incitement to aesthetic percep4
tion as well as in the ethical realm as a summons to moral reflec4
tion(
-32
The new literary wor% is recei$ed and Bud&ed a&ainst the
bac%&round of other wor%s of art as well as a&ainst the bac%&round
of the e$eryday e8perience of life( Its social function in the ethical
realm is to be &rasped accordin& to an aesthetics of reception in the
same modalities of Huestion and answer problem and solution
3" K LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
under which it enters into the horiFon of its historical influenc
How a new aesthetic form can ha$e moral conseHuences at th same
time or put another way how it can ha$e the &reatest coT cei$able
impact on a moral Huestion is demonstrated in an impressi$e manner
by the case of Madame .ovary, as reflected in the trial that was
instituted a&ainst the author )laubert after the prepublica tion of the
wor% in the Revue de Paris in -/2?( The new literary form that
compelled )laubert=s audience to an unfamiliar perception of the
@well4thumbed fable@ was the principle of impersonal 5or unin4$ol$ed7
narration in conBunction with the artistic de$ice of the so4called style
indirect libre, handled by )laubert li%e a $irtuoso and in a
perspecti$ely conseHuential manner( 'hat is meant by this can be
made clear with a Huotation from the boo% a description that the
prosecutin& attorney Pinard accused in his indictment as bein& im4
moral in the hi&hest de&ree( In the no$el it follows upon Amma=s
first @false step@ and relates how she catches si&ht of herself in the
mirror after her adultery9
0eein& herself in the mirror she wondered at her face( *e$er had her eyes been
so lar&e so blac% or so deep( 0omethin& subtle spread about her bein& trans4
fi&ured her(
0he repeated9 @I ha$e a lo$erN a lo$erN@ deli&htin& at the idea as at that of a
second puberty that had come to her( 0o at last she was &oin& to possess those
Boys of lo$e that fe$er of happiness of which she had despaired( 0he was enter4
in& upon somethin& mar$elous where all would be passion ecstasy delirium(
The prosecutin& attorney too% the last sentences for an obBecti$e
depiction that included the Bud&ment of the narrator and was upset
o$er the @&lorification of adultery@ which he held to be e$en much
more dan&erous and immoral than the false step itself(
-3>
Met
)laubert=s accuser thereby succumbed to an error as the defense
immediately demonstrated( )or the incriminatin& sentences are not
any obBecti$e statement of the narrator=s to which the reader can
attribute belief but rather a subBecti$e opinion of the character who
is thereby to be characteriFed in her feelin&s that are formed accord4
in& to no$els( The artistic de$ice consists in brin&in& forth a mostly
inward discourse of the represented character without the si&nals of
direct discourse 5@0o I am at last &oin& to possess@7 or indirect dis4
course 5@0he said to herself that she was therefore at last &oin& to
possess@7 with the effect that the reader himself has to decide
whether he should ta%e the sentence for a true declaration or under4
stand it as an opinion characteristic of this character Indeed Amma
Bo$ary is @Bud&ed simply throu&h a plain description of her e8ist4
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA J 3<
cnce out of her own feelin&s(=@
3?
This result of a modern stylistic
analysis a&rees e8actly with the counterar&ument of the defense at4
torney 0enard who emphasiFed that the disillusion be&an for Amma
already from the second day onward9 @The denouement for morality
is found in each line of the boo%@
-3/
5only that 0enard himself
could not yet name the artistic de$ice that was not yet recorded at
this timeN7( The consternatin& effect of the formal inno$ations of
)laubert=s narrati$e style became e$ident in the trial9 the impersonal
form of narration not only compelled his readers to percei$e thin&s
differently:@photo&raphically e8act@ accordin& to the Bud&ment of
the time:but at the same time thrust them into an alienatin& uncer4
tainty of Bud&ment( 0ince the new artistic de$ice bro%e throu&h an
old no$elistic con$ention:the moral Bud&ment of the represented
characters that is always uneHui$ocal and confirmed in the description
:the no$el was able to radicaliFe or to raise new Huestions of li$ed
pra8is which durin& the proceedin&s caused the ori&inal occasion for
the accusation:alle&ed lasci$iousness:to recede wholly into the
bac%&round( The Huestion with which the defense went on its
counterattac% turned the reproach that the no$el pro$ides nothin&
other than the @story of a pro$incial woman=s adulteries@ a&ainst
the society9 whether then the subtitle to Madame .ovary must not
more properly read @story of the education too often pro$ided in
the pro$inces(@
-3.
But the Huestion with which the prosecutin& at4
torney=s re?uisitoire reaches its pea% is nonetheless not yet thereby
answered9 @'ho can condemn that woman in the boo%L *o one(
0uch is the conclusion( In the boo% there is not a character who can
condemn her( If you find a wise character there if you find a sin&le
principle there by $irtue of which the adultery mi&ht be sti&matiFed
- am in error(@
-21
If in the no$el none of the represented characters could brea% the
staff across Amma Bo$ary and if no moral principle can be found
$alid in whose name she would be condemnable then is not the
rulin& @public opinion@ and its basis in @reli&ious feelin&@ at once
called into Huestion alon& with the @principle of marital fidelity@L
Before what court could the case of Madame .ovary be brou&ht if
the formerly $alid social norms:public opinion reli&ious sentiment
public morals &ood manners:are no lon&er sufficient to reach a
$erdict in this caseL
-2-
These open and implicit Huestions by no
means indicate an aesthetic lac% of understandin& and moral philis4
tinism on the part of the prosecutin& attorney( Rather it is much
more that in them the unsuspected influence of a new art form
comes to be e8pressed which throu&h a new maniere de voir les
33 J LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA
choses was able to Bolt the reader of Madame .ovary out of the self4
e$ident character of his moral Bud&ment and turned a predecided
Huestion of public morals bac% into an open problem( In the face
of the $e8ation that )laubert than%s to the artistry of his impersonal
style did not offer any handhold with which to ban his no$el on
&rounds of the author=s immorality the court to that e8tent acted
consistently when it acHuitted )laubert as writer but condemned
the literary school that he was supposed to represent but that in
truth was the as yet unreco&niFed artistic de$ice9
'hereas it is not permitted under the prete8t of portrayin& character and
local color to reproduce in their errors the facts utterances and &estures of the
characters whom the author=s mission it is to portray that a li%e system applied
to wor%s of the spirit as well as to productions of the fine arts leads to a realism
which would be the ne&ation of the beautiful and the &ood and which &i$in&
birth to wor%s eHually offensi$e to the eye and to the spirit would commit
continual offences a&ainst public morals and &ood manners(
ls"
Thus a literary wor% with an unfamiliar aesthetic form can brea%
throu&h the e8pectations of its readers and at the same time con4
front them with a Huestion the solution to which remains lac%in&
for them in the reli&iously or officially sanctioned morals( Instead
of further e8amples let one only recall here that it was not first
Bertolt Brecht but rather already the Anli&htenment that proclaimed
the competiti$e relationship between literature and canoniFed morals
as )riedrich 0chiller not least of all bears witness to when he e8press4
ly claims for the bour&eois drama9 @The laws of the sta&e be&in
where the sphere of worldly laws end(@
-2<
But the literary wor% can
also:and in the history of literature this possibility characteriFes
the latest period of our modernity:re$erse the relationship of Hues4
tion and answer and in the medium of art confront the reader with
a new @opaHue@ reality that no lon&er allows itself to be understood
from a pre&i$en horiFon of e8pectations( Thus for e8ample the latest
&enre of no$els the much4discussed nouveau roman, presents itself
as a form of modern art that accordin& to Ad&ar 'ind=s formulation
represents the parado8ical case @that the solution is &i$en but the
problem is &i$en up so that the solution mi&ht be understood as a
problem(@
-23
Here the reader is e8cluded from the situation of the
immediate audience and put in the position of an uninitiated third
party who in the face of a reality still without si&nificance must
himself find the Huestions that will decode for him the perception
of the world and the interpersonal problem toward which the answer of
the literature is directed(
LITARARM HI0TDRM A0 +HALLA*GA K 32
It follows from all of this that the specific achie$ement of litera4
ture in social e8istence is to be sou&ht e8actly where literature is not
absorbed into the function of a representational art( If one loo%s at
the moments in history when literary wor%s toppled the taboos of
the rulin& morals or offered the reader new solutions for the moral
casuistry of his li$ed pra8is which thereafter could be sanctioned by
the consensus of all readers in the society then a still4little4studied
area of research opens itself up to the literary historian( The &ap
between literature and history between aesthetic and historical
%nowled&e can be brid&ed if literary history does not simply describe
the process of &eneral history in the reflection of its wor%s one more
time but rather when it disco$ers in the course of @literary e$olu4
tion@ that properly socially formative function that belon&s to
literature as it competes with other arts and social forces in the eman4
cipation of man%ind from its natural reli&ious and social bonds(
If it is worthwhile for the literary scholar to Bump o$er his ahis4
torical shadow for the sa%e of this tas% then it mi&ht well also pro4
$ide an answer to the Huestion9 toward what end and with what
ri&ht can one today still:or a&ain:study literary historyL
Chapter 2
History of Art
and Pra&matic History
At first si&ht history in the realm of the arts presents two contra4
dictory $iews( 'ith the first it would appear that the history of ar4
chitecture music or poetry is more consistent and more coherent
than that of society( The chronolo&ical seHuence of wor%s of art is
more closely connected than a chain of political e$ents and the more
&radual transformations of style are easier to follow than the trans4
formations of social history( !alery once said that the difference
between art history and social history was that in the former the pro4
ducts were @filles $isibles les unes des autres@ whereas in the latter
@chaHue enfant semble a$oir mille peres et reciproHuement(@
-
Dne
mi&ht conclude from this that the claim @man ma%es his history him4
self@ is most stron&ly borne out in the realm of the arts(
'ith the second $iew the paradi&ms of art historio&raphy in their
prescientific and then in their positi$istic phase
"
show that this
&reater consistency of detail is purchased at the price of an o$erall in4
consistency as re&ards the lin%s between art &enres as well as their re4
lation to the &eneral historical and social process( Before it turned to
tracin& the history of style art history had always ta%en the form of
artists= bio&raphies which were lin%ed only throu&h chronolo&ical
order( The literary historio&raphy of the humanists also be&an with
@stories@ i(e( bio&raphies of writers in the order of their dates of
death sometimes di$ided up into cate&ories of authors(
<
The model
was Plutarch=s Lives, which also established the pattern of @parallels(@
This form of inte&ration which until the end of the ei&hteenth century
underlay the response to classical art and the dispute o$er its
ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM K 3?
e8emplary character belon&ed specifically to the first sta&e of the
@histories of art appreciation(@
3
)or the literary form of @parallels@
presupposes the idea of perfection as a criterion that transcends time
e$en when authors or wor%s e8tend it to @&enres@ of art or to nation4
al @&olden a&es(@ The historical appearance of art splits up into a
$ariety of different elemental courses each of which is directed to4
wards its own @point of perfection@ and throu&h aesthetic norms
can be compared with earlier histories or @forerunners(@ The appear4
ance of all histories in the arts can then be Boined to&ether a&ain in
the composite historical picture of a periodic recurrence of the &olden
a&e:a picture that is typical of humanistic historio&raphy and also
of !oltaire=s social history(
2
A second sta&e of the @histories@ came about throu&h historicism
5o$erestimation of historical sin&ularity7 in its positi$istic phase( The
principle of e8plainin& a wor% of art by the sum of its historical con4
ditions meant that with e$ery wor% study had to start ri&ht from
scratch so that the @be&innin&s@ could be ascertained from its sources
and the determinant factors of time and en$ironment could be e84
tracted from the author=s life( The Huestion of sources which ine$i4
tably leads to the Huestion of sources of sources loses its way in
@histories@ Bust as completely as that of the lin% between life and
wor%( Thus the seHuential lin% between one wor% and the ne8t is
lost in a historical $acuum which would be ob$ious simply from the
chronolo&ical order if it were not concealed by the $a&ue &eneraliFa4
tion of @currents@ or @schools@ or brid&ed by an e8ternal ne8us
borrowed from pra&matic history4first and foremost that of nation4
hood( As a&ainst this the Huestion may Bustifiably be as%ed whether
art history can in fact do anythin& else but borrow its o$erall coher4
ance from pra&matic history(
Between the first and second sta&es of the @histories@ lies the his4
toricism of the Anli&htenment in which art history played a not
insi&nificant role( The epochal turnin& point at which sin&ular history
to&ether with the newly founded philosophie de (>bistoire, won the
battle a&ainst plural histories
>
be&an at the start of the ei&hteenth
century throu&h insi&hts arri$ed at in the study of art( The dispute
that flared up a&ain at the hei&ht of )rench classicism concernin&
the e8emplary character of classical art brou&ht both sides:the
*nciens and the Modernes+ultimately to the same conclusion
which was that ancient and modern art in the lon& run could not be
measured a&ainst the same standard of perfection %.eau absolu', be4
cause each epoch had its own customs its own tastes and therefore
its own ideas of beauty %.eau relatif', The disco$ery of the historical
3/ K ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
element of beauty and the historical perception of art that it initiated
led up to thehistoricismof the Anli&htenment(
?
In the ei&hteenth cen4
tury this process resulted in an increasin& emphasis on the temporal
element of both art history and philosophical history which since
)enelon=s ProHet d>un traite sur 4>histoire 5-?-37 had deliberately em4
ployed the unifyin& means and classical norms of the epic to le&itimiFe
its superiority o$er the merely factual ruler4and4state type of history
/
'inc%elmann=s Gescbichte der Iunst des *ltertums 5-?>37 is the
first landmar% of the new historio&raphy of art which was made
possible throu&h the historiciFin& of antiHuity and was set on its
way by the abandonin& of comparati$e description in the form of
@parallels(@ In turnin& away from the traditional @history of artists@
'inc%elmann sets the new @history of art@ the tas% of @teachin&
the ori&in the &rowth the chan&e and the decline of the same to4
&ether with the different styles of nations times and artist=s(@
.
Art history as 'inc%elmann inau&urated it does not need to borrow
its o$erall coherence from pra&matic history since it can claim a
&reater consistency of its own9 @The arts( ( ( li%e all in$entions
be&an with necessity6 afterwards one sou&ht beauty and finally
there followed the superfluous9 these are the three outstandin&
sta&es of art(@
-1
As opposed to the course of e$ents in pra&matic
history the seHuence of wor%s in the art of antiHuity is distin&uished
by a complete and therefore normati$e course9 in the realm of the
arts the historical element can complete itself naturally( )riedrich
0chle&el who carried this principle o$er to poetry loo%ed for and
found in Gree% poetry @a complete natural history of art and of
taste@ in the course of which @e$en the incompleteness of the earlier
sta&es and the de&eneration of the later@ could ta%e on e8emplary
si&nificance(@ Herder=s critiHue of 'inc%elmann can in this conte8t
be interpreted as an attempt lo&ically to e8tend the temporal ele4
ment of art history to @the whole seHuence of times@
-"
and to assert
the historical uni$ersality of beauty as opposed to the sin&ulariFed
art of the Gree%s which had ne$ertheless been raised to the le$el of a
norm(
-<
Poetry @as a tool or as an artistic product and flower of ci$i4
liFation and humanity@ re$eals throu&h its history somethin& that
@could only be brou&ht about pro&ressi$ely in the &reat course of
times and nations(@
-3
And here the point is reached at which art
history and social history enter into a relationship that raises a new
Huestion9 whether the history of art which is usually re&arded as a
dependent @poor relati$e@ of &eneral history mi&ht not once ha$e
been the head of the family and mi&ht not once a&ain become a
paradi&m of historical %nowled&e(
ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM K 3.
II
The decay of the traditional form of literary history shaped in the
nineteenth century and now drained of all e8emplary scholarly char4
acter ma%es it almost impossible for us to realiFe the &reat status
that was enBoyed by art history at its birth with the formation of
historical perception in the thou&ht of the Anli&htenment in the
philosophy of history of the German idealists and at the be&innin&
of historicism( 'ith the turnin& away from traditional histories
chronicles and accounts of rulers states and wars the history of
the arts seemed li%e a paradi&m of the new form of history which:
abo$e all:could claim a philosophical interest9 @Tous les peuples
ont produit des heros et des politiHues9 tous les peuples ont epro$e
des re$olutions9 toutes les histoires sont presHue e&ales pour Hui ne
$eut mettre Hue des faits dans sa memoire( Mais HuiconHue pense
et ce Hui est encore plus rare HuiconHue a du &out ne compte Hue
Huatre siecles dans l=histoire de monde(@
ls
Pra&matic histories are of
monotonous uniformity6 only throu&h the perfection of the arts
can the human spirit rise to its own particular &reatness and lea$e
behind wor%s that en&a&e not only the memory but also thou&ht
and taste( Thus !oltaire Bustifies the new underta%in& of his -iecle
de Louis J(= 5-?2-7( !oltaire=s chan&eo$er to the @philosophy of
history@ was followed by 'inc%elmann and Herder=s foundin& of
the history of art and literature( They made the same claims and
made their criticisms of traditional political and war history no less
clearly(
Before his famous wor%s 'inc%elmann wrote down Gedan$en
vom mundlichen =ortra der neuem allemeinen Gescbichte 5-?237
to distin&uish @what is truly useful in history@ from the @nice and
beautiful(@ He sets himself apart from @our pra&matic scribes@ and
fromTthe @di$erse &eneral histories@ demands @&reat e8amples@
and @decisi$e studies@ sets up a canon9 @Df scholars and artists
&eneral history immortaliFes only in$entors not copyists6 only ori4
&inals not collectors9 a Galileo lluy&ens and *ewton not a !i$iani
not a Hopital ( ( ( @ and thus follows the basic principle9 @A$erythin&
subordinate belon&s to specialist history(@
->
The new demands of
'inc%elmann=s Gescbichte der Iunst des *ltertums 5-?>37 deni&rate
not only the pre$ious @history of artists@ but also the chronolo&ical
presentation of pre$ious history( The history of art is to be @no mere
narration of chronolo&y and chan&es within it@ but history and sys4
tem all in one6 it is to brin& out the complete @essence of art@ and
the idea of beauty throu&hout its historical de$elopment(@
21 J ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
)or Herder too the ad$anta&es of a history of the poetry of times
and nations were clear( This can be seen from the panoramic presen
tation of current poetry with which in his @Humanitats4Briefen@ of
-?.> he refers to the historical4philosophical problem of the <uer+
ette" @In this &allery of different ways of thin%in& aspirations and
desires we certainly come to %now periods and nations more deeply
than alon& the decepti$e dreary route of their political and war4
history( In the latter we seldom see more of a people than how it let
itself be &o$erned and %illed6 in the former we learn how it thou&ht
what it hoped and wished for how it enBoyed itself and how it was
led by its teachers or its inclinations(@
-/
The history of the arts
becomes a medium throu&h which the historical indi$iduation of the
human spirit is presented throu&hout the course of times and na
tions( Thus the ideality of the Gree%s which 'inc%elmann had still
maintained is pushed bac% into its historical settin& the normati$e
element of perfection carried o$er to the di$ersity of indi$idual
beauty and the world4historical study of poetry related to a concep
tion of history that has no further need of any immanent teleolo&y@
and yet a&ain promises the aesthete a coherent whole( Those aspects
of a natural history of art that are still to be found in Herder4the
ima&ery of &rowth and old a&e the cyclic completion of e$ery
culture and the @classical@ as the @hi&hest of its 5respecti$e7 %ind@:
brin& into $iew the coherence of art history in the traditional way as
conditioned by the outcome of the @uerelle, The trailblaFin& ap
proach with which Herder outstripped this immanent teleolo&y as
well as the pro&ressi$e theory of the arts arose out of his return to
the tradition of biblical hermeneutics( Herder4as 'eber showed4
de$eloped a theory of beauty that once more asserted its historical
uni$ersality a&ainst the relati$ism of national and epochal indi$idual
ities9 the beautiful which is no lon&er somethin& metaphysically
definable or essentially imitable can be reconstructed throu&h the
hermeneutic critical process as the @supra4historical@ Huintessence of
historical manifestations ta%in& on an eidetic form for the e8pert or
the critic(
"1
Thus history e8poses itself to @aesthetic study as a
spiritual continuity in a sense different from that of the hteralness of
facts(@
"-
( (
'e shall loo% later at the Huestion of whether the historian ot
fully de$eloped historicism owes somethin& to Herder=s *stbeti$er
and whether in fact the hermeneutic science of history of the nine4
teenth century had a latent paradi&m in the poetic heuristics ot art
history( The course that literary and art history followed in tne
nineteenth century can be characteriFed throu&h the pro&ressi$e
ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM K 2-
reduction of all claims to ad$ance a uniHue insi&ht of their own(
#nder historicism which entailed the historical study of ancient and
modern art as a new paradi&m of historical e8perience art history
handed o$er loc% stoc% and barrel its le&itimacy as a medium for
aesthetic philosophical or hermeneutic reflection( The new history
of national literatures howe$er became an ideal counterpart to
political history and claimed to de$elop throu&h the conte8t of all
literary phenomena the idea of how national indi$iduality could
attain its identity from Huasi4mythical be&innin&s to the fulfillment
of national classicism(
Positi$ism &radually reduced this ideolo&ical orientation throu&h a
&reater emphasis on science but this merely left research into literary
history without any particular framewor%( 'hat Herder said of the
old annalistic literary history can a&ain be applied to the positi$istic
which is a mere imitation of the e8ternal lin%in& of e$ents in pra&4
matic history9 it @steps throu&h nations and times with the Huiet
tread of a miller=s mule(@
"<
The modern theory of literary studies
datin& from the )irst 'orld 'ar lays emphasis on stylistic formalist
and structural methods and in turnin& away from positi$ism has also
turned away from literary history( *ow the literary historian tends
to %eep Huiet when the discussion is of problems of the discipline of
history and historical hermeneutics( But e$en today the history of
literature can still awa%en that same interest it too% on in the ideas
of the Anli&htenment and the period of Idealism if only the appear4
ance and function of literature in history are liberated from the ri&id
con$entions and false causalities of literary history and the historici4
ty of literary wor%s is put in its ri&htful perspecti$e opposed to the
positi$istic idea of %nowled&e and the traditionalist idea of art(
Ill
The form4 of literary history sanctioned by the historian is concei$4
ably the worst medium throu&h which to display the historicity of
literature( It co$ers up the parado8 of all art history which Kroysen
touched on when he e8plained why the past reality of historical facts
and their posterior interpretation are different as for instance with
pictures in an art4&allery9 @Art history establishes a connection
between them which in themsel$es they do not ha$e for which
they are not painted and from which there arises a seHuence a
continuity under the influence of which the painters of these
pictures stood without bein& aware of it(@
"3
Representin& the @obBecti$e facts@ of literary history are data of
2" a ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
wor%s authors trends and periods( But e$en when their chronolo&y
can be fully confirmed their interconnection as seen in retrospect
by the literary historian is Huite different from that @which once in
its present Otime; had a thousand other connections than those
which concern us historically(@
"2
The retrospecti$ely established
@actual@ connection of literary @facts@ captures neither the continuity
in which a past wor% arose nor that in which the contemporary
reader or historian reco&niFes its meanin& and importance( 'hat has
been the @e$ent@ of a literary wor% cannot be directly &au&ed from
the facts listed by literary history( The Huestion left open by Kroysen
as to how one is to e8tract from the seHuence of wor%s that continu4
ity in which wor%s are first created and recei$ed can be answered
only when one realiFes that the analo&y between @literary facts@ and
@historical facts@ is an epiphenomenon(
">
This analo&y positi$istic in
ori&in debases the historicity of the wor% of art and at the same
time the interconnection of literary wor%s( As a literary fact or in4
tersectin& point of definable factors the literary wor% forfeits its
historically concrete appearance( This latter has its basis in the form
and meanin& created by the author realiFed by his readers and to be
realiFed by them o$er and o$er a&ain( 'hen literary history adopted
the paradi&m of positi$istic history reducin& the e8perience of litera4
ture to causal lin%s between wor% and wor% and author and author
the historical communication between author wor% and reader dis4
appeared behind an hypostatiFed succession of mono&raphs that re4
tained history only in name(
"?
Behind the appearances of literary history howe$er there is ba4
sically no obBecti$e lin% between wor% and wor% that is not brou&ht
about by the creatin& and recei$in& subBects of literature(
"/
It is this
intersubBecti$e communication that separates the historicity of liter4
ature from the factual obBecti$ity of pra&matic history( But this dif4
ference narrows if one follows Kroysen=s critiHue of the do&ma of
@obBecti$e facts@ and accepts that diffuse e$ents are only @under4
stood and combined throu&h the interpretation Oof them; as a co4
herent process as a comple8 of cause and effect of aim and fulfill4
ment in short as a fact@ and that these same e$ents can also be
interpreted differently from @the point of $iew of the new fact@ or
from the later standpoint of the obser$er(
".
In this way Kroysen
&a$e bac% to the historical fact its basic character as an e$ent which
li%e the wor% of art is an open field as far as interpretation is con4
cerned( )or it is not only the @ri&ht of historical study@ but also an
eHually primary ri&ht of aesthetic interpretation to $iew wor%s or
@facts in the li&ht of the si&nificance they ha$e &ained throu&h their
ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM K 2<
effects @
<1
And so the analo&y that constitutes the lin% between art
history and pra&matic history lies in the character both of the wor%
of art and of the historical fact as an e$ent4a character which in both
cases was le$eled out by positi$ism=s obBecti$ist idea of %nowled&e(
The problem of the connections and structural interactions of art
history and pra&matic history is one that needs to be loo%ed at a&ain(
Dn the one hand one must infer from Kroysen=s critiHue of the ob4
Becti$ism of the historical school that there may ha$e been unac%now4
led&ed fictional narrati$e forms and aesthetic cate&ories of the his4
tory of style that made possible this classical form of historio&raphy(
And on the other hand one must as% whether Kroysen=s idea of
@the e$ent@ which includes the conseHuences of thin&s as well as
the standpoint of the retrospecti$e obser$er does not itself presup4
pose the paradi&m of the past wor% of art and its undefined meanin&(
I!
@The study of history is not an encyclopaedia of historical sciences or
a philosophy 5or theolo&y7 of history or a physics of the historical
world or :least of all :a poetics for historio&raphy( It must set itself
the tas% of bein& an or&anon of historical thou&ht and research(@
<-
Kroysen=s science of history is in its approach hermeneutic( This
ma%es it hard for it to &i$e the lie to the e8pectation that it will
merely be a @poetics for historio&raphy@ li%e Ger$inus= Grund#ue
der (listori$ 5-/<?7( The fact that it also implies a philosophy 5the
continuity of pro&ressi$e historical wor$' and a theolo&y of history
5the hi&hest aim of a theodicy' is less harmful to its claims to inde4
pendence than the suspicion that history is an art and therefore can4
not be raised to the status of a science( )or the method of in$esti&at4
in& sources4the @physics of the historical world@4could not suffice
to assure history of this status( Kespite its triumphs :as Kroysen
ironically points out :people hailed @as the &reatest historian of our
time the man who in his presentation Oof history; was closest to
the no$elsof'alter0cott@5p( <""7( Kroysen=s polemic a&ainst Ran%e
and the obBecti$ist ideal of historicism is aimed principally at e8posin&
the illusions that accompany the apparently obBecti$e narration of
traditional facts(
The first is the illusion of the completed process( Althou&h e$ery
historian %nows that our %nowled&e of history must always remain
incomplete the pre$ailin& form of the narrati$e creates @the illusion
and wants to create it that we are faced with a complete process of
historical thin&s a finished chain of e$ents moti$es and purposes@
23 J ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
5p( -337( The historical narrati$e uses the law of fiction that e$en
disparate elements of a story come closer and closer to&ether for the
reader and ultimately combine in a picture of the whole6 if this
aesthetic effect is to be a$oided and the ima&ination pre$ented from
closin& the &aps then special pre$enti$e measures are reHuired that
parado8ically are more common to modern artistic prose than to
historio&raphy(
The second is the illusion of the first be&innin& and the definiti$e
end( Here with a sa&acity rare for his time Kroysen unco$ered and
denounced the @false doctrine of the so4called or&anic de$elopment
in history@ 5p( -2"79 @It is completely beyond the scope of historical
research to &et to a point that would be ( ( ( the be&innin& the
sudden ori&in@ 5p( -217( It is untrue of history @that all conditions
for the later are present in the earlier@ 5p( -3-7 and it is eHually
untrue that thin&s in history ha$e as definite a conclusion as Ran%e
ma%es out in his history of the period of the Reformation:for
@what has become bears in itself all elements of new unrest@ 5p( "./7(
'hen the historical narrati$e proceeds &enetically and tries to e8plain
thin&s from the standpoint of their ori&in it once more falls bac%
upon a law of fiction:namely the Aristotelian definition of the
poetic fiction which must ha$e a be&innin& a middle and an end9
a be&innin& that does not ori&inate out of somethin& else and an end
that can be followed by nothin&(
The third illusion is that of an obBecti$e picture of the past( 'ho4
e$er belie$es with Ran%e that the historian need only disre&ard his
own partiality and cause his present to be for&otten 5p( <1>7 in
order to capture an undistorted past is as little able to &uarantee the
truth of the resultin& @pictures from the past or illustrations of what
is lon& since lost@ as are @poets and no$elists@ 5p( "?7( A$en if a past
could be @established in the full breadth of its former present@
5p( "?7 in the past thin&s themsel$es there would still not be that @cri4
terion for the important and the characteristic@ that can be &ained
only by reflectin& on the standpoint from which the whole $ariety
of phenomena can be $iewed as a 5relati$e7 whole( @Dnly the thou&ht4
less can be obBecti$e@
<"
for9 @Here the =facts= only seem to be spea%4
in& alone e8clusi$e =obBecti$e(= They would be dumb without the
narrator who ma%es them spea%@ 5X.-7(
The (
Y
=
and the C
Huences of what Kroysc M(T((TS4444444444444
toricism accordin& to which the historian need only repeat the pure
facts as e8tracted from his sources @and the resultin& illusion ot
ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM K 22
facts handed down then bein& passed off as history@ 5X<>17( The
flourishin& historio&raphy of the nineteenth century which sou&ht
to disa$ow the artistic character of history writin& in order to &ain
reco&nition as a science de$ol$ed on a fictionaliFation of its subBect
matter to the e8tent that it followed the principle that the historian
must efface himself in order for history to be able to tell its own
story( The poetics of this method is no different from that of the
contemporary pea% of literature4the historical no$el( Howe$er it
is not enou&h to characteriFe this new poetics of historical narrati$e
by the material re$elation and poetic anecdotal animation of the
past with which 0ir 'alter 0cott=s no$els satisfied the historically
curious( 0cott=s ability to bully scientific historio&raphy into an in4
di$idualiFed presentation of the past such as history had ne$er
been capable of before also was due to a principle of form(
'hat so impressed A( Thierry Barante and other historians of
the Twenties in 0cott=s no$els was not only the su&&esti$e power
of historical color and detail the indi$idual physio&nomy of a past
epoch and the perspecti$e enablin& historical e$ents to be pursued
throu&h persons instead of throu&h the usual impersonal actions( It
was also abo$e all the new form of the @drama@:one of 0cott=s
maBor claims to fame :by which his contemporaries meant not so
much the dramatic plot4wea$in& as the still unfamiliar dramatic
form of the narrati$e9 as the narrator of the historical no$el remains
completely in the bac%&round the story can unfold itself li%e a play
&i$in& the reader the illusion that he himself is present at the drama
of the persons in$ol$ed( This also means that the reader is put in the
position of bein& able to ma%e his own Bud&ments and draw his own
moral conclusions:which had pre$iously always been denied him by
ar&umentati$e historians li%e Hume or Robertson(
<<
These analo&ies
between the poetics of the historical no$el and the ideal of obBecti$ity
sou&ht by contemporary historio&raphy spea% for themsel$es(
<3
In
both cases we ha$e a narrator who is e8plicitly withdrawn but
implicitly present all the while communicatin& and passin& Bud&ment
: this situation arisin& out of the illusion of an unmediated presen4
tation of the past( A$en more than the no$elist 0cott who could
dele&ate his narrati$e functions to his characters4or hide them
throu&h perspecti$es4the historian Ran%e continually re$eals himself
throu&h a posteriori $iewpoints and aesthetic classifications that could
ha$e played no part in the li$es of those who actually e8perienced the
historical e$ent( That he defiantly cuts the thread Boinin& the period
@as it actually was@ with that @which resulted from it@ becomes
painfully ob$ious whene$er a Bud&ment selection moti$ation
2> J ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
or lin%in& of e$ents presupposes the hindsi&ht of the historian and
whene$er the impression has to be con$eyed that a $iew made possi4
ble only by this hindsi&ht and by the afteraffects of the e$ent in
Huestion was a pattern inherent in that ori&inal e$ent( In Ran%e=s
historio&raphy these inconsistencies are concealed by the illusion
of a completed process :and this in a manner no lon&er reminiscent
of 0cott=s handlin& of historical plots but of the stylistic approach
to the seHuential continuity of e$ents e$inced by the form of art
history(
'e can now illustrate the thesis that Ran%e=s historio&raphy is deter4
mined by aesthetic cate&ories that fall in with the latent paradi&m of
the history of style by analyFin& the period of the An&lish 'ar as
presented in Ran%e=s !ran#osiscbe Geschichte 5+hap( I <6 -/2"4
-/>-7(
<2
History of style in the form created by 'inc%elmann has
the followin& characteristics9 a turnin& point throu&h the introduc4
tion of somethin& new 5chan&e of style76
<>
di$ision into phases 5e(&(
the four phases of Gree% art9 older style hi&h beautiful and the
style of imitators76 the completeness of periods 5styles ha$e clear be4
&innin&s and a definite end sealed off by the success of the new7(
In Ran%e=s presentation the period of the An&lish 'ar starts off
in se$eral respects with a radical chan&e to somethin& new( Louis IW
the @ori&inal of all reli&ious %in&s@ is succeeded by a %in& from the
same +apetian stoc% but @a character of a different %ind@:Philip
the )air a belie$er in the specifically modern doctrine of power poli4
tics 5p( ?/7( He was the first that @with ruthless ambition@ dared to
@$iolate@ the boundaries to the German Ampire maintained by his
predecessors :a fact concernin& which Ran%e has this comment to
ma%e9 @he %new or felt that he was in lea&ue with the nature of
thin&s@ 5pp( ?/4?.7( This sentence is a perfect e8ample of a narrati$e
statement 5henceforth to be abbre$iated n(s(7 possible only in retro4
spect which the narrator Ran%e ob$iously passes off 5@or felt@7 as
comin& from the person of Philip( The chan&e to the new is then the4
matiFed in the dispute with Pope Boniface !III the brea%in& off of
+rusade politics and the destruction of the Drder of the Temple( In
the last4named case Ran%e does not e$en attempt to test the truth
of the accusations a&ainst the Templars his reason bein& that @it is
enou&h for us to ta%e note of the chan&e in ideas@ 5p( ?.7( And so
the border between the old and the new can be defined in its full
epoch4ma%in& si&nificance9 @The a&e that had been enli$ened by the
ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM D 2?
ideas of &eneral +hristendom was o$er 5n(s(76 the &oods from which
the profits were to be used in the reconHuerin& of Jerusalem were
collected up and used in the ser$ice of the %in&dom( ( ( ( Throu&h
his OPhilip=s7 whole bein& there blew already the sharp breeFe of
modern history@ 5n(s( p( /17( Historical processes of such a &eneral
%ind as Ian%e had in mind do not in reality ta%e o$er one from
the other at a sin&le frontier between old 5@was o$er@7 and new
5@blew already@7 but they mer&e into one another at a $ariety of
le$els and crossin&4points sometimes delayed sometimes premature(
Ran%e=s presentation which is hi&hly effecti$e from the points of
$iew of narrati$e and perspecti$e brushes aside the hetero&eneity
and &i$es this new impulse a function that one can only call aesthetic
for here the @chan&e in ideas@ li%e the creation of a new style pro4
ceeds as a sort of e$ent from a definite be&innin& and at a stro%e
chan&es the whole outloo% of the world(
Ran%e has styliFed the political startin& point of this epoch in a
manner that betrays him9 @But scarcely had this standpoint been
adopted of a ruthless isolated policy oriented toward a furtherance
of the state of )rance when there occurred an e$ent throu&h which
the country was plun&ed into a &eneral confusion and thrown bac%
completely upon itself@ 5n(s( pp( /1 /-7( 'ith this temporal $a&ue4
ness 5@but scarcely had ( ( ( when there occurred@7 Ran%e surrep4
titiously introduces a teleolo&y that continues to show itself in the
lin%in& and phasin& of e$ents ri&ht up to the formulation of an end
result9 @The world was astonished to see not only )rench fla&s flyin&
in *ormandy but also the An&lish retreatin& from the hundred4year
possession of AHuitania( They %ept nothin& e8cept +alais( Perhaps as
&reat a piece of &ood fortune for the conHuered as for the conHuerers
for the nations had to separate if each of them Owas to; de$elop in
accordance with its own instincts@ 5n(s( p( .27( Just li%e the unfold4
in& of a new style then the history of the new epoch also has its
purpose in the li&ht of which all indi$idual contin&encies become
meanin&ful and their connection clear4@clear@ as the seHuence of
wor%s representin& a particular style sharin& in e$ery chan&e in that
style and re$ealin& only the sort of chan&es that can be included in a
description of that style(
'ith Ran%e=s narrati$e style the hetero&eneous is often absorbed
into the &eneral course of thin&s by means of temporal phasin& and
harmoniFin&( Hetero&eneous elements of an e$ent are brou&ht in as
it were in sta&es 5@for centuries@ ( ( ( @lon& since@ ( ( ( @finally@
Z Z 4T IP4 ?.;7 then to be plun&ed into their main de$elopment with
the @now@ of a $ital moment 5@And this &reat faction now made
2/ K ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
contact with the stru&&le o$er the succession@ Op( /<;7( Dr the main
action mi&ht brin& to the fore a lon& hidden hetero&eneous e$ent
throu&h a hi&hly si&nificant @completely@ so that it may thereby be
pletely@ by the An&lish 'ar 5p( /"7( The temporal seHuence implied
in @completely@ in the typical @now@ 5which not infreHuently has
the meanin& of @at this $ery moment@7 or in the combination @al4
ready ( ( ( but@ 5p( />7 lea$es matters of chronolo&y $ery $a&ue
where often it would be difficult to be precise or where precision
would destroy the harmonious flow and it creates out of the con4
tin&ency of e$ents a continuity of si&nificant moments(
This idealiFed time seHuence li%e the history of a style describes
a steady upward and downward mo$ement e8cept that here the
cur$e runs in the opposite direction as Ran%e follows the line of
the decline and subseHuent rise of royal power( +orrespondin& to
the culminatin&4point of a history of style is the moment at which
all the hetero&eneous trends are homo&eniFed9 @Meanwhile how4
e$er the An&lish 'ar had bro%en out a&ain and there came a mo4
ment at which all these Huestions howe$er little they ori&inally had
in common mer&ed into one another@ 5p( //7( The ideality of this
moment is a&ain betrayed by the fact that is ob$iously not identical
with any of the e$ents of this phase 5A&incourt Treaty of Troyes
Henry !=s entry into Paris7 but rather symboliFed the lowest ebb
of the )rench crown( The upward mo$ement be&ins with a reference
to a hi&her need9 @But his Othe Kauphin=s; sword ( ( ( alone would
scarcely ha$e sa$ed him6 first he had to separate himself from the
( ( ( union of the Arma&nacs ( ( ( if he really wanted to be Iin&
of )rance@ 5p( /.7( Dnce a&ain the @&reat and sa$in& moment@
which the narrator Ran%e dwells on for some time 5p( .17 does not
coincide with any concrete e$ent( The description of the upward
mo$ement homo&eniFes the e$ents and chan&es that stren&then the
monarchy and lea$es the defeated opposition nothin& but its dyin&
moments of decline( And so the idea concealed in the e$ent but
brou&ht out by the narrator as the decisi$e impulse behind the tran4
sition can be fulfilled by the historical outcome already described
4the idea of a new monarchical order to&ether with which is inau&u4
rated a new idea of the nation @de$eloped in accordance with its own
instincts@ 5p( .27( But the historian who describes the cut4and4dried
historical indi$iduality of this epoch with such apparent obBecti$ity
still owes us the reasons for his interpretation and narrati$e perspec4
ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM K 2.
fi$e which betray themsel$es in his parti pris for the consolidation
of the @fi8ed order@ of the monarchy 5p( .37 and a&ainst the re4
pressed ideas of the towns and estates mo$ement(
!I
'hile the principle behind Ran%e=s presentation of history refers
bac% to the latent paradi&m of the history of style Kroysen=s cri4
tiHue of the narrati$e presentation and the resultant artistic nature
of @obBecti$e@ historio&raphy presupposes a hermeneutics that arose
from the historical approach to art( Kroysen tries to shatter the
@con$entional $iew ( ( ( that the only type of historical presenta4
tion is the narrati$e@ 5p( "237 throu&h the distinction of nonnarrati$e
forms of presentation 5the @e8aminin&@ the @didactic@ the @dis4
cursi$e@7 and also throu&h the attempt to draw a borderline between
@artistic@ and @historical@ narrati$e( His statement that the artistic
creation is @a totality somethin& complete in itself@ 5p( "/27 is
aimed at the historical no$el 5@a picture a photo&raph of that which
once was@ p( "/27 and applies eHually to the history of the past and
to the historical representation of respecti$e epochs by historicism(
#nderlyin& this is Kroysen=s main ar&ument9 @That which was does
not interest us because it was but because in a certain sense it still
is in that it is still effecti$e because it stands in the total conte8t of
thin&s which we call the historical i(e( moral world the moral cos4
mos@ 5p( "?27( The narrati$e form of historical presentation accord4
in& to Kroysen can escape the suspicion of bein& artistic fiction only
if as a mimesis of de$elopment it includes and reflects @our inter4
pretation of important e$ents from this standpoint@ 5p( "/27( But
this presentation of history :accordin& to Kroysen the only @histori4
cally@ le&itimate one :has its precedent in the hermeneutic process
of e8periencin& and readaptin& the art of the past( The meanin& of
a wor% of art as well is e8tracted only durin& the pro&ressi$e process
of its reception6 it is not a mystic whole that can re$eal itself totally
on its first showin&(
<?
The art of the past Bust li%e history does not
interest merely because it was but because @in a certain sense it still
is@ and in$ites one to new adaptations(
Kroysen=s ar&ument a&ainst the narrati$e techniHue lea$es unan4
swered the Huestion of how the classical narrati$e form of history
can be eliminated and how the contrastin& didactic form of presen4
tation can be introduced :@in order to use the whole wealth of the
past for the enli&htenment of our present and for our deeper under4
standin& of it@ 5p( "?27( Kroysen seems to ha$e o$erloo%ed the fact
>1 K ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
that the new tas% @of showin& the de$elopment of this present and
of its thou&ht content@ 5p( "?27 li%e any @mimesis of de$elopment@
cannot be performed lin&uistically without a narrati$e lin%4in other
words without the form of @story(@ This also applies to the indi4
$idual e$ent if as Kroysen maintains a historical fact as an e$ent4
Bust li%e a wor% of art :is constituted by the ran&e of its possible
meanin&s and can therefore be made concrete only throu&h the in4
terpretation of later obser$ers or performers( Kroysen=s new defini4
tion of the historical fact :@'hat happens is understood and put
to&ether only by interpretation as a coherent e$ent ( ( ( in short
as a fact@ 5pp( -<<4<374necessarily implies narration if the diffuse
e$ent of the past is to be &rasped as a totality in the li&ht of its
present meanin&( In this conte8t narrati$e is to be understood pri4
marily as a basic cate&ory of historical perception and only second4
arily as a form of historical presentation( The different modes of
narrati$e presentation ha$e throu&hout history been subBect to a
process consistin& of $arious phases and de&rees of literariness and
@anti4literariness(@ Kroysen=s polemic a&ainst the @artistically@
closed narrati$e form of historicism a&ain implies an @anti4literary@
form of presentation:with a limited perspecti$e aware of its own
location and a horiFon that is left open6 and parado8ically the
poetics of modern literature offers paradi&ms for such a presentation(
This interwea$in& of poetics and history reappears in A( +( Kanto=s
analytical philosophy of history( Kanto=s premise is9 @our %nowled&e
of the past is si&nificantly limited by our i&norance of the future@
5p( ->76 he bases narrati$e lo&ic on the posteriority of its statements9
@Othey; &i$e descriptions of e$ents under which those e$ents could
not ha$e been witnessed@ 5p( >-76 historical e8planation presupposes
@conceptual e$idence@ 5p( --.7
</
and narrati$e 5@A narrati$e de4
scribes and e8plains at once@ Op( -3-;76 it should not try to repro4
duce the past but with the aid of the past @or&aniFe present e8peri4
ence@ 5p( ?.7( All this is directly in line with Kroysen=s approach to
history thou&h Kanto ma%es no reference to it( Poetics comes onto
the scene when Kanto deals with the role of narrati$e in historical
e8planation and see%s an eHui$alent to the unpro$able @historical
laws@ 5+haps 848i7( He claims to find it in @temporal wholes@
which first of all he e8plains by referrin& to the historical $ariability
of literary forms 5p( "">7 and then traces bac% to definitions
5pp( ""< ff(7 that are basically Bust a rehash of the classical Aristo4
telian norms of epic fiction( But if the narrati$e as a form of histori4
cal e8planation is to %eep open the possibility of further narrati$e
statements about the same e$ent 5p( ->?7 the closed horiFon of the
ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM K >-
classical narrati$e form must be surmounted and the contin&ency of
history made to pre$ail a&ainst the epic tendency of the @story(@
@A story is an account I shall say an e8planation of how the
chan&e from be&innin& to end too% place@ 5p( "<379 this corresponds
to the Aristotelian definition of the story %Poetics, -321 bP :all the
more so as Kanto had already substituted @chan&e@ in the sense of
the tra&ic denouement 5-321 a6 -32" a7 for the mere e$ent as the
actual subBect of historical e8planation 5p( "<<7( In this way Kanto
falls into the illusion already unco$ered by Kroysen of the first
be&innin& and the definiti$e end6 it immediately &ets him into trou4
ble when he obser$es4but swiftly dismisses as a mere problem of
causality4that the @chan&e of thin&s@ mi&ht be the middle of a his4
tory that stretches as far bac% as it does forwards 5p( "317( His thesis
@that we are in fact referrin& to a chan&e when we demand an e84
planation of some e$ent@ 5p( "3>7 also narrows the idea of an e$ent
to a homo&eneous chan&e and i&nores the fact that in an e$ent not
only the chan&e from before to after but also the aftereffects and
the retrospecti$e importance for the obser$er or for the actin& per4
son need to be e8plained( Kanto belie$es he can achie$e homo&ene4
ity throu&h what seems to him to be the ob$ious condition that the
historical narrati$e reHuires a ne$er4chan&in& subBect and should
include only details or episodes that will ser$e the cause of e8plana4
tion 5p( "217( But this is precisely how Aristotle defined the epic
unity of the story 5-32- a7 at the same time drawin& attention to
the superiority of fiction4which is concerned with the possible or
the &eneral4o$er history which can deal only with the factual and
the particular 5-32- b7( If narrati$e lo&ic which here is still com4
pletely confined to the closed circle of classical poetics is to fit in
with the contin&ency of history it could follow the paradi&m of the
modern no$el9 since )laubert this has systematically dismantled the
teleolo&y of the epic story and de$eloped new narrati$e techniHues
in order to incorporate the open horiFon of the future into the story
ot the past to replace the omniscient narrator by localiFed perspec4
ti$es and to destroy the illusion of completeness throu&h une8pected
and une8plained details(
*arrati$e as a basic form of historical perception and e8planation
can be $iewed throu&hout in accordance with Kanto=s analo&y to the
basic form of literary &enres and their historical appearance( Dnly
one must then refute the substantialist misconception that in a his4
tory of &enres the multiplicity of historical $ariants is countered by
an in$ariable form which as @historic law@ subsumes e$ery possible
nistorical form of a &enre(
<.
The history of artistic &enres in fact
>" J ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
re$eals the e8istence of forms that possess no &reater &enerality than
that which shows itself in the chan&e of their historical appearance(
31
'hat Kroysen said of the indi$iduality of nations also applies to the
literary form or artistic &enre as historical unit9 @They chan&e to the
e8tent that they ha$e history and they ha$e history to the e8tent
that they chan&e@ 5p( -./7( This sentence refers to the basic $iew of
history in Kroysen=s Histori$, the @continuity of pro&ressi$e historical
wor%@ 5p( ".7 or:in Kroysen=s interpretation:the eiruJoaiC6 eic
avro, throu&h which accordin& to Aristotle %5e an,, ii 3("7 the species
of man differs from that of animals which can only reproduce as
species( It is ob$ious that the history of art as re&ards the historical
appearance of its forms fulfills in a $ery distinct manner Kroysen=s
idea of a continuity @in which e$erythin& earlier e8tends and
supplements itself throu&h the later@ 5p( -"7( If it is inherent in the
idea of @historical wor%@ that @with e$ery new and indi$idual
appearance it creates a newness and an addition@ 5p( .7 then artis4
tic productions correspond to this idea more than other manifes4
tations of historical life which in the framewor% of continuin& in4
stitutions chan&e more slowly and not always in such a way that
e$ery chan&e @creates a newness and an addition@ as the wor% of
art in fact can with e$ery new and indi$idual appearance( The ana4
lo&y between the historical e$ent and the past wor% of art which
Kroysen=s Histori$ presupposes therefore e8tends e$en further( The
history of art throu&h its manner of pro&ression in time and the
study of art throu&h its continuous mediation of past and present
art can become a paradi&m for a history that is to show the @de4
$elopment of this present@ 5p( "?27( But art history can ta%e on
this function only if it itself o$ercomes the or&anon4type principle
of the history of style and thus liberates itself from traditionalism
and its metaphysics of supratemporal beauty( Kroysen was already
pointin& the way when he tried to brin& the histories of indi$idual
arts bac% into the @pro&ression@ of historical wor% and when he
spurred on the art history of his day which was @still only in its
be&innin&@ with the words9 @The idea of beauty will pro&ress in
the same measure as the ac%nowled&ed beauty of ideas@ 5p( "<17(
!II
The conception of a history of art that is to be based on the his4
torical functions of production communication and reception and
is to ta%e part in the process of continuous mediation of past and
present art reHuires the critical abandonment of two contrastin&
ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM a ><
positions( )irst it defies historical obBecti$ism which remains a
con$enient paradi&m ensurin& the normal pro&ress of philolo&ical
research but which in the realm of literature can achie$e only a
semblance of precision which in the e8emplary disciplines of
natural and social science scarcely earns it any respect( It also
challen&es the philolo&ical metaphysics of tradition and thereby
the classicism of a $iew of fiction that disre&ards the historicity
of art in order to confer on @&reat fiction@ its own relation to
truth :@timeless present@ or @self4sufficient presence@
3-
:and a
more substantial or&anic history :@tradition@ or @the authority
of the traditional(@
3"
Traditionalism which holds fast to the @eternal store@ and
&uaranteed classical character of @masterpieces@ and so creates
for itself the spectacle of a -onntasstrasse der Literatureschichte
50unday street of literary history7
3<
can appeal to a secular e84
perience of the fine arts( )or as Kroysen remar%s in his Histori$
5-/2?79 @*o one before Aristotle thou&ht that dramatic poetry
mi&ht ha$e a history6 until about the middle of our century it
did not occur to anybody to tal% of a history of music(@
33
The
timelessly beautiful is also subBect to historical e8perience be4
cause of historical influences elements of which will remain in
the wor% of art and because of the open horiFon of its meanin&
which becomes apparent in the ne$er4endin& process of interpre4
tation6 and the fine arts also ha$e a history to the e8tent that
they do chan&e in this way:these facts are a comparati$ely
recent disco$ery which the triumph of historicism could not
ma%e self4e$ident( 'hat Kroysen=s contemporary Baudelaire
pro$ocati$ely formulated in -/2. as a @theorie rationnelle et
historiHue du beau@ illustrated with the outra&eous e8ample of
clothin& fashions and contrasted with the low4brow bour&eois
taste for the @immortal@
32
has continually been re&arded e$er
since the @uerelle des *nciens et des Modernes as a new challen&e
to the classical interpretation of art by the enli&htened or historical
consciousness(
The conception of tradition that this idea of art &oes bac% to is
: accordin& to Theodor '( Adorno : carried o$er from natural
spontaneous situations 5the lin% between &enerations traditions
of crafts and trades7 to the realm of the mind(
3>
This carryin& o$er
endows what is past with an authoritati$e orientation and sets the
creations of the mind into a substantial continuity that supports
and harmoniFes history at the cost of suppressin& the contrary the
re$olutionary the unsuccessful(
3-
In accordance with the ima&e of
>3 K ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
transmission %tradere', the process of historical action here turns into
a self4acti$atin& mo$ement of imperishable substances or into the se4
Huential effect of ori&inal norms( To put it as briefly as possible9 @In
truth history does not belon& to us but we belon& to it(@
3/
In the sphere of art the alteration of the historical pra8is of hu4
man creati$ity into a self4sufficient recurrence of formati$e historical
entities re$eals itself in the hypostatiFed metaphor of the after+life of
anti?uity, This stands for a historio&raphic model that in the human4
ist=s credo has its counterpart in the @imitation of the ancient@ and
in the course of history witnesses nothin& but the continual altera4
tion of decline and return to classical models and lastin& $alues( But
tradition cannot transmit itself by itself( It presupposes a response
whene$er an @effect@ of somethin& past is reco&niFable in the present(
A$en classical models are present only where they are responded to9
if tradition is to be understood as the historical process of artistic
pra8is this latter must be understood as a mo$ement that be&ins with
the recipient ta%es up and brin&s alon& what is past and translates or
@transmits@ it into the present thus settin& it in the new li&ht of
present meanin&(
Alon& with the illusion of a self4acti$atin& tradition aesthetic do&4
matism also falls into discredit:the belief in an @obBecti$e@ meanin&
which is re$ealed once and for all in the ori&inal wor% and which an
interpreter can restore at any time pro$ided he sets aside his own
historical position and places himself without any preBudices into
the ori&inal intention of the wor%( But the form and meanin& of a
wor% formati$e of tradition are not the unchan&eable dimensions or
appearances of an aesthetic obBect independent of perception in
time and history9 its potential of meanin& only becomes pro&ressi$ely
$isible and definable in the subseHuent chan&es of aesthetic e8per4
ience and dialo&ically so in the interaction between the literary wor%
and the literary public( The tradition4formin& potential of a classic
wor% can be seen by its contemporaries only within the horiFon of
its first @materialiFation(@
3.
Dnly as the horiFon chan&es and e84
pands with each subseHuent historical materialiFation do responses
to the wor% le&itimiFe particular possibilities of understandin& imi4
tation transformation and continuation :in short structures of e84
emplary character that condition the process of the formation of
literary tradition(
If one wishes to &i$e the name @tradition@ to this discontinuous
process of an acti$e normati$e and chan&in& reproduction of what
is past in the realm of art then one must do away with the Platonic
idea of art and with the substantialist conception of history as an
@e$ent of tradition(@ The recei$in& consciousness certainly stands
ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM J >2
amon& traditions that precondition its way of understandin& but
Bust as certainly the traditional cannot be fitted out with predicates
and a life of its own for without the acti$e participation of the re4
cei$in& mind these are simply not concei$able( It is therefore a sub4
stantialist relapse in his historical hermeneutics when H(4G( Gadamer
: ob$iously indul&in& a predilection for the classics :e8pects of the
traditional te8t per se 5re&ardless of whether it is a wor% of art or a
historical document7 @that it as%s a Huestion of the interpreter( In4
terpretation ( ( ( always contains a basic reference to the Huestion
that has been as%ed on one( To understand a te8t means to under4
stand a Huestion(@
21
But a past te8t cannot of its own accord across
the a&es as% us or later &enerations a Huestion that the interpreter
would not first ha$e to unco$er or reformulate for us proceedin&
from the answer that the te8t hands down or appears to contain(
Literary tradition is a dialectic of Huestion and answer that is always
%ept &oin& :thou&h this is often not admitted :from the present in4
terest( A past te8t does not sur$i$e in historical tradition than%s to
old Huestions that would ha$e been preser$ed by tradition and could
be as%ed in an identical way for all times includin& our own( )or the
Huestion whether an old or alle&edly timeless Huestion still : or once
a&ain :concerns us while innumerable other Huestions lea$e us in4
different is decided first and foremost by an interest that arises out
of the present situation critically opposes it or maintains it(
'alter BenBamin in his critiHue of historicism reaches an analo4
&ous conception of historical tradition9 @To put into operation e84
perience with history:which for e$ery present is an ori&inal e8peri4
ence:is the tas% of historical materialism( It turns to a conscious4
ness of the present which shatters the continuum of history(@
2-
'hy this tas% should fall to the historical materialist alone is not
made clear by this essay( )or after all a historical materialist must
presumably belie$e in a @real historical continuity@ if with BenBamin
he declares his alle&iance to the ideas e8pressed in An&els= letter to
Mehrin& 5-3 July -/.<7( Anyone who with An&els wishes to pro4
claim the apparent triumph of thou&ht as @intellectual reflections of
chan&ed economic fact@ cannot also impute to the conscious mind
the achie$ement of @shatterin& the continuum of history(@ Accordin&
to materialist do&ma he cannot apply any consciousness to the present
that is not pre$iously conditioned by chan&ed economic facts in the
midst of the real historical continuity which parado8ically that
consciousness is meant to shatter( The famous @ti&er leap into the
past@ aside hist5
II1*_1OUM1C I I!Caill IUilliil"-1- I#*- $i%iu&& ng'i i(-u)&i%##
6t@ %Gescbicbtspbilosopbische 6besen, /iv' completely brushes
listorical materialism9 BenBamin=s anti4traditionalist theory of
>> K ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
reception superseded it in the )uchs essay before he himself realiFed it(
!II
The classical idea of art as the history of creati$e spirits and timeless
masterpieces to&ether with its positi$istic distortion in the form of
innumerable histories of @Man and 'or%@ has since the )ifties been
the subBect of critical e8amination conducted in the name of the
@structural method(@ In An&lo4American criticism this proceeded
from *orthrop )rye=s theory of archetypal literature and in )rench
from +laude Le$i40trauss6 it aimed at a predominantly elitist idea of
culture and art contrasted this with a new interest in primiti$e art
fol%lore and subliterature and demanded a methodical approach
startin& with the indi$idual wor% and finishin& with literature as a
system(@ )or )rye literature is an @order of words@ not a @piled
a&&re&ate of wor%s@9 @Total literary history &i$es us a &limpse of the
possibility of seein& literature as a complication of a relati$ely re4
stricted and simple &roup of formulas that can be studied in primiti$e
culture(@
2<
Archetypes or @communicable symbols@ mediate be4
tween the structure of primiti$e myths and the forms or fi&ures of
later art and literature( The historical dimension of literature with4
draws behind the omnipresence or transferability of these symbols
which ob$iously chan&e &radually with literary means of e8pression
from myth to mimesis6 it reemer&es only when at the last moment
)rye attributes to the myth an emancipatory function re&ardin& ritual
so that:li%e Matthew Arnold:he can set art the tas% of remo$in&
class barriers enablin& it to participate @in the $ision of the &oal of
social effort the idea of complete and classless society(= =
23
The &ulf between structure and e$ent between synchronous sys4
tem and history becomes absolute in Le$i40trauss who searches be4
hind the myths for nothin& but the structure in depth of the closed
synchronous system of a functional lo&ic( The latent Rousseauism of
this theory is apparent in the chapter @Ku mythe au roman@ from
L><riine des manieres de tabled 'hen the structural analysis of
the Indian myths which in a sin&le breath are awarded and refused
@liberte d=in$ention@5@nous pou$ons au moins demontrer la necessite
de cette liberte@ O -13;7 poses a historical process such as the de4
$elopment from myth to no$el this process appears as an incontro4
$ertible de&radation in the &eneral FdebacleF of history 5pp( -124-1>7(
In this downward mo$ement of the real throu&h the symbolic to
the ima&inary the structures of contrast decline into those of repe4
tition( Le$i40trauss is reminded here of the @serial@ which also draws
ARTHISTORYANDPRAGATICHISTORY !"7
its life from the denatured repetition of ori&inal wor%s and li%e the
@mythe a tiroir@ is the subBect to a short periodicity and the same
@contraintes formelles(@ But this new $ersion of the old theory of
the @decayed matter of culture@ 5or here @matter of nature@7 is
contradicted by the fact that in the nineteenth century the serial
no$el was not the @etat dernier de la de&radation du &enre roman4
esHue@ but on the contrary the startin& point for the &reat @ori&inal@
no$el of the BalFac and Kostoye$s%y type :not to mention the fact
that the Mysteres de Paris %ind of no$el de$eloped a new mytholo&y
of city life that cannot be fitted in with the idea of a decline in the
@e8tenuation du mythe(@ #ltimately Le$i40trauss=s theory of a de4
cline itself surreptitiously ta%es on the nature of a new myth when
in the moral outcome of the serial no$el he claims to find an eHui$a4
lent to the closed structure of the myth @par leHuel une societe Hui
se li$re a l=histoire croit pou$oir remplacer l=ordre lo&ico4naturel
Hu=elle a abandonne a moins Hu=elle4meme n=ait ete abandonee par
lui@ 5p( -1>7( History as the de$iation of society from nature person4
ified in the @ordre lo&ico4naturel@ if one were not to assume that
nature herself 5comparable to Heide&&er=s @Iehre@7 has turned away
from man9 with this Heide&&er=s myth of @0eins$er&essenheit@ 5for4
&etfulness of bein&7 is &i$en a worthy panstructuralistic companion4
piece(
)or Le$i40trauss e$ery wor% of art is completely e8plicable throu&h
its function within the secondary system of reference of society6
e$ery act of speech is reduced to a combinatory element in a primary
system of si&ns6 all meanin& and indi$iduation mer&es into an anony4
mous subBectless system establishin& the priority of a spontaneous
natural order o$er any historical process( And so we may assume
with Paul Ricoeur that the paradi&m of anthropolo&ical structural4
ism will be producti$e for the methodolo&y of the study of art and
literature only if alon& with the results of structural analysis the
latter ta%es up and re&ains what the former see%s do&matically to
e8clude9 @une production dialectiHue Hui fasse ad$enir le systeme
comme acte et la structure comme e$enement(@
2>
An approach to brid&in& the &ap between structure and e$ent is
already to be distin&uished in the literary theory of Roland Bardies
who in )rance pa$ed the way for criticism of the @Lansonist system@
of uni$ersity literary history and was the first to show what struc4
tural analysis of a literary wor% could really achie$e( His Racine in4
terpretation penetrates the historical e8planation and nai$e psycho4
lo&y of literary creation and establishes a %ind of structural anthro4
polo&y of classical tra&edy( The archaic system of characters is
>/ J ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
transplanted into a surprisin&ly rich conte8t of functions a conte8t
that e8tends from the three dimensions of topo&raphy ri&ht up to
metaphysics and the in$erted theolo&y of redemption of the Racinian
hero and that stimulates and e8pands one=s historical understand4
in&(
2?
The Huestion left open in L>homme racinien as to what litera4
ture meant to Racine and his contemporaries is for Barthes one of
those problems that literary history can sol$e only throu&h a radical
con$ersion @analo&ous to that which made possible the transition
from the chronicles of %in&s to &enuine history(@ )or literary history
can only @deal on the le$el of literary functions 5production com4
munication consumption7 and not on that of the indi$iduals who
ha$e e8ercised these functions(@
2/
)rom a scientific point of $iew
literary history would accordin&ly be sociolo&ically possible only as
a history of the literary institution while the other side of literature
: the indi$idual connection between author and wor% between wor%
and meanin&:would be left to the subBecti$ity of criticism of which
Barthes can Huite ri&htly ma%e the demand that it confess to its pre4
conceptions if it wants to pro$e its historical le&itimacy(
2.
But this
raises the Huestion whether the thus le&itimiFed subBecti$ity or series
of interpretations of a wor% is not itself a&ain @institutionaliFed@
throu&h history formin& a system in his historical seHuence( The
Huestion also arises as to how one is to concei$e the structure of a
wor% in opposition to the structuralist a8iom of completeness re4
mains open to an interpretation that in principle is incapable of com4
pleteness and indeed ta%es on its specific character as art throu&h
this $ery openness and dependence on indi$idual response(
Barthes has not as%ed the first of these Huestions but his answer
to the second is eHually e8asperatin& for the do&matists of positi$ism
and of structuralism(
>1
@Acrire c=est ebranler le sens du monde y
disposer une interro&ation indirecte a laHuelle l=ecri$ain par un
dernier suspens s=abstient de repondre( La reponse c=est chacun de
nous Hui la donne y apportant son histoire son lan&a&e sa liberte6
mais comme histoire lan&a&e et liberte chan&ent infiniment la re4
ponse du monde a l=ecri$ain est infinie9 on ne cesse Bamais de repon4
dre a ce Hui a ete ecrit hors de tout reponse9 affirmes puis mis en
ri$alite puis remplaces les sens passent la Huestion demeure(@
>-
Here the open structure of the literary wor% is obser$ed in the open
relation between meanin& Huestion and answer but the cost of this
is a yawnin& &ap of subBecti$e arbitrariness between the past wor%
and its pro&ressi$e interpretation4a &ap that can be brid&ed only by
the historical mediation of Huestion and answer( )or the implicit
Huestion which in fact is what first awa%ens our present interest in
AIT HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM E >.
the past wor% can be obtained only throu&h the answer that the
aesthetic obBect in its present materialiFation holds or seems to hold
ready for us( Literary wor%s differ from purely historical documents
precisely because they do more than simply document a particular
time and remain @spea%in&@ to the e8tent that they attempt to sol$e
problems of form or content and so e8tend far beyond the silent
relics of the past(
>"
If the literary te8t is ta%en primarily as an answer or if the later
reader is primarily see%in& an answer in it this by no means implies
that the author himself has formulated an e8plicit answer in his wor%(
The answerin& character of the te8t which pro$ides the historical
lin% between the past wor% and its later interpretation is a modality
of its structure :seen already from the $iewpoint of its reception6 it
is not an in$ariable $alue within the wor% itself( The answer or mean4
in& e8pected by the later reader can ha$e been ambi$alent or ha$e
remained alto&ether indeterminate in the ori&inal wor%( The de&ree
of indeterminacy can :as 'olf&an& Iser has shown :actually deter4
mine the de&ree of aesthetic effecti$eness and hence the artistic
character of a wor%(
><
But e$en the e8treme case of an open4struc4
tured fictional te8t with its Huantity of indeterminacy calculated to
stimulate the ima&ination of the acti$e reader re$eals how e$ery
fresh response lin%s up with an e8pected or supposed meanin& the
fulfillment or nonfulfillment of which calls forth the implicit Hues4
tion and so sets in motion the new process of understandin&( This
process emer&es most clearly in the history of the interpretation of
&reat wor%s when the new interpreter is no lon&er satisfied with the
con$entionally accepted answer or interpretation and loo%s for a
new answer to the implied or @posthumous@ Huestion( The open in4
determinate structure ma%es a new interpretation possible whereas
on the other hand the historical communication of Huestion and
answer limits the mere arbitrariness of interpretation(
It ma%es no difference whether the con$entionally accepted answer
of a te8t has been &i$en e8plicitly ambi$alently or indeterminately
by the author himself6 or whether it is an interpretation of the wor%
that first arose at its reception( The Huestion implied in the answer
presented by the wor% of art :a Huestion which accordin& to Barthes
each present must answer in its own way :is now set within a chan&ed
horiFon of aesthetic e8perience and so is no lon&er as%ed as it was
ori&inally by the past te8t but is the result of an interaction between
present and past(
>3
The Huestion which enables the past wor% of art
to affect us still or anew has to be implicit because it presupposes
the acti$e mind=s testin& the con$entional answer findin& it con$inc4
?1 J ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
in& or otherwise discardin& it or puttin& it in a new li&ht so that the
Huestion now implied for us may be re$ealed( In the historical tradi4
tion of art a past wor% sur$i$es not throu&h eternal Huestions nor
throu&h permanent answers but throu&h the more or less dynamic
interrelationship between Huestion and answer between problem
and solution which can stimulate a new understandin& and can allow
the resumption of the dialo&ue between present and past(
Analysis of the dialectic of Huestion and answer formati$e of tradi4
tion in the history of literature and art is a tas% that literary criticism
has scarcely e$en be&un( It &oes beyond the semiotic conception of a
new science of literature which Barthes sees in an all too narrow
framewor%9 @It cannot be a science of contents 5which can only be
suc%led by historical science proper7 but a science of the conditions
of contents i(e( of forms9 what will concern it is the $ariations of
meanin& applied and to a certain e8tent applicable to the wor%s(@
>0
Howe$er the constantly renewed interpretation is more than an an4
swer left to the discretion of the interpreter for literary tradition is
more than Bust a $ariable series of subBecti$e proBections or @fulfilled
meanin&s@ o$er a mere matri8 or @empty meanin&@ of wor%s @which
bears all of those(@
>>
It is not only the formal constitution and $aria4
bility of the meanin&s applicable to wor%s that can be described in
accordance with the lin&uistic rules of the si&n( The content the se4
Huence of interpretations as they ha$e appeared historically :this
too has a lo&ic9 that of Huestion and answer throu&h which the ac4
cepted interpretations can be described as a coherence formati$e of
tradition6 it also has a counterpart to the lan&ua&e or @literature com4
petence@
>?
that is a prereHuisite for all transformations9 the initial
meanin& or problem structure of the wor% which is its @a priori@
content conditionin& all subseHuent interpretations and pro$idin&
the first instance a&ainst which all these must pro$e themsel$es( And
so there is no reason why the science of literature should not also be
a science of contents( And indeed it will ha$e to be because the
science of history cannot relie$e it of the tas% of closin& the &ap that
Barthes throu&h his formal ri&orism has widened between author
and reader reader and critic critic and historian and furthermore
between the functions of literature 5production communication re4
ception7(
>/
A new science of literature will cease to be a mere au8iliary
to history at the moment when it uses the pri$ile&e of its still
@spea%in&@ sources and their communication of response and tradition
to attempt to mo$e away from the old @history of de$elopment@ and
towards a new @history of structure@:a mo$e that the science of
history is also concerned with ma%in&(
ART HI0TDR! A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM K ?-
IW
How can the history of art and literature contribute towards closin&
the &ap between structural method and historical hermeneuticsL
This problem is common nowadays to $arious approaches to a theory
of literature that4li%e my own attempt
>.
4re&ard as necessary the
destruction of literary history in its old mono&raphic or @epic@ tradi4
tion in order to arouse a new interest in the history and historicity
of literature( This is especially true of the )rench Nouvelle Criti?ue
and Pra&ue structuralism
?1
whose standpoint we must e8amine here
at least as it is represented in a few pioneer wor%s(
Dne representati$e ad$ocate of the Nouvelle Criti?ue is Gerard
Genette( In his pro&rammatic essay -tructuralisme et criti?ue litteraire
5-.>>7
?
= he shows different ways in which literary criticism could
use structural description and the theory of style could inte&rate al4
ready current analyses of immanent structures in a structural synthe4
sis( The contrast between intersubBecti$e or hermeneutic analysis and
structural analysis would not reHuire literature to be di$ided into two
separate spheres of mytho&raphic or subliterature on the one hand
and artistic literature in the e8e&etic tradition on the other:as
Ricoeur has su&&ested in his critiHue of Le$i40trauss(
?"
)or the two
methods could e8pose complementary meanin&s of the same te8t9 @a
propos d=une meme oeu$re la critiHue hermeneutiHue parlerait le
lan&a&e de la reprise du sens et de la recreation interieure et la cri4
tiHue structurale celui de la parole distante et de Na reconstruction in4
telli&ible(@
?<
Thematic criticism which until now has been concerned
almost e8clusi$ely with the indi$idual wor%s of authors would ha$e
to relate these to a collecti$e topic of literature dependent on the
attitude taste and wishes4in short the @e8pectation of the pub4
lic( Literary production and consumption would act in the same
way as parole and lanueK and so it must also be possible to formu4
late the literary history of a system in a series of synchronous sec4
tions and to translate the mere seHuence of autonomous mutually
=influencin&@ wor%s into a structural history of literature and its
functions(
?2
Jean 0tarobins%i on the other hand with his new definition of
literary criticism %La relation criti?ue, -.>/7 proceeds from the be4
lief that structuralism in its strict form is applicable only to literatures
that represent a @re&ulated play in a re&ulated society(@
?>
The mo4
ment literature Huestions the &i$en order of institutions and tradi4
tions o$ersteps the closed limits of the surroundin& society with its
sanctioned literature and thus opens up the dimension of history
in a culture the result is that the synchronous structure of a society
?" J ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
and the appearance of its literature as an e$ent no lon&er belon& to the
homo&eneous te8ture of the same lo&os9 @la plupart des &randes
oeu$res modernes ne declarent leur relation au monde Hue sur le
mode de refus de l=opposition de la contestation(@
??
The tas% of a
new criticism will be to brin& this @relation differentielle@ bac% into
the structural conte8t of literature( This not only reHuires that the4
matic criticism open the closed hermeneutic circle between wor% and
interpreter 5traBet te8tuel7 onto the wor%=s path to the world of its
readers 5traBet intentionnel76 it also reHuires that critical understandin&
should not frustrate the differential or @trans&ressi$e@ function of
the wor%9 if history continually cancels out the protest element and
the e8ceptionality of literature absorbin& it as a paradi&m of the ne8t
order the critic must fi&ht a&ainst this le$elin& out of wor%s in the
line of tradition and must hold fast to the differences
?/
thus
emphasiFin& the discontinuity of literature in the history of society(
)urthest from the do&ma of the irreconcilability of structural and
historical analysis is probably Pra&ue structuralism( Here approaches
of )ormalist literary theory ha$e been de$eloped into a structural
aesthetics which see%s to comprehend the literary wor% with cate4
&ories of aesthetic perception and then to describe the percei$ed &es4
talt of the aesthetic obBect diachronically in its @concretiFations@
conditioned by response( The pioneer wor% of Jan Mu%afo$s%y has
been continued particularly by )( !odic%a to form a theory of lit4
erary history that is based on the aesthetics of response(
?.
In his
boo% -tru$tura vyvoHe 5-.>.7 he sees the main tas% of literary history
in the conte8t of the polarity between the literary wor% and reality
which is to be materialiFed and historically described accordin& to
the manner of its perception i(e( the dynamic connections between
the wor% and the literary public(
/1
This reHuires on the one hand
the reconstruction of the @literary norm@ i(e( the @totality of literary
postulates@ and the hierarchy of literary $alues of a &i$en period and
on the other the ascertainment of the literary structure throu&h the
@concretiFation@ of literary wor%s i(e( throu&h the concrete &es4talt
that they ha$e assumed in the perception of the public of the time(
Pra&ue structuralism therefore sees the structure of a wor% as a
component part of the broader structure of literary history and
sees the latter as a process arisin& out of the dynamic tension between
wor% and norm between the historic seHuence of literary wor%s
and the seHuence of chan&in& norms or attitudes of the public9 @Be4
tween them there is always a certain parallelism for both creations
4the creations of norms and the creation of a new literary reality4
proceed from a common base9 from the literary tradition that they
ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM K ?<
o$ercome(@
/
= This presupposes that aesthetic $alues li%e the @es4
sence@ of wor%s of art only re$eal their different forms throu&h
a process and are not permanent factors in themsel$es( The literary
wor%4accordin& to Mu%afo$s%y=s bold new $ersion of the social
character of art:is offered not as a structure that is independent
of its reception but simply as an @aesthetic obBect@ which can there4
fore be described only in accordance with the succession of its con4
cretiFations(
By concreti#ation, !odic%a means the picture of the wor% in the
consciousness of those @for whom the wor% is an esthetic obBect(@
/"
'ith this idea Pra&ue structuralism has ta%en up and historiciFed an
approach of Roman In&arden=s phenomenolo&ical aesthetics( Accord4
in& to the latter the wor% in the polyphonic harmony of its Hualities
still had the character of a structure independent of temporal chan&es
in the literary norm6 but !odic%a disputes the idea that the aesthetic
$alues of a wor% could be &i$en complete e8pression throu&h an op4
timal concretiFation9 @As soon as the wor% is di$ided up on its ab4
sorption into new conte8ts 5chan&ed state of the lan&ua&e different
literary postulates chan&ed social structure new system of spiritual
and practical $alues etc(7 one can feel the esthetic effect of precisely
those Hualities of a wor% which earlier ( ( ( were not felt as estheti4
cally effecti$e(@
/<
Dnly the reception i(e( the historical life of the
wor% in literature re$eals its structure in an open series of aspects
throu&h the acti$e interrelationship between the literary wor% and
the literary public( 'ith this theory Pra&ue structuralism has &ained
a position for the aesthetics of reception that relie$es it of the twin
problems of aesthetic do&matism and e8treme subBecti$ism9 @Ko&ma4
tism found eternal unchan&eable $alues in the wor% or interpreted
the history of responses as a way to the ultimate correct perception(
A8treme subBecti$ism on the other hand saw in all responses proof
of indi$idual perception and ideas and sou&ht only in e8ceptional
cases to o$ercome this subBecti$ism throu&h a temporal determina4
tion(@
/3
!odii%a=s theory of reception lin%s up with the methodo4
lo&ical principle that the materialiFation le&itimated by a literary
public4which itself can become a norm for other wor%s:is to be
distin&uished from merely subBecti$e forms of materialiFation
which do not enter any current tradition as a $alue Bud&ment9 @The
obBect of co&nition cannot be all materialiFations possible with re4
&ard to the indi$idual attitude of the reader but only those which
show a confrontation between the structure of the wor% and the
structure of the norms currently $alid(=@@ Thus the critic who re4
cords and publishes a new materialiFation Boins the author and the
?3 J ART HI0TDRM A*K PRAGMATI+ HI0TDRM
reader as someone with his own particular function within the @lit4
erary community@ whose constitution as @literary public@ is only
one of se$eral perspecti$es that can offer this theory of a structural
literary history as a shot in the arm to the methodolo&ically sta&nant
sociolo&y of literature(
A theory that sets out to destroy the substantialist idea of tradition
and to replace it with a functional idea of history is bound to be
open to the char&e of one4sidedness precisely in this sphere of art
and literature( 'hoe$er abandons the latent Platonism of the philo4
lo&ical method dismisses as illusory the eternal essence of the wor%
of art and the timeless standpoint of its obser$er and be&ins to re4
&ard the history of art as a process of production and reception in
which not identical functions but dialo&ical structures of Huestion
and answer mediate between past and present4such a person must
run the ris% of missin& a specific e8perience of art that is ob$iously
in opposition to its historicity( Art historio&raphy that follows the
principle of the open structure and the perceptually incomplete
interpretation of wor%s in accordance with the process of produc4
ti$e understandin& and critical reinterpretation is concerned primari4
ly with the intellectual and emancipatory function of art(
/>
It is not
then bound to i&nore the social and in the narrower sense aesthetic
character of art:its critical communicati$e and socially influential
function and those achie$ements that the acti$e and the sufferin&
man e8periences as impulses of ecstasy pleasure and play and with4
al as impulses that remo$e him from his historical e8istence and his
social situationL
It cannot be disputed that the emancipatory and socially forma4
ti$e function of art represents only one side of its historical role in
the process of human history( The other side is re$ealed in the fact
that wor%s of art are @directed a&ainst the course of time a&ainst
disappearance and transience@ because they see% to immortaliFe
i(e( @ to confer on the obBects of life the di&nity of immortaliFation( @
s
And so accordin& to Iurt Badt art history also has the tas% of show4
in& @what art has been able to present of human perfection for in4
stance e$en in sufferin& 5Griinewald=s Cbristus',FL Howe$er reco&4
niFin& the supratemporal character of this &lorifyin& and immortal4
iFin& function does not mean contrastin& the historicity of art with
the timeless essence of an absolute beauty that has manifested itself
only in the immortality of the wor%( The &lorified immortality ot
*+, "I,O+- *!D .+*/M*,IC "I,O+- 0 12
the wor% of art is somethin& that has been created aainst transcience
and within history itself(
/.
The history of art incorporates the his4
torical appearance of wor%s and their immortality as the result of
aesthetic acti$ities of man%ind( If with Iarel Iosi% we understand
the dialectics of history as a process in which history @contains both
the historicity that is transient sin%s into the past and does not re4
turn and historical character the formation of the immortal:i(e(
the self4formin& and self4creatin&@
.1
:then the history of art is dis4
tin&uished from other spheres of historical reality by the fact that in
it the formation of the immortal is not only $isibly carried out
throu&h the production of wor%s but also throu&h reception by its
constant reenactment of the endurin& features of wor%s that lon&
since ha$e been committed to the past(
The history of art maintains this special status e$en if one concurs
with the Mar8ist literary theory that art and literature cannot claim
any history of their own but only become historical insofar as they
participate in the &eneral process of historical pra8is( The history of
art %eeps its special position within pra&matic history to the e8tent
that throu&h the medium of perception and by means of interpreta4
tion it can consciously brin& forth the historical capacity of @total4
iFation in which human pra8is incorporates impulses from the past
and animates them throu&h this $ery inte&ration(@
.-
TotaliFation in
the sense of @a process of production and reproduction animation
and reBu$enation@
."
is presented in e8emplary form by the history of
art( )or here:as T( 0( Aliot pointed out:it is not only the authentically
new wor% that re$ises our $iew of all past wor%s( Here the past wor%
too which has the appearance of immortal beauty and :accordin& to
Malrau8:embodies art as a counter to fate needs the producti$e wor%
of understandin& in order to be ta%en out of the ima&inary museum
and appropriated by the interpreti$e eye of the present( And here too
ultimately art historio&raphy can win bac% its disputed le&itimacy
insofar as it see%s out and describes the canons and conte8ts of wor%s
reBu$enatin& the &reat wealth of human e8perience preser$ed in past art
and ma%in& it accessible to the perception of the present a&e(
Chapter :
Theory of Genres
and Medie$al Literature
The de$elopment of a theory not infreHuently has an unreco&niFed
or essentially unreflected dependency on the %ind and the limitations
of the obBect throu&h which the theory is to be e8emplified or to
which it is to be applied( This is especially the case with the theory
of literary &enres( Dn the one hand traditional philolo&ists de$eloped
it with preference for e8amples from the classical literary periods4
that offered the ad$anta&e that the form of a &enre could be deter4
mined accordin& to canoniFed rules and its history followed from
wor% to wor% accordin& to the intentions and accomplishments of
their authors( 0tructuralist studies opposed this indi$idualiFin& con4
sideration with a theory that was primarily de$eloped from primi4
ti$e &enres such as for e8ample the narrati$e of myths or the @come
populaire@6 from such e8amples without an indi$idualiFed artistic
character the theory could demonstrate those simplest structures
functions and seHuences that constitute and differentiate $arious
&enres on the basis of a narrati$e lo&ic(
In contrast to this polariFation it seemed worthwhile to de$elop
a theory of literary &enres within a field of inHuiry that lies between
the opposites of sin&ularity and collecti$ity of the artistic character
of literature and its merely purposi$e or social character( Medie$al
$ernacular literatures are especially appropriate for such an attempt(
)or in this area philolo&ical studies ha$e barely &otten beyond indi4
$idual mono&raphs themsel$es often only o$er$iews( These &enres
are a lon& way from bein& sufficiently delimited let alone historically
represented in their historical contemporaneity and seHuence(
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA a ??
The &eneric di$isions of the handboo%s rest on a con$ention of the
discipline that is scarcely called into Huestion any lon&er accordin&
to which one promiscuously uses ori&inal characteriFations classical
&enre concepts and later classifications( In international discussion
Romance literary studies ha$e for a lon& time failed to ad$ance any
contribution to a historical systematics or to the &eneral de$elop4
ment of a theory of literary &enres(
-
This failure has its material
reasons but also its scholarly4historical ones(
A history and theory of $ernacular &enres in the Middle A&es
bumps up a&ainst the particular problem that the structural charac4
teristics of the literary forms :from which the history and theory
would be&in :themsel$es first ha$e to be wor%ed out from te8ts
that are chronolo&ically hi&hly diffuse( Here we ha$e newly de4
$elopin& literatures that are not immediately dependent on the pre4
cedin& Latin literature as concerns either a humanist principle of
strict imitation or the canon of a bindin& poetics( In the Romance
$ernacular there was at first scarcely any poetolo&ical reflection on
&enres( @The !ul&ate lan&ua&es and their lon&4de$eloped typolo&ies
only come into the $iew of the theorists after -<11 with Kante
Antonio da Tempo and Austache Keschamps(@
"
But medie$al the4
orists Bud&ed poetry primarily accordin& to styles and not accordin&
to &eneric norms(
Dn the other hand the modern system of the three basic %inds or
@natural forms of literature OKichtun&; @ would want to do more
than e8clude the maBority of medie$al &enres as impure or pseudo4
poetic forms(
<
)or e$en the $ernacular epic or lyric is difficult to
describe within the distinction pro$ided by the modern triad of epic
lyric and dramatic:and the passion play simply cannot be so de4
scribed( Basic distinctions such as purposi$e or purposeless didactic
or fictional imitati$e or creati$e traditional or indi$idual :which
ha$e &o$erned literary understandin& since the emancipation of the
@fine arts@ :were not yet percei$ed and reflected on6 thus it ma%es
no sense to wor% with a triadic di$ision of literature owed to this
emancipatory process and to heap to&ether with the didactic the
remainder of a problematic fourth @literary %ind@ 75ichtart8 4in the
Middle A&es surely the lar&er part4that doesn=t fit into the triadic
schema(
In $iew of such difficulties a hei&htened si&nificance was &i$en to
the critiHue that be&an shortly after -.11 a&ainst the pseudo4norma4
ti$e concept of &enre in positi$istic literary history 5understood as
@e$olutionary@ by Brunetiere7( +roce=s aesthetics which in $iew of
the e8pressi$e uniHueness of each wor% of art still reco&niFed only
?/ K GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
art itself 5or intuition7 as a @&enre@ seemed to free the philolo&ies
from the &enre problem alto&ether4a problem that +roce dissol$ed
into the simple Huestion of the utility of $arious classifications for
boo%s( But of course the cuttin& of a Gordian %not does not lead to
any endurin& solution to a scholarly problem( +roce=s @solution@
would certainly not ha$e been accorded any such tenacious success
with enthusiasts and opponents if the reaction a&ainst the norma4
ti$e &enre concept had not been led by the rise of modern stylistics
3
which similarly declared the @$erbal wor% of art@ to be autonomous
and de$eloped methods of ahistorical interpretation for which an
initial obser$ation of historical &enre4forms appeared superfluous(
'ith the turn away from the aestheticism of the @wor%4immanent@
method which produced a record har$est of scholarly mono&raphs
but left unanswered the Huestion of the diachronic and synchronic
coherence of literary wor%s be&an the process of a new historico4
hermeneutic and structuralist de$elopment of theory4within which
we still stand today( The theory of literary &enres is at the point of
see%in& a path between the 0cylla of nominalist s%epticism that al4
lows for only aposteriori classifications and the +harybdis of re&res4
sion into timeless typolo&ies a path alon& which the historiciFation
of &enre poetics and of the concept of form are upheld(
2
To initiate
a Bustification of this path with a critiHue of +roce recommends itself
not merely on the &rounds of an intradisciplinary discussion( )or
+roce pushed to an e8treme the critiHue of the uni$ersal $alidity of
the canon of &enres a critiHue that had been &rowin& since the ei&h4
teenth century so that the necessity of foundin& a historical system4
atics of literary &enres once a&ain becomes apparent(
@A$ery true wor% of art has $iolated an established &enre and in this
way confounded the ideas of critics who thus found themsel$es com4
pelled to broaden the &enre(@
>
'hat +roce pro$ides here as an anni4
hilatin& attac% upon the normati$e &enre concept once a&ain pre4
supposes 5howe$er unconsciously7 that precise state of affairs in
which the historical reality the function 5understood within the aes4
thetics of production7 and the hermeneutic achie$ement of the
&enre concept would be demonstrable( )or how else can one answer
in a controllable manner the sin&le Huestion considered le&itimate by
+roce4whether a wor% of art is a perfectly achie$ed e8pression or
only half so or e$en not at all
?
4if not throu&h an aesthetic Bud&4
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA K ?.
ment that %nows to distin&uish within the wor% of art the uniHue
e8pression from the e8pected and &enericL
A$en a perfect wor% of art 5as the unity of intuition and e8pres4
sion to use +roce=s terms7 could be absolute 5isolated from e$ery4
thin& e/pected' only at the e8pense of its comprehensibility( +roce
considered art a matter of pure indi$idual e8pression thereby em4
ployin& a form of the aesthetics of e8perience and of &enius
/
that is
lin%ed to a specific period but was ille&itimately &eneraliFed by him(
But e$en considered as such the literary wor% is conditioned by
@alterity@ that is in relation to another an understandin& conscious4
ness( A$en where a $erbal creation ne&ates or surpasses all e8pecta4
tions it still presupposes preliminary information and a traBectory of
e8pectations 71rwartunsrichtun8 a&ainst which to re&ister the ori&i4
nality and no$elty( This horiFon of the e8pectable is constituted for
the reader from out of a tradition or series of pre$iously %nown
wor%s and from a specific attitude mediated by one 5or more7 &enre
and dissol$ed throu&h new wor%s( Just as there is no act of $erbal
communication that is not related to a &eneral socially or situation4
ally conditioned norm or con$ention
.
it is also unima&inable that a
literary wor% set itself into an informational $acuum without indi4
catin& a specific situation of understandin&( To this e8tent e$ery
wor% belon&s to a &enre:whereby I mean neither more nor less than
that for each wor% a preconstituted horiFon of e8pectations must be
ready at hand 5this can also be understood as a relationship of @rules
of the &ame@ 7Zusammenhan von -pielreeln8' to orient the read4
er=s 5public=s7 understandin& and to enable a Hualifyin& reception(
The continually new @widenin& of the &enre@ in which +roce saw
the supposed $alidity of definitional and normati$e &enre concepts
led ad absurdum describes from another perspecti$e the processli%e
appearance and @le&itimate transitoriness@ of literary &enres
-1
as
soon as one is prepared to desubstantialiFe the classical concept of
&enre( This demands that one ascribe no other &enerality to literary
@&enres@ 5no lon&er so called indeed e8cept metaphorically7 than
that which manifests itself in the course of its historical appearance(
By no means must e$erythin& &enerically &eneral :what allows a
&roup of te8ts to appear as similar or related :be dismissed alon&
with the timeless $alidity of the concept of an essence E=Mesembe+
riffN implicit in the classical &enre poetics( Dne may refer here to
the differentiation in lin&uistics as well of a &enerality that assumes a
middle position between the uni$ersal and the indi$idual(@ )ollowin&
this line of thou&ht literary &enres are to be understood not as
/1 K GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
enera 5classes7 in the lo&ical senses but rather as roups or historical
families,
-"
As such they cannot be deduced or defined but only his4
torically determined delimited and described( In this they are ana
lo&ous to historical lan&ua&es for which it li%ewise holds that German
or )rench for e8ample do not allow themsel$es to be defined but
rather only synchronically described and historically in$esti&ated
'ith the help of determinations that Iant de$eloped for aesthetic
Bud&ment one can li%ewise &rasp the &enerality of literary &enres
that do not let themsel$es be reduced to an anterior determinate
and in$ariable norm( Accordin& to Iant the modality of a Bud&ment
of taste cannot be the @necessary conseHuence of an obBecti$e law@
but rather can be called @merely e8emplary@ because it necessarily
@demands the consent of all to one Bud&ment which can be consid4
ered as the e8ample of a &eneral rule that one cannot assert(@ This
mediation of the &eneral and the particular throu&h the e8emplary
clearly also holds for the recepti$e and producti$e continuity of a
literary &enre that as @an undetermined norm@ is at once e8ample
and model @the public meanin& of which always only fulfills and
determines itself in the particular Bud&ment of taste and in the par4
ticular wor% of art(@ Thus understood the cate&ory of the e8emplary
does away with the schema of rule4and4instance and ma%es possible
a processli%e determination of the concept of &enre in the aesthetic
realm( )or @that which the e8emplary indicates is undetermined,
ha$in& dynamic character that is bein& further determined throu&h
each new concretiFation(@
-<
0uch a determination no lon&er applies the &enerality of literary
&enres normati$ely %ante rent' or in a classificatory manner %post
rent', but rather historically %in re', that is in a @continuity in which
each earlier e$ent furthers and supplements itself throu&h the later
one@
-3
and its ad$anta&es are self4e$ident( It frees the de$elopment
of theory from the hierarchical cosmos of a limited number of &enres
sanctioned(by the pattern of antiHuity that do not allow themsel$es
to be mi8ed or increased( #nderstood as &roups or historical families
not only the canoniFed maBor and minor &enres can constitute a
&roup and be described in terms of the history of &enres but also
other series of wor%s that are bound by a structure formin& a conti4
nuity and that appear historically(
-2
The continuity formati$e of a
&enre can lie in the series of all the te8ts of one &enre such as the
animal fable or in the oppositional series of the chanson de &este and
the courtly romance6 it can lie in the succession of the wor%s of one
author such as those of Rutebeuf or in the cross4sectional pheno4
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA K /-
mena of a period style such as the alle&orical manner of the thir4
teenth century( But it can also lie in the history of a %ind of $erse
such as the paired tetrameter in the de$elopment of a @literary
tone@
->
that o$erlaps with particular phenomena such as epic hyperbole
or in a thematic structure such as the sa&a4form of the medie$al
Ale8ander the Great( But a wor% can also be &rasped accordin& to
various &eneric aspects as for e8ample the Roman de la rose of Jean
de Meun in which :held to&ether throu&h the traditional framewor%
of the minne4alle&ory : satire and tra$esty alle&ory and mysticism in
the manner of the school of +hartres the philosophical tractatus
and comedic scenes 5the roles of Amis and of !ielle7 all crisscross
one another( But such a di$ision does not relie$e the critic from pos4
in& the Huestion of the &eneric dominant within the relational system
of the te8t 5in our e8ample it is the lay4encyclopedia which forms
of representation Jean de Meun boldly and in&eniously meant to
broaden7(
'ith the introduction of the concept of the dominant
44
that
shapes the system the so4called mi8in& of &enres:which in the classi4
cal theory was the merely ne&ati$e side4piece to the @pure &enres@ :
can be made into a methodolo&ically producti$e cate&ory( Dne would
then further distin&uish between a &eneric structure in an indepen4
dent or constituti$e function and one in a dependent or accompany4
in& function( Thus for e8ample the satiric element in the Romance
Middle A&es at first and for a lon& time appears only in a dependent
function9 in connection with the sermon the moral didactic or @chas4
tisin&@ poem 5for e8ample La .ible Guiot', the literature of ran%
%1tats du monde, the mirror of princes7 the animal epic the $erse4
farce the poesia iocosa, or also the @conflict poem@ the polemical
lyric and all the forms that A( Adler counted as historicum, 'here it
then &ains a constituti$e function as for e8ample in the satiric
wor%s of Peire +ardenal Rutebeuf or +ecco An&iolieri independent
&enres of satire arise which howe$er:in contrast to the ancient or
Horatian tradition with which the literature of the Renaissance first
reestablishes contact :do not become absorbed in the continuity of
a sinle o$erarchin& &enre( But there are also cases in which a &eneric
structure appears only in an accompanyin& function as for e8ample
the so4called ap, or the &rotesHue which in the Romance Middle
A&es ne$er arri$ed at the form of an independent literary &enre(@
Accordin&ly a literary &enre in the nonlo&ical &roup4specific sense is
determinable in that in contrast to the wider sphere of dependent
functions it is independently able to constitute te8ts whereby this
/" D GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
constitution must by synchronically comprehensible in a structure
of nonsubstitutabie elements as well as diachronically in a potential
for formin& a continuity(
Ill
If to be&in with we inHuire into the determinability of literary
&enres in a synchronic perspecti$e then one must proceed from the
fact that the delimitation and differentiation cannot be decided ac4
cordin& to one4sided formal or thematic characteristics( There is
the old reco&nition first formulated by 0haftesbury that the pro4
sodic form does not by itself alone ma%e up the &enre but rather
that an @inner form@ must correspond to the outer form from out
of which the particular @measure@ the uniHue @proportion@ of an
independent &enre first allows itself to be clarified(@ This @inner
form@ is once a&ain not to be &rasped by a sin&le criterion( That
which constitutes a literary &enre in its uniHue structure or @family
similarity@ manifests itself at first in an ensemble of formal as well
as thematic characteristics6 these must first be in$esti&ated in their
function in a ruled coherence before their dominant, which shapes
a system can be reco&niFed and thereby the delimitation from
other &enres can be decided(
Dne means toward the establishment of constituti$e &enre dis4
tinctions is the test of commutation( Thus for e8ample the different
structures of the fairy tale 7Marchen8 and the no$ella cannot be
&rasped only throu&h the oppositions of unreality and e$erydayness6
nai$e morality and moral casuistry6 the self4e$ident wonder of fairy
tales and the @unheard4of e$ent@ but rather may also be understood
throu&h the different si&nificance of the same fi&ures9 @Dne puts a
princess in a fairy tale ne8t to a princess in a no$ella and one notices
the difference(@
"1
As a further e8ample one could introduce the non4
e8chan&eability of characters between the chanson de &este and the
courtly no$el( Kespite the &radual assimilation of the heroic epic to
the %ni&htly romance in the )rench tradition heroes li%e Roland
or M$ain ladies li%e Alda or Anide and lords li%e +harlema&ne or
Artus were not brou&ht from out of the one &enre into the other6 a
reception throu&h another tradition the Italian one was first called
for so that throu&h a fusion of the two )rench &enres into a new
one the so4called romance epic the ori&inally distinct &roups of
characters could be transposed into a sin&le structure of action( The
ori&inal separation is repeatedly perceptible in +hretien de Troyes
once one reco&niFes si&nals of none8chan&eability behind the rhetori4
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA K /<
cal schema of the o$ercomin&(
"
= Another stri%in& indication of struc4
tural distinctions is the contradictory application of procedure in
cases where the author then corrects himself( Thus for e8ample the
author of the !ierabras uses two motifs of fairy tale4li%e wonder
that are constituti$e for the Arms4romance 5a ma&ic belt and a mira4
culous balsam76 they would dama&e a rule of his &enre the chanson
de &este :namely the boundary of probability in an e8emplary ac4
tion which is still to be maintained e$en in heroic hyperbole:and
thus they are each immediately allowed to fall away that is simply
to disappear from the action as inconseHuential motifs(
""
The synchronic determination of literary &enres can today no
lon&er a$oid the Huestion of their @uni$ersals(@ In the multiplicity
of the artistic and utilitarian &enres of a literature is there not a
limited number of recurrent functions and thereby somethin& li%e
a system of literary communication within& which &enres are des4
scribable as partial systems or as $ariations of a fundamental modelL
As re&ards this Huestion typolo&ical poetics with its recourse to
anthropolo&ical cate&ories 5such as temporal or spatial e8perience7
has brou&ht us less far than the tradition of Aristotelian poetics( The
latter=s norms and interrelations of rules ob$iously preser$e so much
of empirical obser$ation that they retain heuristic $alue when one
then mo$es alon& an inducti$e path from a period=s fundamental
model for particular &enres to achie$in& the hypothesis of a literary
system of communication( As a first step toward this &oal the fol 4
lowin& see%s to adduce a partial system of &eneric functions from
the e8amples of the medie$al epic 5chanson de &este7 romance 5re4
man arthunen', and no$ella 5the 5ecameron',
The fundamental model that the medie$al &enres of epic 5[ A7
romance 5[ R7 and no$ella 5[ *7 ha$e in common may be described
in four modalities which may in turn be differentiated throu&h more
narrow determinations and which are filled by the three &enres in
different manners9@
-( *uthor and 6e/t 5*arration7
-- Rhapsode $s( *arrator $s( Absent *arrator
fc(9 0pea%in& poet %Honleur' and aural audience6 the author re4
treats behind material so that the occurrences seem to narrate
themsel$es( R9 'ritin& poet and unseen audience6 the author steps
forward
as mediatin& narrator behind material(
*9 'ritin& poet and unseen audience6 the mediatin& narrator for
the most part conceals himself in that which is narrated(
/3 J GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
-(" Apic DbBecti$ity $s( )able to be Interpreted $s( A$ent to be Kis4
cussed
A9 Apic formulas such as the assertion of truth participation in
the hero=s fate and epic forestallin& construct an emotional
unity between Bon&leur and audience( R9 *arrator=s
interpolations %sines du narrateur' ser$e the interpretation of the
fable %matiere et sens separate from one another7(
*9 *arrator=s commentaries often lea$e the meanin& of the e$ent
uninterpreted6 this remains left to the audience=s discussion
-(< Apic Kistance $s( Actuality6 @How4suspense@ $s( @If4at4all4sus4
pense@
A9 )rom the epic distance the occurrence appears as a wholly
past one6 the epic forestallin& ma%es possible the pathos of
the @how4suspense(@
R9 To be sure it is narrated from epic distance in the @passe du
sa$oir@6 and yet an @ if4suspense@ draws into the fable coun4
terbalanced throu&h the secure e8pectation of the happy
endin&(
*9 Also narrates the spatial and temporal distance as if it were
present6 @if4at4ail4suspense@ without an e8pectable happy
endin&(
"( Modus dicendi 5)orms of Representation7
"(- *onwritten 5oral literature7 $s( 'ritten 5boo%7
A9 Dral 5impro$isin&L7 deli$ery for a nonliterate audience( R9
A te8t composed in writin& and intended for readin& 5or
readin& aloud7 that also arises from a written tradition %ro+
man#" rewritten in the $ernacular7( *9 'hereas the romarn,
arises from a written 5ori&inally Latin7
tradition the no$ella:fi8ed in writin&:comes from an oral
tradition and enters bac% into it(
"(" !erse $s( Prose
A9 Assonantal lais, the @formulaic style@ of which also allows
for impro$isation(
R9 @+ouplet@ narrati$e form 5paired octosyllabic lines7(
*9 +olloHuial prose raised to an art form by Boccaccio(
"(< Le$el of 0tyle9 sermo sublimis $s( medius $s( humilis
A9 Ale$ated style in the paratactic synta8 pro$ided by the Bible(
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA E /2
R9 Middle style6 comfortably narrati$e6 restricti$e $is4a4$is e$ery4
day reality because of the filter of courtly speech(
*9 +on$ersational tone with a new license to say e$en thin&s
from the lower reality in a suitable manner 5Boccaccio9 con
onesti vocaboli',
"(3 +losure $s( 0eHuel6 Len&th $s( Bre$ity
A9 Apic breadth neither first be&innin& nor definiti$e end 5the
formation of &enealo&ical cycles7(
R9 A8tract sin&ular series of ad$entures and ad$ance 5the round4
table7 &i$e the story of the no$elistic heroes a closure that no
lon&er refers to any before or after(
*9 The bre$ity corresponds to temporal tension 5runnin& from
an arbitrary be&innin& to a dissol$in& end without a middle76
the end of the no$ella as a @solution for this time@ implies
further no$ellas(
<( Construction and Levels of -inificance 5#nities of the Repre4
sented7
<(- Action %arumentum'" Apic Dccurrence 7.eebenbeit8 $s( Ro
mance Happenin& 7Gescheben8 $s( #nprecedented A$ent
71re inis8
A9 The epic action from an often minimal cause &rowin& into a
catastrophe has its unity in an obBecti$e occurrence that en4
compasses the world4order6 its hero is a representati$e of the
fate of his community(
R4( The romance happenin&:the ad$enture as a structure for the
fulfillment of meanin& arisin& by accident:has its unity in
the sin&ular character of the e8emplary hero(
*9 The e$ents of the no$ella are neither part of a hi&her order
nor a sin&ular path of life but rather an @unprecedented oc4
currence comin& to pass@ 5Goethe7 that raises a moral Huestion(
<(" +haracters 0ocial 0tatus9 Hi&h $s( Middle $s( Low
li9 A8clusi$ely aristocratic 5hi&h4feudal76 the pea% of the heroic
hierarchy includes the often4mythified %in& 5@half4&od@7 fol4
lowed by the circle of the best 5twel$e peers7 surrounded by
normal %ni&hts for the most part nameless6 the heathen op4
position reflects the same hierarchy(
R9 A8clusi$ely aristocratic the e8cluded lower order appearin& in
the contrastin& fi&ure of the u&ly vilain+, opposition between
the inacti$e ideal %in& 5Artus7 and the %ni&ht who
/> K GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
alone ta%es the field and whose ad$enture stands in relation to
the winnin& of his lady(
*9 The characters of the no$ella encompassin& all bour&eois
roles and not e8cludin& representati$es of other classes dis4
tance themsel$es from the heroic canon of the beautiful and
noble(
<(< Represented Reality6 0ymbolic $s( A8emplary $s( Kescripti$e A9
Dnly a few symbols for the outer world %pin, olivier' frame the
portrayal of heroic acts6 the latter are differentiated throu&h
symbolic &estures and ele$ated throu&h typolo&ical references(
R9 The e8emplary styliFed courtly world forms the framewor%
within which the e8cluded unideal reality is transformed into
elements of a ma&ical opposin& sphere and ele$ated throu&h the
fairy tale4li%e fortune of the @other world(@ *9 The no$ella is
able to represent the outer world as an en$ironment of a $ariety
of thin&s throu&h its con$ersational tone as well as throu&h a new
circumstantial manner of description(
3( Modus recipiendi and -ocial !unction
3(- Ke&rees of Reality9 res esta %bistoria' $s( res ficta $s( arumen+
tum ?ui fieri potuit
A9 +laim to historical truth and the preser$ation of past acts for
endurin& memory6 the substratum of the chanson de &este :
the le&end: clin&s to one place or to names made %nown
throu&h history(
R9 To be sure the romance follows the fictional principle of the
fairy tale that in the ad$enture no occurrence may be li%e
reality6 and yet the courtly narrator presents the claim of dis4
co$erin& a sensus moralis in the res ficta,
*9 The(no$ella does not inHuire into the meanin& of history and
e8cludes the miraculous character of the fairy tale because it
always stands in the middle of time and space and therefore
needs the probability of a societal e$ent(
3(" Mode of Reception9 Admiration and Amotion $s( Antertainment
and Instruction $s( Astonishment and Reflection
A9 Heroic ideality which e8cludes ineluctable tra&edy as well as
liberatin& comedy and implies an ethics of action worthy of
imitation in the polarity of admiration and emotion 5the
hero=s characteristics of the martyr7(
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA K /?
R9 The fairy tale4li%e ideality of the ad$enture not only allows
the enBoyment of a literary fiction 5already a$ailable for iron4
iFation7 but also communicates the doctrine of courtly ed4
ucation 7.ildun8 throu&h its ethics of the e$ent(
*9 The moral casuistry brou&ht to li&ht by the astonishin& e$ent
in particular and by the plurale tantum of no$ellas in collec4
tions in &eneral shows in tra&edy as well as in comedy the
problems inherent in the ethical norms of e$eryday life and
demands the reflection of the educated reader(
3(< 0ocial )unction9 Interpretation of History %memoire collective'
$s( Initiation $s( +on$ersation 5the formation of Bud&ment7
A9 Primary form of historical transmission for the nonreader in
which the national history of an ideal past %le passe tel ?u>il
eut dii etre' is transposed and ele$ated into an epic4mythic
system of world4e8planation(
R9 The later function as an entertainment for the pri$ate reader
is preceded by the ori&inal function as the initiation into
courtly life and courtly lo$e9 @the le&itimate Huest for a ter4
restrial happiness re&ulated by a social discipline and a life4
style(@
*9 +on$ersation as a form of @passionate obser$ation of secular
life@ and reflection of social norms(
"3
0uch %inds of structural analyses still lac%in& for many literary
&enres could &radually lead to a synchronic cross4section in which
the or&aniFation of the traditional and the noncanoniFed &enres ap4
pears not as a lo&ical classification but rather as the literary system
of a definite historical situation( But since @e$ery synchronic system
contains its past and its future as inseparable structural elements of
this system@
"2
a historical systematics of literary &enres demands
further cross4sections of literary production in the before and after
of diachrony(
I!
If we inHuire into the determinability of literary &enres in a dia4
chronic perspecti$e then we should be&in with the relationship of
the indi$idual te8t to the series of te8ts that is formati$e of a &enre(
The limitin& case when a te8t is the only %nown e8ample of a &enre
only pro$es that it is more difficult4but in no way e8cluded in
principle :to determine a &eneric structure without recourse to the
// J GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
history of the &enre( 'hat for e8ample is &eneric in the &enre of the
chante+fable, handed down only throu&h *ucassin et Nicolette, mani4
fests itself with sufficient clarity from the structural difference $is4a$is
related &enres such as the Latin prosimetrum or Kante=s =ita Nuova,
from which it distin&uishes itself throu&h the narrati$e runnin&
throu&h the $erse parts as well as the prose parts to say nothin& of its
different le$el of style and form of deli$ery 5mimin&L7( Dn the other
hand its &eneric character also manifests itself in its relationship to
the lyric and epic &eneric models that it cites combines and not
infreHuently parodies( The techniHue of allusion and monta&e uniHue
to *ucassin et Nicolette may ha$e rendered more difficult the
reproducibility of the chante4fable since it demands a &reater %now4
led&e of the contemporary forms from the author as well as from the
public6 but in principle the possibility that further e8emplars of this
&enre e8isted is not to be disputed( Dn the other hand the relation4
ship between constant and $ariable structural elements that comes to
li&ht in historical chan&e can be established only from a diachronic
perspecti$e(
The $ariability within historical appearance presented difficulties
for the theory of &enres as lon& as one depended on a substantialist
notion of &enre or sou&ht to &rasp the histories of &enres within the
e$olutionary schema of &rowth flowerin& and decay( How can a
&enre=s historical chan&e be described if the &enetically &eneral 7*lle+
meine8 is to understood neither as a timeless norm nor as an arbi4
trary con$entionL How can the structure of a &enre transform itself
without losin& its uniHuenessL How is the temporal process of a &enre
to be thou&ht if not as a de$elopment toward a masterwor% and a
decline in the phase of the epi&onesL If in place of the naturalistic
concept of &enre 5the &enre as an idea that appears in each particular
bein& and as &enre only repeats itself7 one poses the historical con4
cept of a continuity @in which e$ery earlier element e8tends and
completes itself throu&h the later one@ 5accordin& to Aristotle the
O66>L9<<PK etc avro that distin&uishes man%ind from the animal7
">
then the relationship between the indi$idual te8t and the series of
te8ts formati$e of a &enre presents itself as a process of the continual
foundin& and alterin& of horiFons(
"?
The new te8t e$o%es for the
reader 5listener7 the horiFon of e8pectations and @rules of the &ame@
familiar to him from earlier te8ts which as such can then be $aried
e8tended corrected but also transformed crossed out or simply
reproduced( !ariation e8tension and correction determine the lati4
tude of a &eneric structure6 a brea% with the con$ention on the one
hand and mere reproduction on the other determines its boundaries(
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA D /.
If a te8t simply reproduces the elements of a &eneric structure
only plu&s some other material into the preser$ed model of repre4
sentation and merely ta%es o$er the recei$ed topics and metaphorics
it constitutes that stereotypical %ind of literature into which pre4
cisely successful &enres such as for e8ample the chanson de &este
in the twelfth century or the fabliau in the thirteenth soon sin%( The
limit that is thereby reached is that of mere use4$alue or @consump4
tion4character(@ The more stereotypically a te8t repeats the &eneric
the more inferior is its artistic character and its de&ree of historicity(
)or it is also $alid for literary &enres that @they transform them4
sel$es to the e8tent that they ha$e history and they ha$e history to
the e8tent that they transform themsel$es(@
"/
The historicity of a literary &enre stands out a&ainst a process of
the shapin& of a structure its $ariation e8tension and correction
which can lead to its ossification or can also end with its suppression
throu&h a new &enre( The nonsense4poetry can ser$e as an e8ample
here which in )rance in the thirteenth century appeared in two in4
dependent &enres the fatrasie and the resverie,
2C
!iewed &enetically
the fatrasie can be defined as a deri$ation or better a transformation
of a narrati$e &enre the @lyin& tale@ 7Liienmarchen8 )F The new
&enre is characteriFed by the omission of the en$elopin& conte8t
that si&nals the artful lie6 by the rupture %brisure' of e$ery ne8us of
narration or meanin& in the fatrastic plot6 and by the strict bipartite
asymmetrical construction of the poem and the parado8 arisin&
therefrom of a structure of @the total cancellin& of all real lo&ic
outside of any rational conte8t but within an absurd metrical4narra4
ti$e =unity(= @Z@ The in$ention of the fatrasie as a fi8ed form of poetry
is probably to be attributed to Philippe de Remi( If this hypothesis
of '( Iellcrmann=s is correct then the !atrasies d>*rras stemmin&
from the same period already indicate the first $ariation and material
e8tension9 the atemporal motifs of Philippe are mi8ed in with satiric
secondary intentions 5de&radin& the sacred and the heroic7 and with
the comedy of the scabrous( This tendency is pushed so far in a
further $ariation created by Ilaimmondin and 'atriHuet de +ou$in
that a new parodistic &enre44the Garras4splits off from the fatrasie
as the pure form of nonsense4poetry( Here a pro$erbli%e refrain of
mostly amorous content is placed before the fatrastic ele$en4syllable
line and it pro$ides the framewor% of the poem which then parodies
its possible utterance in the form of an impossible discourse( 'ith
this the fatras impossible that de$elops away from the fatrasie becomes
a @parodistic hybrid4creation of a &loss@ to which Baudet Herenc later
opposed the fatras possible, a serious counterpart with
.1 J GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
mostly spiritual thematics6
<"
in the abo$e4s%etched process the latter
is surely to be considered as a correction of the nonsense4poetry(
Belon&in& to this nonsense4poetry is the &enre of the res$erie
which appears contemporaneously with the fatrasie and comes down
to us in only three e8amples and which only recently was reco&niFed
and described by '( Iellermann in its independent structures(@ The
res$erie shows how the same intention :the lan&ua&e4&ame of the
production of nonsensical utterances :can be transformed into an4
other &enre throu&h the in$ention of a new @rule to the &ame(@ )or
here a dialo&ical situation is to be presupposed in which a se$en4
syllable line recited by the poet must be answered by a four4syllable
line that is to satisfy two conditions9 @It must form a unity of mean4
in& with the precedin& $erse and pro$ide the poet with a new rhyme4
word for a new line that is in its content wholly different from the
precedin& one(@
<3
In this &enre as well we bump into Philippe de
Remi who rendered its form more difficult throu&h his rhyme4acro4
batics6 it appears to ha$e e8pired with the so4called 5it des traverces
5-<1<7( But it returns a century and a half later in the -ottie des
menus propos 5-3>-7 which cut the lan&ua&e4&ame of the res$eries
to fit the fi&ure of the fool and reactualiFed it by connectin& it with
the idea of the foolish world(
<2
The leapin& character of this process
in which the later form of the Co?+i+l>ane is also to be included6 the
continual $ariations renderin& it more difficult or more simplistic6
the differentiation throu&h new @rules of the &ame@6 the con$ersion
of the structure into the form of deli$ery of another 5here the dra4
matic7 &enre9 all these elements characteriFe the historical life of
literary &enres and at the same time refute the or&anic schema
si6 in this nonteleolo&ical continuity @the result at the end@
doubtl cannot be @made into the &oal of the be&innin&(@
<>
The e8ample of nonsense poetry meanwhile indicates only the im4
manent process of a &enre in its literary aspects and not the :here
scarcely determinable:historical or li$ed4world situations that mi&ht
ha$e conditioned this process in the interaction between author and
society the audience=s e8pectations and the literary e$ent( To in4
Huire into such entan&lements is indispensable if one is to be serious
about the historiciFation of &enre poetics and the temporaliFation
of the concept of form( The methodolo&ical postulate that the new
formation or the death of literary forms:ultimately indeed e$ery
turn in the history of &enres :must ha$e a correspondence in
ne
e
btless
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA J .-
the sociohistorical situation or at least an impulse arisin& from it
is no lon&er upheld by Mar8ist theory nor by literary sociolo&y with
the nai$ete with which it was maintained by the classical theory of
reflection 7&iederspieelunstheorie8(@ A$en proponents of these
methods ac%nowled&e today that the &enres @represent to a certain
e8tent an a priori of literary reality(@
</
They emphasiFe the inter4
dependence between the infrastructure of society and the super4
structure of literature abo$e all where chan&es in the basic economic
and politicosocial relations @bear the character of a historical re$olu4
tion@ transform themsel$es into the structural elements of art and
then @Obrea% throu&h; the traditional stabiliFed forms styles and
$alue4concepts of literature(@
<.
Dn the other hand they see how
literary &enres after the moment of their social formation @achie$e
a life of their own and an autonomy which reaches beyond their
historical hour of fate(@
31
They spea% of an @often anachronistic
afterlife@ and of the historical death of literary &enres
3-
most re4
cently:under the influence of Brechtian aesthetics:e$en of the pos4
siblility of @refunctionin&@ lon&4past &enres and artistic de$ices in4
dependently of their ori&inal social determination ma%in& them
ser$iceable for a new aesthetic and social function(
3"
The latest wor% by Arich Iohler on the history of the &enre of
the pastourelle may be used as an e8ample of this tendency in schol4
arship(
3<
The point of departure is a decisi$e chan&e in direction of
the &enre( In both his pastourelles the troubador Ga$audan con4
sciously 5his shepherdess representin& the sum of the e8periences of
all her predecessors7 &oes beyond the constituti$e rule of the &enre:
the unsuppressible essential difference between @nobilitas@ and @rus4
ticitas(@ In this meetin& of %ni&ht and shepherdess hi&h and lower
lo$e are mediated and reconciled whereby Ga$audan refers to buried
elements of the bucolic to the representation of an earthly paradise
before the fall of ori&inal sin( If with Arich Iohler one sees in the
pastourelle more than a &ame with literary roles then unresol$ed
contradictions of social reality lie hidden in Ga$audan=s #topian solu4
tion( Ga$audan=s teacher Marcabru had called into Huestion the mat4
ter4of4course manner in which the risin& class of the lower %ni&ht4
hood had distanced itself from its ori&in in the medium of the pas4
tourelle( Ga$audan had sou&ht to brid&e the &ap between %ni&hthood
and fol% throu&h the new theme of friendship %amhtai' between
%ni&ht and shepherdess( The price was an ele$ation of the illusionary
so that Ga$audan=s #topia of reconciliation already represents the
limitin& case of the pastourelle that anticipates the self4cancellin& of
the &enre(
." J GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
!I
A second e8ample of literary4sociolo&ical scholarship will introduce
the cate&ory of structural chan&es now to be considered those that
lead to the splittin& off of a new &enre( The e8istence of the sirventes+
son&s :a &enre historically secured throu&h forty4nine e8amples and
its description coined by )olHuet de Romans:was because of their
@mi8ed character@ one of the oldest irritations for Pro$encal studies(
)or the chanso+sirventes ties the theme of lo$e to that of politics(
Meanwhile as Arich Iohler demonstrated with this double4thematics
the &enre once a&ain presents the ori&inal unity of feminine praise
and lordly ser$ice which in the vers &enre of the earliest troubador
poetry were not yet separated thematically but then separated into
the &enres of the chanso and sir$entes that thereby arose( The his4
torical system of this lyric poetry thus demonstrates first how
throu&h a structural chan&e 5the separation of the thematies of lo$e
and moral satire7 two new @purer@ &enres arose6 and second how
from the need to a&ain brin& to consciousness the unity lost in the
one4sided structures of the two &enres arose the antithetical struc4
tural law of an independent &enre(
33
The form of a new &enre can also proceed from structural alter4
ations that cause a &roup of simple &enres already at hand to enter
into a hi&her principle of or&aniFation( The classic case for this is the
form of the Tuscan no$ella coined by Boccaccio which would be
normati$e for the whole later de$elopment of the modern &enre of
the no$ella( +onsidered &enetically an astonishin& multiplicity of
older narrati$e or didactic &enres enter into Boccaccio=s 5ecameron"
medie$al forms such as the e/emplum, the fabliau the le&end the
miracle the lai, the vida, the nova, lo$e4casuistry Driental narrati$e
literature Apuleius and Milanese lo$e4stories local )lorentine his4
tories and anecdotes( As H(4J( *euschafer demonstrated
32
Boccaccio
transposed the &i$en thematic and formal multiplicity into the un4
mista%able structure of a new &enre throu&h a determinable transfor4
mation the rules of which may be defined formally as placin& the
plot4schemata in a temporal dimension thematically as the callin&
into Huestion of moral norms( The step from the older narrati$e and
didactic forms to the new &enre4structure of the no$ella that inte4
&rated them can be described throu&h oppositions such as9 the uni4
polar or bipolar nature of the characters6 the plot as typical or as a
sin&ular case6 the finality or ambi$alence of moral norms6 transcen4
dental dispensation or human self4affirmation( Generic determinates
from the later theory of the no$ella such as for e8ample that of
the @unprecedented occurrence@ or the solution of a moral case4
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA K .<
which by themsel$es would not suffice to characteriFe the &enre4
achie$e their specific si&nificance in connection with the structure
formed by Boccaccio( *aturally this does not mean that all elements
of this &eneric structure must from now on be found in all later no4
$ellas( Boccaccio=s successors do not simply repetiti$ely continue an
initial structure9 @It is much more the case that there one can on the
one hand establish a certain return to the e8emplary and fle8ible
narrati$e forms of the Middle A&es that were in no way =o$ercome=
by Boccaccio once and for all but on the other hand also disco$er
new and independent modes of narration(@
3>
In its historical appear4
ance the no$ella accents the $arious forms that its poly&enesis incor4
porates sometimes in simplifyin& $ariants 5for e8ample in the fle8ible
conte', sometimes in complicatin& cases 5for e8ample in the multi4
faceted casuistry of Mme( de La Iayette7(
'hen the theories of the no$ella of particular authors are too nar4
row or too partial to be co$ered by the multiformed process of this
pro&ressi$e unfoldin& and correctin& of the &enre=s system one may
not simply conclude from the discrepancy between poetic theory
and literary production that there Bust is no &enerically typical form
of the no$ella(
3?
Rather the con&ruence between theory and practice
that is ne$er fully achie$ed :more specifically the con&ruence be4
tween e8plicit theory immanent poetics and literary production :
itself belon&s amon& the factors that condition the process of the his4
torical appearance of a literary &enre( Thus a canonical theory or
one canoniFed for a certain time cannot immediately be contrasted
as a &eneric norm with the series of wor%s realiFed in practice( Rather
between the theory that posits the norm and the literary series there
mediates the immanent poetics that determines the structure of the
indi$idual wor% and is to be read out of it( And in cases where a theo4
retical norm lays claim to uni$ersally bindin& $alidity4 as for e8am4
ple the Aristotelian poetics for post4medie$al literature4the conflict
between the authoritati$e &eneric norm and the immanent poetics
can become precisely the moti$e force that %eeps the historical pro4
cess of the &enre mo$in&(
0ince the $ernacular &enres of medie$al literature did not de$elop
from a pre&i$en canon and in conflict with it their system can be
read only out of the immanent poetics and $erified in the constancy
or $ariability of particular structural elements with the continuity
formati$e of a &enre( This method necessarily presupposes the her4
meneutic circle but not the or&anic circle of fulfillment( 'here there
is no initially posited and described &eneric norm the establishin& of
a &eneric structure must be &ained from the perception 7*nscbauun8
.3 K GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
of indi$idual te8ts in a continually renewed pre4concei$in& 7=orriffN
of an e8pectable whole or re&ulati$e system for the series of te8ts(
This preconcei$in& does not necessitate any telos of fulfillment( It
presupposes an aesthetic principle that lends meanin& to the @rules
of the &ame@ not their fulfilled state of bein&( The processli%e ap4
pearance of a &enre in time has as Iarl !ietor has emphasiFed @no
&oal at all6 it will not come to rest in a fulfillment but rather will be
present in a continually renewed realiFation( There is only a historical
end to the history of a &enre Bust as it has a be&innin& in time(@
3/
0ince
that which is &eneric in a tradition may not in itself establish the
aesthetic $alue of its te8ts the notion that the fulfillment of a te8t
remains the same as the purity with which it fulfills the model or
type of a &enre is a specifically classicist e8pectation( In medie$al
literature on the other hand masterwor%s such as for e8ample the
Chanson de Roland, +hretien=s romances the first Renart parts
Guillaume de Lorris=s lo$e4alle&ory or the 5ivina Commedia demon4
strate precisely that they far surpass the con$entions of their &enre(
Here the precedin& te8ts of the &enre did not de$elop with fore4
seeable necessity toward its most perfect e8pression nor did the
masterwor%s pro$ide a model of the &enre the reproduction of
which alone already &uaranteed success for the wor%s that came later(
If one follows the fundamental rule of the historiciFation of the
concept of form and sees the history of literary &enres as a temporal
process of the continual foundin& and alterin& of horiFons then the
metaphorics of the courses of de$elopment function and decay can
be replaced by the nonteleolo&ical concept of the playin& out of a
limited number of possibilities(
3.
In this concept a masterwor% is
definable in terms of an alteration of the horiFon of the &enre that is
as une8pected as it is enrichin&6 the &enre=s prehistory is definable
in terms of a tryin& and testin& of possibilities6 and its arri$al at a his4
torical end is definable in terms of formal ossification automatiFa4
tion or a &i$in&4up or misunderstandin& of the @rules of the &ame@
as is often found in the last epi&ones(
21
But the history of &enres in
this perspecti$e also presupposes reflection on that which can become
$isible only to the retrospecti$e obser$er9 the be&innin& character of
the be&innin&s and the definite character of an end6 the norm4foundin&
or norm4brea%in& role of particular e8amples6 and finally the historical
as well as the aesthetic si&nificance of masterwor%s which itself may
chan&e with the history of their effects and later interpretations and
thereby may also differently illuminate the coherence of the history
of their &enre that is to be narrated( )or in the dimension of their
reception literary &enres as well stand
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA K .2
under the dialectic of after4history and prehistory insofar as accord4
in& to 'alter BenBamin because of their after4history @their prehistory
also becomes reco&niFable as concei$ed in continual chan&e(@
2
=
!II
The theory of literary &enres cannot remain within the structures of
self4enclosed histories of &enres but rather must also consider the
possibility of a historical systematics( If for centuries no attempt has
been underta%en to brin& the totality of literary &enres of a period
into a system of contemporary phenomena the reason may be that
the normati$e doctrine of &enres has been profoundly discredited
and alon& with it any systematics decried as speculati$e( In the
meantime the modern theory of &enres can proceed only descripti$e4
ly and not by definition6 this insi&ht in no way e8cludes the possi4
bility that alon& the path of synchronic description and historical
in$esti&ation one may arri$e thou&h not at a &enerically determined
system of communication nonetheless at a historical seHuence of
such systems( A$en the literature of the Middle a&es is no arbitrary
sum of its parts but rather a latent orderin& or seHuence of order4
in&s of literary &enres( After all se$eral references by medie$al
authors and the 5in this respect still une$aluated7 selection and ar4
ran&ement of te8ts and &enres in collected manuscripts point to this
orderin&( The Latin poetics with its rhetorical cate&ories and classifi4
cations of style mi&ht well also be brou&ht to bear heuristically on
an establishin& and delimitation of &eneric characteristics e$en
thou&h for the most part it contains only traditional didactic material
and was not normati$e for the $ernacular literature(
)rom the transmission of ancient rhetoric and theory of poetry
there were in the Middle A&es basically four schemata of di$ision at
one=s disposal that could in $aryin& de&ree ser$e the e8planation of
&enres9 modes of discourse %enus demonstrativum, deliberativum,
iudicialis', le$els of style %enera dicendi" humile, medium, sublime',
forms of deli$ery %enus dramaticum, narrativum, mi/tum', and
finally obBects %tres status hominum" pastor otiosus, aricola, miles
dominans',
i2
The doctrine of the three modes of discourse each
with two submodes is admittedly not de$eloped into a system for
the di$ision of correspondin& literary &enres in the rhetorical hand4
boo%s6 it remains to be in$esti&ated whether they pro$ided anythin&
for the oratorical literature that first appeared in Italy( In the ancient
tradition the three &enera dicendi were distin&uished abo$e all accord4
in& to formal elements of the le$el of style 5$ocabulary meter
.> K GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
imaeery ornamentation7( Here the medie$al reception too% a step
beyond the ancient theory( Twelfth4 and thirteenth4century authors
introduced the concept of @style@ %Fsum iitur tres stylu bumilis,
mediocris, randilo?usF', which they no lon&er defined solely ac4
cordin& to the means of representation but also accordin& to its ob4
Bect 5i(e( the social class of the represented characters and the ele4
ments of their en$ironment7(
2<
The model for this system was the
interpretation of !ir&il=s wor%s &oin& bac% to 0er$ius and Konat
which had him in the .ucolica, Georica, and *eneid representin&
three sta&es of human society 5shepherd farmer warrior7 in the ap4
propriate that is similarly le$eled style( Df the !ir&ilian &enres
admittedly only the bucolic is culti$ated in the Middle A&es and
not the &eor&ic9 and the *eneid is also nowhere identified with the
chanson de &este(
23
And yet the principle of classification accordin&
to the social class of the characters carried out by Johannes de
Garlandia has its correspondence at least in the strictly class4ordered
@rules of the &ame@ of the Dld )rench epic and romance if one
i&nores the missin& orderin& in the le$els of style(
The theory of the three forms of deli$ery accordin& to the system
of the &rammarian Kiomedes %narrativum when the poet himself
spea%s dramaticum when the characters alone spea% mi/tum when
poet and characters alternately ha$e the $oice7 achie$ed particular
influence in the Middle A&es throu&h Bede and Isidore( Kiomedes=
tripartite di$ision proceedin& from the most superficial formal char4
acteristics did more to cause confusion concernin& the function of
ancient &enres 5for e8ample concernin& that of the ancient theater
so that the structure of plays to be performed had to be sou&ht and
de$eloped anew7 than it did to establish producti$e new distinctions(
22
Johannes de Garlandia brou&ht order into this transmission( His
Poetria, a synthesis of the *rtes dictaminis and the *rtes poeticae, fit
Kiomedes= tripartite di$ision into a new summa of literary &enres
which is systematically arran&ed accordin& to four perspecti$es9 -( ac4
cordin& to the $erbal form %prosa and metrum', the first arran&ed
into four &enres6 the techno&raphic or scholarly the historical the
epistolary the rhythmic and musical76 "( accordin& to the form of
deli$ery %?uicum?ue lo?uitor" Kiomedes= tripartite di$ision76 <( ac4
cordin& to the de&ree of reality of the narrati$e 5three species narra+
tionis" res &esta or bistoria, res ficta or fabula, res ficta ?uae tamen
fieri potuit or arumentum'K 3( accordin& to the feelin& e8pressed in
the poetry %de differentia carminum, a fourfold arran&ement that
de$elops a differentiation of the enera traica, comica, satyrica,
and mimica that is mentioned by Kiomedes and in the 6ractatus coi+
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA < CQ
silianus',
sR
The system of &enres of Johannes de Garlandia=s Poetria
did not arise purely deducti$ely but rather in its richness in defini4
tions related to content perhaps sou&ht to order the state of literary
&enres arri$ed at in the reality of the thirteenth century9 this is a hy4
pothesis for which at least two ar&uments seem to spea%( A( Adler
has pointed out that the bistoricum in Johannes=s definition 5that is
the satiric &enre in the fourth rubric7 Huite precisely e8presses the
perimeters and the function of the thirteenth4century literary forms
that one may distin&uish as the be&innin&s of political satire( And the
distinction thematic as well as stylistic between tra&edy Ecarmen
?uod incipit a audio et terminat in lucto' and comedy %carmen io+
cusum incipiens a tristitia et terminans in audium' returns in the
&enre4theory of Kante=s letter to +an Grande and corresponds to the
structure as well as to the 5later7 title of the 5ivina CommediaD
4
References by $ernacular authors that brin& to li&ht synchronic re4
lations or partial systems of literary &enres ha$e as yet not really
been collected(
2/
Dne of the most impressi$e e8amples is offered by
the prolo&ue to the oldest part of the Roman de Renart"
0ei&neurs oi a$eF mainte conte
Eue mainte conterre $ous raconte
+onment Paris ra$i Alaine
Le mal Hu=il en ot et la paine9
Ke Tristan dont la +hie$re fist
Eui asseF bellement en dist
At fabliaus et chancon de &este
Maint autre conte par la terre(
Mais onHues n=oistes la &uerre
Eui tant fu dure de &rant fin
Antrc Renart et Msen&rin(
OPt( II -4--;
I he Bon&leur who boasts of his obBect as a totally new thin& dis4
tin&uishes it from a series of well4%nown indi$idual wor%s and
&enres9 troHa 5ancient romance7 tristan 5Breton romance7 fabliau
chanson de &este and then an unidentified animal4poem 5perhaps
a $ernacular $ersion of Ssenrimus)', This list of the wor%s that
were popular around --?>G?? allows one to &rasp a literary sys4
tem insofar as the &enres that are specified are not Bust accidentally
selected but rather form the specific horiFon of e8pectations before
which the new and often parodistic conte about the be&innin& of the
enmity between the fo8 and the wolf:runnin& counter to the heroic4
poetry of the courtly conception of lo$e:must ta%e place(
2
=
./ K GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
Toward the end of the twelfth century Jean Bodel be&ins his
-aisnes with the statement that there are only three &reat epic &enres
for connoisseurs which he names accordin& to content %materes' and
then ran%s accordin& to de&ree of reality so that the &enre of his
own wor% ob$iously appears at the top9
>1
Li conte de Bretai&ne sont si $ain et plaisant(
+il de Rome sont sa&e et de sens aprendant(
+il de )rance sont $oir chascun Bour aparant(
Ow( .4--;
In this scale chanson de &este and Breton romance correspond to the
opposition res &esta and res ficta 5here with the addition9 @wonder4
ful and pleasin&@7 that we encountered in Johannes de Garlandia=s
species narrationis6 the ancient romance @rich in teachin&s@ can stand
for the 5probable7 ar&umentum(
)or the lyric one can refer here to Kante=s 5e vulari elo?uentia,
the second part of which is a poetics relatin& to $ernacular poetry
and which refers to the modus of the can#one, the ballata the son4
net and other 0leitimos et erreulares modos as &enres of the lyric
5II <7( And as themes that are worthy of the hi&h style he intro4
duces the public &ood %-alus', lo$e %=enus', and ethics %=irtus', Met
this orderin& sprin&s not primarily from a di$ision of &enres but
rather once a&ain from a poetics of the %inds of style( )or such
themes @are not $iewed as the causes of the hi&h style but as means
for its realiFation(@
>-
*e$ertheless this does not spea% a&ainst the
e8istence of &eneric structures( The new lyric &enres created by the
Pro$encal poets in the Romance $ernacular certainly did not de$elop
in isolation but rather did so in reciprocal dependence and di$ision
of function( 0uch di$isions and reshufflin&s within a lyric system
may be &rasped only when the history of all the established &enres
is written and in$esti&ated in connection with the later poetics9
Raimon !idal=s Ra#os de trobar, the contemporaneous Leys d>amor
appearin& at the be&innin& of the thirteenth century in Toulouse
the 5reita manera de trobar of the Consistorio del ay saver founded
in -</? in Barcelona Austache Keschamps= treatise =an de dictier
et de fere chancons, which &oes bac% to the canon of Toulouse and
AnriHue de !illena=s 0panish *rt de trovar, )rom amon& these I mi&ht
introduce the oldest stoc%4ta%in& of Pro$encal poetry which Guilhelm
Molinier incorporated into his Leys d>amors between -<"/ and -<22(
He distin&uishes between ten maBor &enres and se$enteen subBacent
ones( The former include the canso sir$entes dansa, descort, tenso,
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA J CC
partimen, pastorela, retroncha, planb, and escondi, Amon& the latter
some ser$ed as accompaniment for dances6 for others no e8amples
are yet %nown so that their identification is problematical(
>"
This
system of the maBor lyric &enres was dissol$ed around the turn of the
thirteenth to the fourteenth century throu&h the new system of the
so4called @&enres a formes fi8es(@ As K( Poirion has demonstrated
><
this sha%e4up is connected with a chan&e in the relationship between
music and te8t9 whereas in the thirteenth century the musical rhythm
alone still determined lyric poetry the poetic te8t and polyphonic
melody now separate into hetero&eneous de$elopments( At first
lyric poetry threatened to disappear alto&ether9 @*either the motets
layered upon the inaudible te8ts nor the dits which rhymed the lon&
discourses retain the essential ori&inality of lyric poetry(@ But then
from the be&innin& of the fourteenth century onward a new system of
lyric &enres de$eloped9 rondeau and virelai, chant royal and ballad lai
and complainte, which throu&h Guillaume de Machaut=s Remede de
!ortune became typical for the courtly poets6 and from the
narrati$e dit a freer de$elopment toward that modern type of
subBecti$e poetry be&an which is represented abo$e all by !illon=s
wor%(
!III
The Huestion of the reality of literary &enres in the historical e$ery4
day world or that of their social function has been i&nored in me4
die$al scholarship and not because of a lac% of documents( Resistin&
any insi&ht into this Huestion there has lon& been the humanist o$er4
emphasis on the written and printed tradition a Platonic aesthetics
accordin& to which past literature can really be @present@ for us in a
boo% at any moment
>3
and the nai$ely obBecti$ist eHuation of philo4
lo&ical interpretation with the e8perience of the ori&inal reader or
hearer( The necessary reorientation of scholarship was first intro4
duced by Jean Rychner for the chanson de &este(
>0
His pro&rammatic
slo&an referrin& to the @oral style@ the epic techniHue and the oral
dissemination of the Dld )rench epic:@The chanson de este, diffused
under these conditions ou&ht to ha$e been composed for these
conditions(@
>>
4should also be emphasiFed for most of the other
&enres of $ernacular literature for which the problem of their
conditions of influence 7&ir$unsbedinunen8 and social function
still remains an open one( )or this scholarly tas% Romance philolo&y
can &arner ad$ice from a discipline that for more than fifty years
-11 K GA*RA A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
has been de$elopin& methods for this and testin& them on a material
that is furthermore e8emplary for the literature of the Middle A&es9
namely theolo&ical research into literary criticism of the Bible(
Kurin& the same time that Romance philolo&y stood under the
spell of @wor%4immanent@ methods and +roce=s suspicion of liter4
ary &enres was rarely contradicted a scholarly tendency blossomed
within theolo&y that made a philolo&ical principle into one of its
own9 namely that @the literature in which the life of a community :
thus also the ori&inal +hristian con&re&ation : plays itself out arises
out of $ery definite e8pressions and needs of the life of this com4
munity which in turn present a certain style certain forms and
certain &enres(@
>?
Literary forms and &enres are thus neither subBecti$e
creations of the author nor merely retrospecti$e orderin&4con4cepts
but rather primarily social phenomena which means that they depend
on functions in the li$ed world( The Bible is also a literary monument
that bears witness to the life of a community6 it can no lon&er
remain withdrawn from historical understandin& as @&enus illud
sin&ulare transcendens nullam cum aliis comparationem ferens Huod
est ipsa 0criptura sacra(@
>/
Accordin&ly the understandin& of the
Bible is no lon&er thin%able without a literary4critical scholarship that
ta%es account of the en$ironment and its lan&ua&es the personality of
the author and the literary &enres %nown to the ori&inal addressees
of the boo%s(
>.
This literary4historical scholarship has been brou&ht
underway by the so4called @form4historical school@ of Protestant
theolo&y 5H( Gun%el M( Kibelius R( Bultman7 and has since found
its way into +atholic doctrine( The principle @that research into the
author and the literary &enre of a determinate wor% has as its &oal
the e8act understandin& of the messa&e which the wor% contains@
?1
also lies at the basis of the +atholic handboo%s on Biblical
scholarship
?-
which can draw support from the fact that Pope Pius
WII in the encyclical 5ivino afflante spiritu of <1 0eptember -.3<
reco&niFed the modern theory of literary &enres as an aid in Biblical
e8e&esis(
It is instructi$e for the problems of &enre arisin& in the face of
te8ts from the Romance Middle A&es that theolo&ical scholarship has
a concept of &enre that is structural as well as sociolo&ical9 at first
such scholarship inHuires into the &enetically conditioned form and
the function in the li$ed world of a &i$en literary product in order
then to consider it in its historical dimension( The literary &enre be4
comes defined as a @structural ensemble into which e$erythin& comes
to insert itself in order to arri$e at a particular meanin&@6 @each of
these literary &enres communicates a certain truth to the reader but
GA*RA A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA a -1-
in different orders(@
?"
The reco&nition of such structures must mean4
while be preceded by @the Huestion of the presupposed situation of
the spea%er his intention his listeners and of the whole disposition6
in short the Huestion of the =locus in life= @ OGun%el;(@ 'ith the
phrase @locus in life@ one understands a typical situation or mode of
beha$ior in the life of a community such as for e8ample the festi$al
of a sacrifice at sacred sites for the literary form of the hymn but
also such noncultic situations as wor% huntin& and war6 it is from
these situations that the presupposed motifs that were constituti$e
for the form and intention of a &enre first become comprehensible(
)or @only the history of a &enre pro$es whether the form of a literary
wor% is not an accidental product but rather a form capable of de4
$elopment which has its own life(@
-3
The form4historical method
that de$eloped from this concept first determines @the ori&in and af4
filiation of a specific literary &enre in and to typical situations and
beha$iors of a community@ and then follows the rise alteration and
transition of the form so constituted in its history as a literary &enre(
As an e8ample of this one may here cite Rudolf Bu%mann=s represen4
tation of the apopbtbemata)G
IW
But the @literary history of the Bible@ is also of &reat importance for
medie$al Romance philolo&y from a thematic point of $iew( In re4
cent decades one loo%ed abo$e all at the prototype of classical anti4
Huity:its rhetoric and literary topoi, and its model authors:when
as%in& about the ori&ins of Romance literature( But the new literary
&enres of the Romance $ernaculars in no way proceeded from this
tradition in a linear de$elopment or an immediate @appropriati$e
transformation of the ancient herita&e(@ +oncernin& the @afterlife of
antiHuity@ the scholarship on tradition belie$in& in continuity in4
tentionally i&nored the Huestion of how the literature of the +hristian
era mi&ht actually be compatible with ancient literary theory and
whether there was somethin& li%e a +hristian aesthetics( In opposi4
tion to this attitude Arich Auerbach $ariously demonstrated that the
new demands and contents of the +hristian faith had to brea% throu&h
the ancient literary system with its practice of a hierarchy of styles
related to obBects9 @humble e$eryday thin&s ( ( ( lose their baseness
in the +hristian conte8t and become compatible with the lofty style6
and con$ersely ( ( ( the hi&hest mysteries of the faith may be set
forth in the simple words of the lowly style which e$eryone can un4
derstand( ,3i4 was such a radical departure from the rhetorical and
-1" < GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
indeed from the entire literary tradition that it nearly si&nifies th
destruction of its foundation(@
?>
The conseHuences of the formation of
a new +hristian discursi$e art :a @low rhetoric in the sense of the
sermo humilisF established in Au&ustine=s 5e doctrina christianaTE3,
the forms of literature in late4Latin +hristian antiHuity and later in
the Middle A&es are still scarcely in$esti&ated( This is especially the
case for the new formation of tradition in didactic literature the
&enres of which bear the imprint of +hristian eloHuence @edifica4
tion@ and instruction( But the realm of sermo humilis also reaches
into the epic and dramatic &enres which are determined by the model
of the Bible not only thematically:throu&h +hristian do&ma throu&h
typolo&y and the moral doctrine as well as throu&h the authority of
the e8empla:but also formally in manifold ways(
If one loo%s at the results of the @literary history of the Bible@
then one can only wonder why medie$al studies ha$e not yet under4
ta%en any systematic attempt to in$esti&ate the possible model that
literary &enres found in the Bible may pro$ide for medie$al literature(
The abundance of literary forms and &enres ascertainable in the Dld
and *ew Testaments is astonishin& and leads directly to the dis4
co$ery of Romance parallels( The Bible contains worldly lyrics 5son&s
of wor% ridicule drin%in& burial and war7 as well as spiritual ones
5the hymn or the lament7( It de$eloped the most $aried forms of
narrati$e prose9 etiolo&ical historical and also heroic sa&as 5the le&4
endary &arland for 0amson76 le&ends of martyrs and no$ellas 5the
Iin&=s no$ellas but also the Boo% of Ruth7( It contains the model
for $arious forms of historio&raphy 5tribal le&end &enealo&y royal
chronicle7 historical prose 5documents letters contracts war re4
ports7 and bio&raphy 5the self4disclosures of the prophets7( All ima&i4
nable forms of wisdom literature 5pro$erb riddle parable fable de4
bate alle&ory7 and reli&ious instruction 5sermon e8hortation epistle7
are also found in it(
)inally the method of the form4historical school also places the
still4current distinction between the &enres of @spiritual@ and @world4
ly@ literature in a problematic li&ht( 'ith this distinction a literary
understandin& that arises only with the emancipation of the fine arts
from their ties to cultic and social functions is transferred to a period
that did not yet feel any separation between reli&ious life and literary
culture the contents of faith and the forms of art( In the Middle
A&es all literature is still functionally determined throu&h its @locus
in life(@ 'hat is &eneric in it arises from such immediately realiFed
self4e$ident and therefore 5for the most part7 unreflected functions6
and thus not from a reflected relationship with form as an aesthetic
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA K -1<
means which can only appear with the de$eloped &eneric conscious4
ness of a literature that has become autonomous(
??
Two methodo4
lo&ical conseHuences are to be drawn from this accordin& to M(
'altF9 the obBect of research is here @not the &enre as it e8isted in
the consciousness of contemporaries but the function of the wor%s@6
but then a further obBect of study is the process already be&innin&
in the Middle A&es with the courtly lyric in which a reflected &eneric
consciousness appears with the problematiFation of the function and
leads in the Renaissance to the liberation of the autonomy of liter4
ature(
?/
The distinction between @spiritual@ and @worldly@ func4
tional constraint and @literariness@ has meanin& in the Middle A&es
only when it is understood as the process of a &radual literariFation of
&enres that ori&inally are tied to cultic reli&ious and social functions(
)or the application of the form4historical method to medie$al
literature one can ri&htly claim that it is not satisfactory to e8plain
the form of a &enre directly from its @locus in life@:on the one hand
because the &enre can Bust as well form the @locus of life@ as the lat4
ter can the former and on the other hand because the function of
a &enre depends not only on its relation to a real li$ed procedure
but also on its position within a comprehensi$e symbolic system fa4
miliar to contemporaries(
?.
)or the literary &enre the Huestion of the
==locus in life@ has a synchronic as well as a diachronic dimension9 it
implies its function within the comprehensi$e orderin& of the sym4
bolic forms of e8pression of a culture and at the same time its po4
sition in the historical chan&e of this symbolic system( )or our per4
iod this latter aspect means the process of the be&innin& literariFa4
tion and indi$idualiFation of &eneric con$entions(
- his process should not be misunderstood as an or&anic de$elop4
ment nor as seculariFation( Instead the later @profane@ history of a
&enre ori&inally tied to reli&ious or cultic functions does not need to
de$elop immanently and linearly out of its ori&inal structural charac4
teristics but rather can be brou&ht underway throu&h hetero&eneous
impulses( Thus the process of literariFation or subBectification can
fulfill itself precisely counter to the ori&inal purposeful orientation
of the &enre that is counter to its spirituality or edifyin& con$ention(
)or e8ample althou&h Guillaume de Lorris=s Roman de la rose in
many respects appears only to further de$elop4under @profane@
symptoms4the spiritual traditions of the helium intestinum %Psy+
chomachia' and alle&orical poetry in the mode of the Roman de
miserere 5of Reclus de Molliens with numerous moti$ic analo&ies7
/1
the structurally related first &reat worldly alle&ory nonetheless arises
from an opposin& process( Toward the end of the twelfth century the
-13 J GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
separation of alle&orical poetry from Biblical e8e&esis stood under
the ae&is of the contradiction that connected the spiritual author
with the new alle&orical form %duple/ sententia' of the dit 5from ver+
itatem dicere' but a&ainst the brand4new contes and fables of worldly4
courtly poetry( But now Guillaume de Lorris too% up this challen&e
in that he lay claim to the same alle&orical truth for the poetry of
courtly lo$e that the spiritual tradition of te8tual e8e&esis had re4
ser$ed for itself9 @)aced with the absolute Boo% at once model and
ri$al poetry in search of its autonomy forces itself to brin& forth a
word of authority 5Lo$e for e8ample7 which it opposes to that of
the Bible(@
/-
The alle&oriFation of poetry appearin& in the thirteenth
century is neither an immanent &eneric de$elopment nor a mere secu4
lariFation of reli&ious content but rather the ostentatious appropria4
tion and conscious literariFation of a method proper to the spiritual
tradition throu&h poets li%e Guillaume de Lorris who sou&ht an auto4
nomous worldly literature(
The history of the de$elopment of the passion play offers a further
e8ample( Its de$elopment which can be traced ab ovo from the fa4
mous interpolation of the Aaster mass %@uern ?uaeritis in sepulchro
, , , 7 in the tenth century up to the monstrous $ernacular passion
mysteries of the fifteenth century is commonly seen as the proto4
type of a homo&eneous process of pro&ressi$e seculariFation in which
the ori&inally litur&ical e$ent is increasin&ly seculariFed throu&h
scenes of increasin&ly worldly content until it finally de&rades into a
mere dramatic play( In opposition to this interpretation Rainer
'arnin& has brou&ht to li&ht hetero&eneous impulses in the history
of the &enre that cannot be brou&ht under the rubric of a process of
seculariFation(
/"
It is not incidental that the passion play shifts the
sacred plot e/tra muros" as a @mass in the mar%etplace@ it produces
ritual forms that distance themsel$es from church doctrine and fi4
nally e$en contradict it( Mimetic ima&e4ma%in& already had brou&ht
church criticism upon the litur&ical play6 with the be&innin& of the
$ernacular tradition the de$il was introduced as a dramatic4dualistic
counterpart which approaches a remythification of the do&ma of
the incarnation when $iewed a&ainst the bac%&round of Anselm of
+anterbury=s doctrine of satisfaction( In conseHuence of this dualistic
structure there finally arises the drastic arran&ement of the martyr4
dom of the crucifi8ion which brin&s the ostensible representation of
the incarnation into the theolo&ically ambi&uous li&ht of an archaic4
ma&ical scape&oat4ritual9 @To the e8tent that play and reality fuse
to&ether God himself is ridiculed spat upon whipped and nailed to
the cross in the sta&e fi&ure of Jesus(@
/<
In li&ht of this interpreta4
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA E -12
tion the history of the &enre shows an opposin& process behind the
supposed seculariFation which spran& from the latent protest of the
dualistic4pa&an fol% piety a&ainst the monotheistic do&matics and
e8plains the heretic tendency of the plays6
this tendency may ha$e led to the prohibition
of further performances by the Parisian parlia4
ment=s edict of -23/
The last step in a theory of literary &enres can proceed from the fact
that a literary &enre e8ists for itself alone as little as does an indi$i4
dual wor% of art( This fact is less self4e$ident than it may at first ap4
pear if one retains an ima&e of how &enres commonly appear in liter4
ary histories6 they are seen as a seHuence of &eneric de$elopments
closed within themsel$es that for the most part are held to&ether
only throu&h the outer framewor% of some &eneral characteristics
of the period( But the basic principle of a historiciFation of the con4
cept of form demands not only that one relinHuish the substantiaiist
notion of a constant number of unchan&eable essential characteristics
for the indi$idual &enres( It also demands that one dismantle the cor4
relati$e notion of a seHuence of literary &enres closed within them4
sel$es encapsulated from one another and inHuire into the recipro4
cal relations that ma%e up the literary system of a &i$en historical
moment( )or the tas% of disco$erin& diachronic and synchronic inter4
relations between the literary &enres of a period the Russian )ormal4
ists found methodolo&ical approaches that well deser$e to be applied
to the field of medie$al literature(
/3
The )ormalist conception of &enre as a historical system of rela4
tions participates in the attempt to replace the classical notion of
literary tradition : as a steady unilinear cumulati$e course :with
the dynamic principle of literary evolution, by which they do not
mean an analo&y to or&anic &rowth or to Karwinian selection( )or
here @e$olution@ is supposed to characteriFe the phenomenon of lit4
erary @succession@ @not in the sense of a continuous =de$elopment=
but rather in the sense of a =stru&&le= and =brea%= with immediate pre4
decessors throu&h a contemporary recourse to somethin& older(@
/0
In
the historical e$olution of literature thus understood literary
&enres can be &rasped in the periodic alternation of the dominatin&
role as well as in a seHuence of ri$alries( At the basis of this idea lies
the notion of a self4chan&in& @hierarchy of &enres@9 @)or the )ormal4
ists the =period= is also a system with a system4specific =attitude= and
its correspondin& =dominants(= Dn the basis of the &eneral attitude or
led to p
ment=s edict of -23/(
-1> J GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
intention the &enres4which to an especially lar&e e8tent are able to
&i$e e8pression to this attitude :arri$e at the top of the hierarchy of
&enres and become the =dominatin&= &enres of the period( These can
be entirely new &enres but also richly traditional &enres can become
restructured in respect to the new basic intention(@
/>
)rom a diachronic perspecti$e the historical alternation of the
dominatin& &enre manifests itself in the three steps of canoniFation
automatiFation and reshufflin&( 0uccessful &enres that embody the
@hi&h point@ of the literature of a period &radually lose their effecti$e
power throu&h continual reproduction6 they are forced to the
periphery by new &enres often arisin& from a @$ul&ar@ stratum if
they cannot be reanimated throu&h a restructurin& 5be it throu&h the
playin& up of pre$iously suppressed themes or methods or throu&h
the ta%in& up of materials or the ta%in&4o$er of functions from other
&enres7(
/?
In the realm of the Romance literature of the Middle A&es
the followin& e8amples offer themsel$es for an e8planation in terms
of the theory of the @hi&h point@9 the new appearance of the courtly
romance which around the middle of the twelfth century stru&&les
for the dominatin& position with the older chanson de &este6 then
the rise of the prose romance which around the turn of the thirteenth
century ma%es its way with a new claim to truth6
//
and finally the
triumph of alle&ory which around -"<3G<2 5as Huon de Mery in the
prolo&ue to the 6ournoiement de =*ntecbrist testifies alon& with
Guillaume de Lorris7 presents itself as novel pense and as yet
un%nown matire, and replaces the courtly epic and Arthurian world
of the models of +hretien de Troyes Raoul de Houdenc and their
epi&ones which are now felt as past( But as distin&uished from the
e8amples of the )ormalists for the most part chosen from modern
literature the history of &enres in the twelfth and thirteenth centu4
ries lac%s a comparable stratum of subliterature( The new &enres of
the courtly $erse4romance the first prose romances and the alle&ori4
cal epic are not canoniFations of lower &enres but rather proceed
from a shift of functions 5the paired or respecti$ely narrati$e ei&ht4
syllabic line was found in rhymed chronicles6 the prose in historio4
&raphy 6 and the alle&orical form in spiritual poetry7(
The shift or ta%in& o$er of function from other &enres allows one
to see the synchronic dimension in the literary system of a period(
Literary &enres do not e8ist alone but rather form the $arious func4
tions of a &i$en period=s system to which they connect the indi$idual
wor%9 @A wor% which is ripped out of the conte8t of the &i$en liter4
ary system and transposed into another one recei$es another colorin&
clothes itself with other characteristics enters into another &enre
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA K -1?
loses its &enre6 in other words its function is shifted(@
/.
This process
may also be demonstrated with the @matiere de Breta&ne@9 since its
si&nificance within the system of the +eltic4+ymric mytholo&y and
le&endary world was no lon&er understood by the )rench narrators
and their audience its fables recei$ed the other @tone@ of the fairy
tale4li%e miraculous( Throu&h this fictionaliFation conditioned by
reception the Arthurian romance distin&uishes itself most sharply
from the chanson de &este which arises from the historical sa&a and
the martyr le&ends( )rom the perspecti$e of their ri$alry new aspects
of the history of these two &enres may still be &ained( 0imilarly the
history of courtly poetry could surely still be enriched if it were
s%etched within the historical relational4system of the &enres that
surround and abo$e all also ne&ate it9 the Renart parts with their
lau&hin& satire of the whole courtly4%ni&htly world6 the $erse farces
5fabliau87 with their drastic and not infreHuently &rotesHue per$er4
sions of courtly mores6 the dits sermons and moral treatises with
the e8istential earnestness of their doctrine of $irtue and their scat4
tered anticourtly polemics( Aspecially desirable would be research
into the functional di$isions in the didactic @small &enres@ and the
narrati$e @short forms@6 here one could ma%e a sidepiece to Andre
Jolles=s 0infache !ormen, the system of which would surely recei$e
richly e8planatory historical $ariants and e8tensions within the Ro4
mance sphere(
.1
WI
The )ormalist theory imposed upon itself the limitation of consider4
in& and describin& the e$olution of literary &enres and forms as an
unilinear process( It disre&ards the function of literary &enres in Huo4
tidian history and dismissed the Huestions of their reception by and
influence on the contemporary and later audiences as mere sociolo4
&ism and psycholo&ism( The historicity of literature nonetheless is
not absorbed into the succession of aesthetic4formal systems and
the chan&in& of hierarchies of &enres( It does not suffice to set the
literary series@ only in relation with lan&ua&e as the nearest @e8tra4
literary series(@ 0ince literary &enres ha$e their @locus in life@ and
therefore their social function literary e$olution must also beyond
its own relationship between diachrony and synchrony be determin4
able throu&h its social function within the &eneral process of history(
0ince the Thirties Jan Mu%aro$s%y and the so4called Pra&ue 0tructur4
alism ha$e accomplished this further de$elopment of )ormalist theory
in &round4brea%in& studies the reception of which is still lac%in& in
-1/ J GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA
'estern Auropean scholarship(
.-
This step from formalism to a dia4
lectical structuralism is interestin& for a theory of literary &enres
abo$e all because here the wor% of art is understood as a si&n and
carrier of meanin& for a social reality and the aesthetic is defined as
a principle of mediation and a mode of or&aniFation for e8tra4aes4
thetic meanin&s( Dn the other hand a theory of &enres &rounded in
an aesthetics of reception necessarily will add to the study of the
structural relations between literature and society wor% and audience
where the historical system of norms of a @literary public@ lies hid4
den in a distant past6 there it can most readily still be reconstructed
throu&h the horiFon of e8pectations of a &enre system that pre4con4
stituted the intention of the wor%s as well as the understandin& of
the audience(
The testimonies of older literatures often remain mute and the
documents of social history also rarely &i$e a direct answer to the
Huestions that must be as%ed to obtain information about the func4
tion reception and influence of literary wor%s and &enres in their
historical reality and social en$ironment( Thus structuralism and
hermeneutics are here related to one another to an especially &reat
e8tent( Their mediation throu&h the methods of an aesthetics of
reception is necessary to enable one to become at all aware of the
social function 5by means of the synchronic system of &enres norms
and $alues7 and:connected with this :the @answerin& character@
5by means of an analysis of the history of reception7 of wor%s of
past art(
."
Alon& this path our epistemolo&ical interest in the liter4
ature of the Middle A&es will also be &rounded anew9 the opportu4
nity for a renaissance in medie$al studies appears today to lie much
less in the si&nificance of the Middle A&es as a homo&eneous mem4
ber of our familiar 'estern tradition than in the fact that its monu4
ments ha$e preser$ed only a fra&mentary picture of a historically
distant culture and life4world that are often forei&n to us(
If one loo%s bac% on the scholarship of recent decades there is
no lon&er any mista%in& that the humanist faith in an unbrea%able
tradition of literary forms and in the timeless presence of master4
wor%s has decei$ed us about the historical distance and otherness
of medie$al literature( *o perceptible historical continuity e8ists
between the forms and &enres of the Middle A&es and the literature
of our present( Here the reception of the ancient poetics and canon
of &enres in the Renaissance unmista%ably cut throu&h the threads
of the formation of tradition( The redisco$ery of medie$al literature
by romantic philolo&y produced only the ideolo&y of new continu4
ities in the form of the essential unity of each national literature
GA*RA0 A*K MAKIA!AL LITARAT#RA E -1.
but did not enable one to draw the medie$al canon of &enres and
wor%s bac% into a new literary producti$ity( The forms and &enres
of modern literature arose as a counter4thrust to the canon of cias4
sicist4humanist aesthetics9 troubadour lyrics were as little an im4
pulse for the !leurs du mal as was the %ni&htly epic for the 1duca+
tion sentimentale or the passion play for the modern @non4Aristo4
telian@ theater(
But from this one should not now conclude that the theory and
history of the literary &enres of the Middle A&es can no lon&er con4
tribute to the understandin& of the literature of our present( 'hat
they may achie$e and wherein they may once a&ain arri$e at an
actuality can rather first emer&e when our relationship to the Mid4
dle A&es is liberated from the illusion of be&innin&s that is from
the perspecti$e that in this period one mi&ht find the first sta&e of
our literature the be&innin& that conditions all further de$elopment(
The literature of the Middle A&es can once a&ain become an irreplace4
able paradi&m not as a be&innin& that recei$es its si&nificance only
throu&h an end that is distant from it :the de$eloped national liter4
atures:but rather throu&h its @be&innin&ness@ si&nificant in itself(
Throu&h the @be&innin&ness@ of a literature newly formin& itself in
the $ernacular lan&ua&es its archaic &enres pro$ide testimony for the
ideal and reality of a uniHue political as well as cultural historical4
world closed in itself and offer us elementary structures in which
the socially formati$e and communicati$e power of literature has
manifested itself(
Chapter O
Goethe=s and !alery=s !aust"
Dn the Hermeneutics
of Euestion and Answer
@+omparaison n=est pas raison@9 no independent method can be
&rounded in comparison alone( A$en today still no critiHue stri%es
the nai$e self4understandin& of comparati$e literary studies more
sharply than Atiemble=s ironic formulation does( How can a discip4
line lay claim to independence when its methodolo&ical procedure
belon&s to the e$eryday practice of many scholarly acti$itiesL The
learned humanist who reconstructs an e$ent of the past from many
sources6 the lin&uist who in$esti&ates the structure of a lan&ua&e $ia
contrast or from $arious states of the lan&ua&e6 the Burist who draws
on a precedent to sol$e a Huestion of law9 all wor% comparati$ely
now and then without seein& there an ultimate methodolo&ical prin4
ciple( Dnly the professional comparatist seems to ha$e for&otten that
somethin& more than the mere comparison belon&s to the method4
olo&ical application of comparison( )or e$en the most hi&hly de$el4
oped practice of comparison tells us neither what should enter into
the comparison 5and what not7 nor to what end( The rele$ance and
thereby the selection of the comparison cannot be drawn directly
from the compared elements themsel$es6 e$en when in the end si&ni4
ficance apparently @sprin&s out@ on its own it nonetheless presup4
poses hermeneutically a preconception O =orriff8 howe$er often
unadmitted(
It would be idle to be reminded of all this if a &lance at the present
abundance of comparatist production did not confirm that in the
normal course of its research comparati$e literary study still lar&ely
holds to a nai$e hermeneutically unenli&htened obBecti$ism( It does
GDATHA=0 A*K !ALAR!=0 !*0-6 K ---
not concern itself with the rele$ance of its comparison and it therefore
e$idently li$es by the messianic e8pectation that one day a &enie of
synthesis will arri$e who will be able to brin& the flooded mass of
comparatist %nowled&e bac% into a whole that with one stro%e will
return to the collected comparisons the si&nificance that has become
unreco&niFable( In recent years this whole has fondly been called
@world literature@ 7&eltliteratur8, whereby the later Goethe as well
as Mar8 and An&els can stand to&ether as &odfathers in a preestab4
lished harmony(
-
It is admittedly a step forward when in this way
the uni$ersality of literature frees itself from one last conseHuence
of romantic thin%in&:the thou&ht that @each nation has a special
separate history for itself and therefore also possesses a literature
which is independent from the others@ 5Tra&er p( "<7( Indeed the
older comparati$e studies also owed their scholarly4historical ratio
vivendi to this beautiful romantic thou&ht9 this ratio had to be in4
$ented and le&itimated as the method of comparison to brin& bac%
to&ether the literatures or @$oices of the peoples@ 7-timmen der
=ol$er8 which were essentially different( 'hoe$er belie$es that na4
tional literatures are separate histories:that is that they are natures
with their own laws of de$elopment:cannot arri$e at the point of
ma%in& comparison the ultimate methodolo&ical recourse( But today
the romantic definition of literary history as the ideal form of the
indi$iduality and history of a nation belon&s to the past( And an un4
derstandin& of history has come to the fore in which literature and
art can still be &ranted only relati$e autonomy within the real socio4
historical process( Thus a new comparati$e studies faces the problem
of its le&itimation as well as that of its methodolo&y(
The new le&itimation:its obBect of study @world literature@ and
no lon&er the substantial dissimilarity of wor%s and authors in the
conte8t of their national literature:does not at once also sol$e the
methodolo&ical problem( 'hen accordin& to +laus Tra&er the tas%
of literary studies from now on should be the in$esti&ation of national
literary wor%s in relationship to @world literature@ :which cannot be
done independently of their position in the national history and its
relationship to the historical pro&ress of world history 5Tra&er P4
<-74for him this does not raise the Huestion of how this broadest
panorama of possible relations is to be &rasped at all be means of
comparati$e obser$ation( @'orld literature@ is no obBecti$e pre4
found &reatness no system of e$aluation pre4&i$en once and for all
within which e$erythin& can be compared with e$erythin& else( Before
the coinin& of the term 5around -/"?7 @world literature@ already
e8isted historically in the Auropean history of education as the canon
--" J GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6
of e8emplary wor%s and authors( This canon of @world literature@ is
thorou&hly conditioned historically and socially insofar as it presup4
poses a process of appro$al 7*ner$ennun8 throu&h the aesthetic
Bud&ment of historical subBects from the $arious periods and thereby
also a chan&eable consensus omnium, If @world literature@ is to
become the $anishin& point of a post4national literary history in
relation to which the rele$ance and selection of all comparisons
define themsel$es then a new comparati$e studies must first arri$e at
the point of wor%in& out from period to period the history of that
uni$ersal and yet not timeless canon in relation to which the @world
literary@ si&nificance and influence of wor%s and authors are decided(
In the course of this it would be demonstrated that @world litera4
ture@ li%e all formations of tradition includes preser$ation suppres4
sion and omission :that its consensus omnium is not only historical4
ly uni$ersal and socially partial but also a process of appro$al as well
as disappro$al in which the Bud&ment of the particular present either
ta%es o$er or &i$es up past e8perience either renews it or reBects it(
'e are today and especially in uni$ersities that peda&o&ically
mediate literature in a perfect departmentaliFation of national lan4
&ua&es and periods still far from payin& our dues to such conceptual
problems( But in addition to the historical problem of @world litera4
ture@ as an a8is of rele$ance that remains to be wor%ed out one may
also brin& the methodolo&ical inference of my introductory critiHue
to bear on the traditional obBects of comparati$e studies9 hermeneu4
tic reflection must be brou&ht into the method of comparison so that
the rele$ance of the comparison is not abandoned to mere accident
when not to a preBudice of the tradition( The followin& discussion is
to ser$e this purpose for which I ha$e chosen a traditional theme of
comparati$e studies( It is no lon&er a matter of the traditional Hues4
tion of what mi&ht be specifically German or specifically )rench in
Goethe=s and in !alery=s !aust, and thereby represent their literary4
national traditions( *or should the two $ersions of the )aust myth
be in$esti&ated to reco&niFe what is specifically @Goethean@ in
Goethe or @!aleryan@ in !alery( )or e$en this latter obBect of
interest to inHuire into the indi$iduality of authors instead of the
essence of national literatures still stands under the spell of what one
could call the illusion of the timeless comparision(
'hoe$er would thus compare Goethe=s and !alery=s !aust directly
with one another places their wor%s on a timeless le$el of compari4
son as if it were a matter of two $ariations of one and the same
substance( Dr to use the metaphorics of literary history as if it were
a matter of a hi&h4le$el dialo&ue between illustrious spirits with the
GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 )G-#0?= J --<
philolo&ist only needin& to ea$esdrop in order to understand $oice
and counter$oice and to interpret them comparati$ely( But on
closer e8amination it would soon be shown that the direct comparison
remains e8terior that no o$erarchin& si&nificance can be determined
from shared and distin&uishin& features alone indeed that Goethe=s
$oice and !alery=s $oice clearly don=t spea% to one another at all"
they remain two monolo&ues as lon& as one only compares them(
They only enter into a dialo&ical relationship :put another way
!alery=s new !aust only shows itself to be an answer to Goethe=s !aust
B when one reco&niFes the Huestions that in !alery=s $iew Goethe
left Behind( To formulate it methodolo&ically broadenin& the
bipartite schema toward a tertium comparationis that is no
lon&er timeless means a rehistoriciFation such that one disco$ers the
hermeneutic relation of Huestion and answer problem and solution
which mediates not only Goethe and !alery but also the different
meanin&s of their similar wor%s 5as re&ards motifs7 with the con4
temporary horiFon of interest of the interpreter who is comparati$ely
Huestionin& them(
@+omparaison n=est pas raison@9 the comparati$e principle be4
comes reasoned to the de&ree that one brin&s to consciousness the
Huestion or series of Huestions that orients each controlled compari4
son( This preliminary Huestion often unanswered by the obBecti$ism
of the philolo&ical operation can be more or less rele$ant( Dne can
ar&ue about it( But the ar&ument may adBust itself toward the actual
matter at hand when the Huestion that the interpreter poses to the
te8t is confirmed as a Huestion rele$ant to the meanin& of the te8t
throu&h the hermeneutic process of Huestion and answer( The Hues4
tion we pose to !aust must lead to the %nowled&e of the Huestion to
which Goethe=s !aust and later !alery=s !aust were the answer( At
the end of the whole series of Huestion and answer it remains to be
e8amined whether it has satisfied the latest interpreter or rather
lea$es new problems unanswered(
Here one must warn a&ainst a second substantialist illusion( 'ho4
e$er has escaped from the illusion of the timeless comparison may
still run the dan&er of fallin& into the illusion of the timeless Hues4
tion(
"
The literary wor% and to an e$en &reater de&ree the literary
Zmyth ha$e the character of an answer the conclusi$eness of which
can co$er o$er or cause one to for&et the ori&inal Huestion so that it
must be inferred in an e$er4chan&in& form in the process of the
interpretations( It will be shown in our case as well that it was no
lon&er the ori&inal Huestion of the )aust myth that Goethe answered
with his drama of humanity and that !alery too% up another
--3 J GDATHA=0 A*K !ALAR!=0 !*0-6
Huestion implied in the )aust myth when the answer of Goethe=s
!aust no lon&er satisfied him(
It may still be noted if only on the mar&in that structuralist te8t4
theory and more recently the semiotic te8t4theory that has become
so modish are in no way freed from the abo$ementioned illusions
especially when they consider hermeneutic reflection to be super4
fluous( )or the lo&ical combinations of structural anthropolo&y as
well as the binary si&n4systems of semiotics are dependent on rele$an4
cies6
<
their descripti$e models must answer to a preliminary Huestion
if they are to be selecti$e in a controllable manner and not to be
absorbed into that (>art pour =an of formaliFed metalan&ua&es
which no lon&er describe anythin& since they no lon&er answer to
anythin&(
In June -.31 when Paul !alery be&an to write down the first scenes
of a Comedie that 5accordin& to the testimony of his Cahiers' for a
lon& time had been ho$erin& before him under the title of a lll
me
!aust, it was not only that the world appeared to him sufficiently
altered since !aust ( and GG for the theme left behind by Goethe to be
ta%en up a&ain(
3
There was also a concrete moti$e for seein& the
@German )aust@ as a pro$ocation for a )rench answer( !alery wrote
durin& the days of the military catastrophe6 he felt the defeat of his
country as most deeply shameful and wanted @so to spea% to re$en&e
the e$ents@
2
throu&h stubborn writin&( A$en if the wor% that thus
arose Huic%ly surpassed its historical occasion the titles of partial
plays left unfinished:LustBLa 5emoiselle de Cristal %Comedie' and
Le -olitaire ou les Maledictions de &nivers %!eerie dramati?ue'B
still point bac% to a polemical point of departure( !alery=s !aust
does not enter peacefully into the illustrious series of his predeces4
sors9 it is written aainst two concretiFations of the post4Goethean
myth and stands in the relation of a tessera $is4a4$is its entire modern
tradition( This is Harold Bloom=s term in 6he *n/iety of (nfluence,
for the opposin& fi&ure that the poet can fulfill as completion or
antithesis when he reproaches a traditionally powerful predecessor
for not ha$in& &one far enou&h in order thereby to escape from his
spell at the same time(
>
The first of these two concretiFations is the
affaire Maruerite, Goethe=s Gretchen4tra&edy in the tri$ial form
into which it declined durin& the nineteenth century in the Topera
5Louis 0pohr Gounod7 as well as in the dramatic burlesHue( The
other concretiFation does not stand in any direct literary filiation to
GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6 K --2
Goethe=s !austK it is *ietFsche=s =bermensch, to which !alery=s
-olitaire refers that second fra&ment that would ha$e &i$en a purely
ne&ati$e closin& to the @third )aust@ if the last third of the te8t
were not missin&( The pro$ocati$e de$iation from the tradition is
indeed already indicated by the subtitles( 0ince the Maledictions de
(>0nivers 5which one can also read with the @)austian@ hubris of
Hitler=s dictatorship in mind7 ha$e already been e8cellently inter4
preted in reference to the myth of the eternal return by *ed Bastet
/
our in$esti&ation concerns itself primarily with the Huestion of how
the first fra&ment !alery=s 5emoiselle de Cristal, is to be understood
in relation to the Goethean myth of )aust=s sal$ation throu&h the
@eternal feminine(@
In the center of the first part of !alery=s !aust ((( stands the
resumption of the *ffaire Maruerite and not an inte&ral appropria4
tion and reformulation of Goethe=s !aust ( and GG( This can be Huite
irritatin& for the comparatists9 the con$entional comparison of the
two literary te8ts produces more incorrect e$idence here than it does
parallels( Instead of be&innin& with the classical monolo&ue in the
study !alery=s !aust ((( immediately be&ins dialo&ically with a dicta4
tion of the memoirs of the urbane learned man which are ta%en
down not by the @dried4up creep@ 'a&ner but rather by the female
secretary Lust, as lo$ely as she is Huic%4witted( After the de$il=s
wa&er 5with an in$erted meanin&7 the whole series of scenes is
missin&9 *uerbacbs Ieller, He/en$iiche, -trasse, *bend, -pa#ieran,
5er Nachbarin Haus, and later &ai und Hohle, *m .runnen,
Zwiner, Nacht, 5om, &alpurisnacht, In place of this the &arden
scene 5but without Marthe7 is considerably enlar&ed and the plot of
the students= scene is also complicated 5with the insertion of a newly
in$ented trio of de$ils7( A sin&le scene reminds one of the whole of
!aust ((" the (ntermede+, Les !ees, which only at the end of Le
-olitaire forms a sidepiece to II -9 *nmutie Geend,
I his sum total which cannot e8actly be encoura&in& for the
comparati$e method is especially appropriate for undoin& the
preBudice of those philolo&ists who still cannot ima&ine an author=s
mode of production as bein& other than their own( !alery=s !aust (((
certainly did not proceed from a philolo&ically impeccable te8tual
study4 one has reason to doubt whether he e$en e$er really %new
Goethe=s !aust ((, It is also poss>Me+horribile auditu+th#t Gounod s
opera which may ha$e made an impression on !alery in his
childhood thorou&hly conditioned the concretiFation of the *ffaire
Maruerite to which his first part is polemically related( Processes of
reception are necessarily selecti$e6 they presuppose procedures of
--> K GDATHA=0 A*K !ALAR!0 !*0-6
abrid&ment and trans$aluation that may be simplifyin& but aOso
recomplicatin& insofar as it is a matter of an independent reception
with reno$atin& power and not Bust a dependent imitation that does
not pose any new Huestions to the tradition( 0uch Huestions which
disclose the meanin& of the selection may in the present case already
be reconstructed with the &arden scene that !alery surprisin&ly
enlar&ed(
The be&innin& of !alery=s &arden scene 5II 27 reminds one of the
declaration of lo$e @throu&h the flower@ in Goethe=s !aust 5$( <-/17
only that it is a rose and that the new Maruerite finally has to ta%e
hold of another ruse to display the concealed understandin&( Mean4
while !alery named the new Mar&arete @Lust(@ 'hat does this
rebaptism meanL Must the German meanin& of the word be under4
stood as Lucien Goldmann did so that !alery would ha$e dimin4
ished the lo$e that is still all4encompassin& with Goethe into sensual
lust to represent the dichotomy of rational thou&ht and pure sensu4
ousness and thereby a historical phase in the dialectic of theory and
practiceL
.
How does the surname 5emoiselle de Cristal enter into
this interpretationL
In the &arden scene a len&thy monolo&ue reminds one of the
classical answer to the @Gretchen Huestion@ 5$( <3-27 yet with the
ostentatious de$iation that the new )aust dispenses with Goethe=s
pantheism 5@the uni$erse means nothin& to me@7 and opposes to the
feelin& of well4bein& an e8planation of the presently fulfilled instant
throu&h the so4called +AM4formula %corps+esprit+monde', The
be&innin& of !alery=s monolo&ue:@Ha$e I reached the summit of
my artL I am ali$e( And I am only li$in&( There=s an achie$ement(
( ( (@ : could be in reference to Goethe=s formulation in the wa&er4
scene9 @I will say to the instant9G But stayN you are so beautifulN@
5$( ->..7( Is then the fulfilled instant in the &arden4ob$iously a
reprise of the Biblical paradise and perhaps also an ironic reference
to !oltaire=s @'e must culti$ate our &arden@4to be seen as !alery=s
correction of the Goethean myth of the interminable )austian
stri$in&L
In his fulfilled instant !alery=s )aust totally for&ets the presence
of Lust, so that it ta%es an e8ceedin&ly amusin& e$en comic &ame of
hands to help the pair to the e8pected happiness of union( 'ith
Goethe it was )aust who seduced Gretchen and then entan&led
himself in &uilt with her6 with !alery it is Lust who as a new A$e
reaches for the mytholo&ical fruit that she bites into 5a peach instead
of an apple the belle peche that in )rench associates peche OsmB
with itN7( How does the Heu de la main that !alery=s )aust then
GDATHA=0 A*K !AI(ARM=0 !*0-6 K --?
complicates into a lon& story relate to the precedin& monolo&ical
ecstasyL Koes the character of the other in her corporeal presence
interrupt or complete the connaissance pleine et pure of the !aler4
yan )austL And what connection may it ha$e with this that !alery
too% hold once a&ain of the oldest myth about the limits and conse4
Huences of human curiosity for his modern solution to the )austian
stri$in& for redeemin& %nowled&e 5Mephisto=s commentary:@Ano4
ther affair of )rruit ( ( ( All o$er a&ain@ II >:lea$es no room for
doubt7L
'ith this the point has been reached where the Huestions that
ha$e opened up with !alery=s )aust4reprise demand a loo% bac% at
the precedin& process of a literary reception of myth( Hans Blumen4
ber& has shown how the de$elopment and the chan&e in meanin& of
the )aust fi&ure is to be seen in the historical conte8t of the problem
of the @process of theoretical curiosity(@
-1
'e are more narrowly
interested in the renewal of the formulation of the Huestion throu&h
Goethe and !alery somethin& that articulates itself precisely in the
literary reception of myth and is comprehensible in the @answerin&4
character@ of the te8ts(
Ill
The rise of the )aust myth occurs in the post4medie$al phase of the
+hnstian4Au&ustinian discrimination a&ainst curiosity( The ori&inal
)aust fi&ure of Johann 0pies=s Historia of -2/? still personifies the fear of a
sinful cra$in& for %nowled&e which =on its own too% ea&le=s win&s and wanted to
e8plore all &rounds of hea$en and earth(= But the An&lish translator already
softened the epithets of moral reprehensibility and +hristopher Marlowe raised to
tra&ic &reatness the baseness of the dri$e for %nowled&e which was prepared to
play for any sta%e( Kamnation still remained as the final conseHuence but the
doubt had be&un whether the spirit can be sinful when it &i$es itself o$er totally
to its own most uniHue impulse( ( ( ( Dnly Lessin&=s )aust was supposed to
find a solution6 Goethe=s )aust did find it4but did the solution dissol$e the
Huestion which &a$e the fi&ure its epochal statureL @
Blumenber& left this Huestion open and he also did not actually
pursue the problem implied therein namely how Goethe could still
actualiFe the old =ol$sbucb at all after the Huestion that had &i$en
the )aust fi&ure its epochal stature since the Renaissance has ren4
dered itself unnecessary( It is in this space that I can be&in my
attempt to interpret Goethe=s !aust in reference to its position
within the )aust myth=s conte8t of Huestion4and4answer(
--/ K GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6
The Huestion to which the )aust myth ori&inally was the answer is not
as easy to reconstruct as the uneHui$ocal fable of )aust=s punished
5because sinful7 cra$in& for %nowled&e leads one to belie$e )or the
answer that the modern )aust myth pro$ides implies an official
Huestion desired by the churchly authority but also one that at first
is not posed or perhaps is suppressed( The permissible Huestion
may be formulated as follows which is how it can still be drawn out
of the dialo&ue between 0atan and the de$ils in Lessin&=s fra&ments4
which is the passion that more certainly than any other leads man
into corruptionL The fate of the ori&inal )aust fi&ure illustrates in
the drastic manner of a woodcut why cra$in& for %nowled&e is sinful
and where it must lead when man dares to &o beyond the limits of
%nowled&e which are set for him( As with all outward4directed
curiositas, which had been entered into the +hristian catalo&ue of
$ices since Au&ustine the stri$in& toward %nowled&e of nature 5@to
speculate on the elements@ in the !ol%sbuch6 correspondin&ly in
Goethe9 @that I mi&ht %now what holds the world to&ether in its
most inner reaches@ w( </"G<7 counted as sinful or as @ma&ic@
within the still4medie$al presuppositions of the )aust myth( The
process of the Anli&htenment &a$e theoretical curiosity its due as
opposed to the +hristian discrimination a&ainst it and it not only
cast doubt on the notion that man=s stri$in& for %nowled&e:precisely
his most innate and noble dri$e:should be sinful( 'hen with
Lessin& the process in fa$or of theoretical curiosity decided that
)aust=s damnation would be transformed into his sal$ation the
settlement of the Huestion of do&ma also liberated another Huestion
that the ori&inal )aust myth had left unposed since for it the Hues4
tion had been decided in ad$ance( It is the Huestion whether human
happiness can ultimately brea% out of man=s stri$in& toward %nowl4
ed&e or rather remains dependent upon it(
-"
This Huestion refers bac% to the ancient association of theory and
eudaemonia It first brea%s up when it is no lon&er %nowled&e of
nature and the world but rather the other4worldly hope of +hristian
faith that is supposed to lead to the possession of truth that &uaran4
tees human happiness( 'ith the be&innin& of the modern a&e the
separation between the claim to happiness and the path of %nowl4
ed&e of nature and the world is no lon&er maintained9 the rehabilita4
tion of theoretical curiosity also had to reawa%en the ancient e8pec4
tation that the possession of happiness mi&ht lie in %nowled&e of
nature itself( If in the formulation of Hans Blumenber& this e8pec4
tation characteriFes the @ecstatic upswin& of curiosity@ of a real
)aust fi&ure of the Renaissance namely Giordano Bruno 5p( -.-7
GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6 K --.
then it is also already reco&niFable in the e8ample of one of his &reat
contemporaries why the modern in$esti&ator of nature @had to
reproduce the connection between the truth of %nowled&e and the
findin& of happiness in a new manner if in )rancis Bacon=s new
formula the domination of nature could be the presupposition for
the re&ainin& of paradise@ 5p( --7( The new claim to %nowled&e could
certainly dust off the old e8pectation of happiness but it could not
fulfill it( )or no direct instructions toward the happy life can be
deri$ed from the new science6 no @possession of truth@ that could
ser$e for orientin& the li$ed pra8is of each indi$idual person as the
contemplati$e tbeoria once did can be acHuired from the triumphant
achie$ements of the liberated theoretical curiosity 5pp( -/ -.7( To
this e8tent )aust=s sal$ation certainly sol$es the Huestion of the
le&itimacy of the human dri$e for %nowled&e but not that of the
newly arisen antithesis between the claim to happiness and theoreti4
cal curiosity(
'hen Goethe too% up the )aust material in -??< the process of
le&itimiFin& theoretical curiosity:as Lessin&=s fra&ments already
pro$e:had to be ta%en as complete( The medie$al premise of un&odly
curiositas had been o$ercome and in the followin& years Iant
too% the last step of @sublatin&@ 7aufheben8 the Au&ustinian dis4
Bunction between self4%nowled&e and the cra$in& for %nowled&e(
-<
If
Goethe wanted to do more than merely treat an already historical
obBect then new Huestions had to be found and dramatically wor%ed
up for the myth=s pre&i$en answer( These may be hypothetically
subsumed under one Huestion to which the reconstruction of the
interest in the )aust myth has led us the Huestion of whether the
world that has been &i$en o$er to human %nowled&e is then at all
capable of fulfillin& man=s dri$e for happiness(
-R be&in with the monolo&ue with its refrain of @I ha$e already
\ ( ( achN@ may in its opposition to the Anli&htenment triumph of
theoretical curiosity be read as a mode of actualiFation that is typi4
cal for the youn& Goethe( In this satire of the uni$ersity it is not only
the old pansophistic and nature4mystic spirituality that is opposed to
the dead %nowled&e of scholastic learnin&6 and in the 'a&ner4scene it
is not only the new belief in inner form that is opposed to rational4
ism and pedantic rhetoric( The -turm und 5ran )aust fi&ure eHuates
the famulus 'a&ner with the Anli&htenment concept of %nowled&e
5 his clear cold scientific stri$in&@7
-3
and the doubt whether such
Inowled&e could &rasp @li$in&@ @acti$e nature@ 5w( 3-33-7
hence4=orth in no way e8cludes the e8perimental method 5@my
instruments certainly ridicule yours@ $( >>?7( The Titanism of
in$esti&ation of
-"1 J GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6
Goethe=s )aust does not personify the most pro&ressi$e science of hi
time compared with which his return to an intuiti$e %nowled&e of
nature as a whole must appear much more as a relapse into a concent
of %nowled&e datin& from before *ewton Galileo and Bacon( The
actuality of new Huestionin& thus also be&ins only after this return
indicated in the story when the new )aust is @cured of the Ooldl
dri$e for %nowled&e@ 5$( -?>/7(
As if the traditional Huestionin& of the old curiositas mi&ht be
brou&ht to an end with this line from the wa&er4scene the followin&
lines unmista%ably 5if nonetheless still only within implication7 pose
a new Huestion which in fact is entirely suitable for ta%in& up the
process of theoretical curiosity a&ain9
My breast cured of the dri$e for %nowled&e
0hall in the future e8clude no pain And
whate$er is &i$en to all man%ind I will
enBoy within my inner self(
5w( -?>/4?-7
If %nowled&e of undi$ided nature and world is no lon&er to be
reached with the methods of $nowlede 7&issen8, can it not then be
sou&ht and as the path to happiness found in enHoyment 7Genies+
sen8) The -chema #u !aust 5-?.?4..L7 sufficiently clarifies the
central si&nificance of this Huestion with which the interest of
%nowled&e shifts from nature to the subBect from the world as a
whole to @all man%ind(@ Accordin& to this schema the dramatic
action is to be ele$ated from @the character=s enBoyment of life@
throu&h @enBoyment of deeds@ to @enBoyment of creation@ the last
of which was surprisin&ly still to be situated @on the way to hell(@
The hi&h stature of enHoyment within the si&nificance of a %nowled&e
at once participatory and lustful needs only to be pointed out
here(
-2
But Mephisto=s reply then immediately ma%es it clear that
the newly posed Huestion the possibility of enBoyably %nowin&
man%ind as a whole first demands an answer to the more far4reach4
in& Huestion of whether this world is made for the happiness of man
at all( Mephisto=s doubt4@Belie$e li%e me9 this whole is made fora
&od aloneN@ 5$$( -?/1G/-7 :pro$o%es a new theodicy9 the possibility
of human happiness is to be pro$ed alon& )aust=s new path of e8per4
ience6 the di$ine order of this world as re&ards &ood and e$il is to be
Bustified throu&h the wa&er entered into and its determination for
the naturally &ood man tested( )rom the perspecti$e of the history
of the problem of curiositas this means that the dri$e for %nowled&e
was certainly reennobled and reBustified with )aust=s sal$ation in
GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6 K -"-
Lessin&=s fra&ments but that the claim to happiness ori&inally bound
up with it was not &uaranteed( If the Bustification of human %nowl4
ed&e was to be led all the way to autonomy then it needed a proper
inner4worldly &uarantee of a possible fulfillment of e8istence that
could replace the compensatory other4worldly happiness of the
+hristian faith(
That Goethe=s attempt in his new !aust, to renew the old Huestion
of the connection between stri$in& for %nowled&e and fulfillment of
happiness should ha$e led to a contemporary form of theodicy was
made possible throu&h the transformation of the traditional de$il=s
pact into a wa&er if one considers the wor% as a refraction of the
Mephistophelian doubt whether this world is arran&ed not only for a
&od but also for the happiness of man then the nonbiased reader can
arri$e at the impression that Goethe actually shied away from the
ob$ious conseHuences of his answer( This answer lies in the $arious
formulations with which Goethe too% up a&ain Lessin&=s &reat phrase
concernin& the @e$er &rowin& completion@ that is &ranted to man
not by the possession of but rather by @the search for truth@9 the
happiness of human e8istence fulfills itself not Bust at a final &oal
but already alon& the way in the unendin& character of its @hi&h
stri$in&(@
->
But does this not also mean that man in the fi&ure of
the new )aust is capable of liberatin& himself throu&h his stri$in&
to say nothin& yet of such liberation throu&h the labor of the history
for which he himself is responsibleL Goethe ob$iously a$oided this
radical solution which accordin& to Ddo Mar&uard was inau&urated
at this $ery time by philosophic idealism in the form of the philoso4
phy of history with the result of a new theodicy relie$in& God of the
responsibility for history(
-?
Goethe=s )aust is not yet a fi&ure for the
history of the emancipation of man%ind( )ar from liberatin& )aust
throu&h his @hi&h stri$in&@ alone Goethe reentan&les him in &uilt
throu&h his actions toward Gretchen and later toward Philemon and
Baucis so that sal$ation is needed @from abo$e@ 5$( --.<.7 and
alon& with it the transcendental resort to the medie$al buildin& of
faith(
lhe answer of Goethe=s !aust to the newly posed Huestion of the
myth concernin& whether stri$in& toward %nowled&e is compatible
with the desire for happiness lea$es new problems behind it( 'hy
did Goethe brin& a new motif of sinnin& into the drama with the
newly in$ented Gretchen4tra&edy after the process of the Anli&hten4
ment had done away with the old motif of sinnin& throu&h the
ennoblin& of the cra$in& for %nowled&eL 'as it only a concession to
contemporary taste 5the tra&edy of the infanticidal mother7 or did
-"" D GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6
the Gretchen e8perience itself stand once a&ain within a hidden
conte8t of the )austian stri$in& for enBoyable %nowled&eL An answer
to the last Huestion may more easily be found if we loo% bac% upon
the intentions and limits of his predecessor from the perspecti$e of
!alery=s new !aust,
I!
It is not Bust incidental that !alery contrasted his new !aust as
Comedie and !eerie dramati?ue, with Goethe=s 6rabdie, As if he
wanted to demonstrate how antiHuated e$erythin& has become that
had been earnest for his predecessor !alery appears at first simply to
in$ert the traditional positions with the pro$ocati$e point that in the
inter$enin& time their in$ersion had become true( The old )aust was
resi&ned because he could ne$er %now enou&h whereas the new
)aust is so because he always already %nows e$erythin&( The a&ed
Mephisto who formerly reBu$enated )aust is now to be reBu$enated
and led astray by )aust( )ar from needin& a rescue @from abo$e@ as
the old Gretchen did the @demoiselle de costal@ promoted to be
)aust=s secretary reBects all faith in other4worldly fulfillment( 'hat
do these comic in$ersions mean for the meanin&ful Huestions that the
)aust myth brin&s alon& with itL
!alery=s !aust is no mere reprise that only thematiFes a renewed
return of the immemorial form of the myth( The meanin& of this
wor% only discloses itself in its full historical concretiFation when
one reco&niFes the opposin& fi&ure 5the tessera in Harold Bloom=s
sense7 that it cuts in relation to Goethe as well as to the entire
modern )aust tradition9 !alery=s secret ambition is with this myth to
e8haust once and for all the circle of the eternal return of life 5here I
am followin& *ed Bastet=s interpretation7 to represent not Bust a
new )aust but rather a @final )aust(@
-/
Therefore !alery immedi4
ately introduces the a&ed )aust as in$ol$ed in a final acti$ity on the
far side of all in$esti&ati$e curiosity in the dictation of his memoirs(
And as one would not e8pect otherwise with !alery this motif
ser$es here as well to ironiFe the false claim that the narration of his
past mi&ht arri$e at %nowled&e of himself( Thus Mon !aust leads
!alery=s lifelon& polemic a&ainst historicism to its conclusion9 what
was can claim no hi&her truth than what mi&ht be 5@I=$e told you
se$eral times that these memoirs are not recollections and that I
consider what I ima&ine to be Bust as worthy of bein& MA as that
which was and of which I ha$e doubts@ II 27( The Huestion of the
GDATHIi=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-60 -"<
historicist school @how it really was@ 7F+wie es eientlichetvesen,F
Ran%e; is curiositas led astray(
If it is true that in the nineteenth century the process of theoretical
curiosity too% a new turn from %nowled&e of nature to %nowled&e of
history then accordin& to !alery the historical curiosity could be
philosophically le&itimated only on the condition that it reconstitute
the possible as opposed to the factual9 @The past is simply a matter
of faith( A faith is an abstention of our mind=s powers which
refuses to formulate all the concei$able hypotheses concernin& the
absent thin&s and &i$e them all the same force of truth@ 5I -7( The
memoirs of the new and last )aust underta%en in opposition to the
reified history4writin& of his bio&raphers are to &o beyond the
circumference of all possible attitudes toward the factual
untyin& all the e$ents of a life and reconnectin& them( The
formulation @to ma%e a complete circuit of possible opinions on all
the points to %now in succession all the tastes and all the distastes
to ma%e and unma%e and rema%e all these %nots which are the
e$ents of a life@ 5I -7 could be ta%en as !alery=s $ariation upon
Goethe=s @And whate$er is &i$en to all man%ind I will enBoy within
my inner self(@ Met !alery=s reprise be&ins as drama with )aust=s anti4
memoirs only in order to present with them the end of all
theoretical and historical curiosity( Thus in the student4scene 5II -7
the famous teacher shows himself to be a last )aust for whom li%e
the eternal Jew the e8perience of the new has come to be lost( 'ho4
e$er li$es beyond the sin&le cycle of a human life becomes not richer
but poorer in e8perience since for him all %nowled&e in its repeti4
tion con&eals into mere re%nowled&e( The followin& &arden4scene
will then show how )aust nonetheless escapes this role of a @0isy4
phus of life(@
-.
But first it is still to be obser$ed how Mephisto is
brou&ht into this end of curiositas(
Goethe who transformed the traditional de$il=s pact into a wa&er
on account of his new theodicy nonetheless left Mephisto with one
essential function of the old theodicy( Mephisto=s self4presentation as
@part of that force which always wants e$il and always does &ood@
5$( -<<>7 is a pansophic4idealist Bustification of e$il of the %ind that
!alery=s Mephisto must reco&niFe as one of his obsolete preBudices
5@e$il is &ood for e$erythin&@ I "79 @Mou don=t e$en doubt that
there are many other thin&s in the world besides &ood and e$il(@ The
roster of the de$il=s outmoded preBudices and beha$ior is a lon& one
as he remains the same and thus la&s behind the @fearful no$elty of
this a&e of man@6 it ends with the melancholy insi&ht9 @But you poor
-"3 K GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6
peopleN A$il was so beautiful at one time(@ 0ince Goethe=s a&e the
world has so transformed itself that its condition and fortunes its
%nowled&e and possibilities can no more be &rasped with the old
polarity of the humane and the inhumane than the new man may be
understood with the old terms of soul sin and immortality(
After @the process of %nowled&e itself surpassed e$erythin& which
ma&ic could once ma%e enticin&@ 5Blumenber& p( .17 the metaphys4
ical necessity of a theodicy is also remo$ed and there remains for the
esprit pur of e$il only the comic role of the seducer left sittin& who
now in an e8chan&e of roles with )aust is supposed to catch up
with e$erythin& that man%ind has anticipated( He suffers the final
loss of his former &reatness throu&h his future sacrifice( The Gretch4
en who has become the @demoiselle de cristal@ shows him why a
pure spirit re&ardless whether an&el or de$il cannot understand
anythin& of the happiness of human e8istence9 @How do you sup4
pose that eternal bein&s could feel the $alue of a &lance an instant
the &ift of a moment=s unyieldin& ( ( ( the &ift of a &ood which
must be sieFed between its birth and its dyin&( They are nothin& but
dar%ness( ( ( ( But - but we we ha$e our li&hts and we ha$e our
shades ( ( ( I tell you Hell Aternity means little to me@ 5III <7(
'hether this also includes !alery=s answer to the Huestion left
behind by Goethe whence the possibility of human happiness is to
arise4if it can no lon&er be e8pected from a )austian stri$in& for
%nowled&e nor is it to be assi&ned to sal$ation throu&h a transcen4
dental authority:must be demonstrated by the interpretation of the
central &arden4scene(
'hy did !alery indeed call the new Mar&arete @Lust@ and @Kemoi4
selle de +ristal@L 'ith this Huestion one should not o$erloo% the fact
that nowhere did !alery ridicule his illustrious predecessor so fur4
iously as precisely with the reprise of the affaire Maruerite, He has
Mephisto say in a&reement with )aust @I certainly hope the &enre is
finished( 'e are no lon&er neither you nor - 5each accordin& to his
nature7 &oin& to combine a supplementary reBu$enation with a
complementary $ir&inity(@
"1
0uch utterances render dubious in
ad$ance all attempts at seein& )aust and Lust as a symbolic pair of
distinct @masculine@ and @feminine@ principles that at one moment is
happily to o$ercome the opposition between mind and body ani+
mus and anima, or abstract thou&ht and conrete sensual pleasure and
at another moment is to o$ercome the dichotomy between rational
GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 )GI#0=I= J -"2
thou&ht and pure sensuousness %nowled&e and beauty or somethin&
similar( The result of such attempts at interpretation is often an
unintended alle&oresis as in a manner that can $ery nearly be called
medie$al Lucien +oldmann demonstrates when he plays his Goethe
: held to be dialectical :off a&ainst the traditional rationalist !alery
whose thou&ht has re&rettably @alienated itself from pra8is(@
"-
!alery=s Lust is initially de$oted to sheer sensual pleasure and thus
may to Goldmann=s consolation still symboliFe that @connection
with the outer world and reality@ that the thin%in& of !alery=s )aust
estran&ed from pra8is lac%s( The only disturbin& thin& is that !al4
ery=s )aust embraces the Huite practical Lust, floutin& the ma8im
@preneF &arde a l=amourN@ And yet a dialectical4materialist alle&ore4
sis will do away e$en with this9 precisely for this inconseHuence
would )aust be conHuered by solitude in the endN
@PreneF &arde a l=alle&orie@:we should rather as% what si&nifi4
cance Lust ta%es on in her new role as Gretchen promoted to secre4
tary( This role be&ins with a departure from the dutiful role namely
a fit of irresistible lau&hter which brin&s upon Lust a reprimand
from her strict boss( In her insubordinate beha$ior howe$er Lust
ironically only confirms a theory of )aust=s9 @lau&hter is a refusal to
thin%(@ 'hat &oes out from )aust boomeran&s bac% $ia Lust in a
manner that he doesn=t e8pect( That which interrupts the autono4
mous pro&ress of his thou&hts or more precisely the dictation of his
memoirs:namely the irritatin& refits de penser by another:be4
comes the condition for a new spontaneity an e$ent not only in the
recepti$e realm of the senses but also in the producti$e realm of the
intellect( 'e need not entertain the consideration of how differently
Ac%ermann=s Gesprdche mit Goethe mi&ht ha$e run if an insubordi4
nate demoiselle de cristal had ta%en the place of the obedient scribe(
In Mon !aust, in any case the secretary enters from the be&innin&
into a con$ersational role that e$idently :as the present interpreta4
tion will show4corresponds to the function that !alery assi&ned to
sensibilite in the mental economy(
""
Iarl A( Bliiher already saw this
but concluded all too Huic%ly therefrom that @the =sensibility= stands
at the side of the masculine =mind= as its feminine partner(@
"<
A$en if
the two are to form a @symbolic pair@4somethin& that !alery with
his pronounced reBection of @symbolism@ could ac%nowled&e only
with ridicule4e$erythin& still depends on how @mind@ and
sensibility@ enter into a relationship with one another here since they
are in no way so neatly di$ided into the alle&orical hal$es of masculine
and feminine sides(
At first )aust treats Lust no differently than as the secondary
-"> J GDATHA=0 A*K !ALAR!0 !*0-6
character of the secretary in the comedy as the subordinate and
obBect of his orders9 @Mou are not here to understand my child( Mou
are here to write at my dictation@ 5I -7( 'hen he adds @and in
addition to that you are here to be a&reeable to loo% at when I=m
not thin%in&@ this indeed appears only to de$alue her yet one step
lower toward functionin& as an obBect( Met the e8planations that
Lust increasin&ly brin&s forth lead pro&ressi$ely to her reco&nition as
subBect( The embarrassed &esture with which the thin%er=s distracted
hand &rasps any old obBect 5@a %nic%4%nac% a familiar piece of
i$ory@7 while awaitin& his thou&hts displays itself as the necessary
condition of a thin%in& that would be false if it separated itself from
life( The neutral obBect thus becomes an obHet de tendresse for the
thin%er for which Lust then slyly introduces a @beautiful %itty $ery
soft and warm(@ The ne8t step the sheet entitled 1ros enerumene
smu&&led in by Mephisto ta%es up accidentally4the capability @of
bein& sensiti$e to some chance e$ent@4as precisely the definition of
&enius( Thus not inferiority as the natura naturam of classical4
indi$idualistic aesthetics but rather recepti$ity toward obBects is
what ma%es sensibility producti$e(
"3
Dnly here does )aust indicate
that this formulation can also ser$e at the same time as the %ey to
the obscure meanin& of the disco$ered title 1ros enerumene with
his paraphrase of it as @Aros as source of e8treme ener&y(@ A further
step:the play with the turn4of4phrase @your chaste ears@:compels
the writer of the memoirs to admit his curiosity concernin& the
Huestions his partner mi&ht well ha$e suppressed while only listenin&(
*ow Lust is not simply to do that which was initially forbidden her
Bcomprendre : but also to earn the surname that ennobles her to a
subBect abo$e the ironically noble title of @Lust de cristal(@ )or the
demand to @become transparent@ in no way only means that Lust is
to become transparent for )aust and thereby remain recepti$e6
rather she should not conceal her own thou&hts and should present
utterances and answers( 'ith this unnoticed by )aust the character
of the other has assumed the aforementioned role that is indispens4
able for his thin%in&( That this substitution of the transparent
presence of an other for the neutral obBect has as4yet unforeseen
conseHuences for the thin%in& itself comes to li&ht only with the
&arden4scene( This much howe$er is already e$ident9 in no way can
Lust in Mon !aust si&nify the simple reduction of the @all4encompas4
sin& lo$e@ of Goethe=s Gretchen to sheer sensuality %volupte'K nor
may the German word consciously chosen by !alery present a newly
cleaned $ersion of the Apicurean si&nificance of eUoye 5inner tran4
Huility of body and soul7( 'hate$er Lust e$o%es for the German
GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 )GHG0T K -"?
ear
"0
if one holds to the si&nificance unfolded in the dialo&ue itself
5@Lust de +ristal ( ( ( de$eneF transparante@7 then the name of the
new Gretchen certainly cannot symboliFe the perfect state of a self4
pleasin& Ipicurian wisdom( Met what does the ori&inal Gretchen
si&nify in &eneral for Goethe=s )austL
A$en one who $alues as hi&hly as did Bertolt Brecht Goethe=s no4
tion @combinin& the hi&hly contemporary material of the infanti4
cidal mother with the old =puppet4play of Kr( )austus= @ should not
o$erloo% the fact that this @deepest and boldest lo$e4story in German
drama@ could represent somethin& li%e a @dialectic of the bour&eois
class feelin& its oats@
">
only at the cost of cate&ories of sin and sal4
$ation that are in no way enli&htened but rather once a&ain thor4
ou&hly medie$al( After this same hi&hly contemporary material had
on the one hand been de&raded to the most tri$ial le$el throu&h its
reception in the nineteenth century but after !alery on the other
hand nonetheless found the affaire Maruerite worthy of a reprise
in spite of all the ridicule one finds oneself facin& the Huestion of
whether Goethe could not ha$e already appropriated a deeper inter4
est from the theme of seduced innocence an interest that mi&ht e84
plain the endurin& influence of this lo$e4story on the hi&her as well
as the lower le$el of its receptions( I see this %ernal of crystalliFation
datin& from the first dramatic concretiFation in that Goethe &a$e to
the meetin& of the resi&ned learned man with the nai$e and innocent
youn& bour&eois woman the meanin& of Gretchen=s lo$e re$ealin&
somethin& of that nature to )aust that was denied to his Titanic dri$e
for %nowled&e(
Let us recall that Goethe=s )aust no differently than his mythic
predecessor see%s to %now @what holds the world to&ether in its
most inner reaches@ 5$( </"7 has doubts about the science of the
classical faculties and turns to ma&ic( His failin& attempts describe a
spiritual realm in declinin& &radations( The hi&hest authority is the
macrocosm the @endless nature@ that4@but achN only a drama@4
cannot be &rasped 5$$( 3<142.7( The ne8t lowest authority is the
world4spirit which indeed shows itself but which as the face in the
tire cannot be endured by )aust 5w( 3>142-<7( The formulation of
the reBection:@you are li%e the spirit which you comprehend not
mel
4 =4lea$es behind the suspense of whom this spirit mi&ht indeed
Ke and of which authority such that man sent bac% within his bound4
aries mi&ht be able to attain it( 0hould it simply be MephistoL This
e8planation offered by many commentaries@ is scarcely satisfac4
rRN?6
r
R
be

sure
=
r
=
aust
comprehends e$en sees throu&h the @com4aae
to 'hom th5 wa&er binds him6 but why should he then aiso Ke
-"/ K GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6
li%e him the @spirit who always ne&ates@L This is already shown in
the relationship with Gretchen into which he brin&s Mephisto as the
seducer after his own reBu$enation( In the words of Arich TrunF
@Mephistopheles wants sensuality but with )aust it=s lo$e6 Mephis4
topheles wants =shallow insi&nificance= while with )aust it=s all4
encompassin& bliss(@
"/
Dpposin& the seducer Gretchen effects this
chan&e in )aust and furthermore also embodies the role of anta&onist
to Mephisto within the lar&er dramatic intri&ue( 0he thus appears in
a representati$e function that need not therefore be less real Bust
because it is only named metaphorically( In the scene @Abend@
5$( ">?/ ff(7 metaphors of e8uberance of feelin& in )aust=s mode of
discourse first indicate a hi&her le$el of si&nificance until the initially
concealed function of the lo$ed one then $isually comes to li&ht( The
@small clean room@ of the absent youn& woman becomes a @shrine@
for )aust throu&h which a @sweet twili&ht &low@ is diffused( He dis4
co$ers @fullness@ in this po$erty feels @bliss@ @in this prison(@ The
leather chair becomes the @throne of the fathers@ for him6 the simple
thin&s refer to @your spirit of fullness and order@ the traces of her
acti$ity to her @dear handN so li%e a &od=sN@ )inally the si&ht of her
bed unleashes an apostrophe to that authority which Mar&arete rep4
resents for )aust9
Here I=d li%e to tarry whole hours(
*atureN here in li&htest dreams
Mou shaped the nati$e an&elN
Here lay the child filled with the warm life
Df the tender bosom
And here throu&h holy pure ho$erin&
The di$ine ima&e realiFed itself(
5w( "?-14->7
'hat )aust sou&ht in $ain to &rasp in the macrocosm and then in
the world4spirit is offered for his reco&nition on the human plane
in Mar&arete=s nai$e beauty and pure little world( *ature which de4
nies itself to him from authority to authority re$eals itself in the
purest fi&ure or innocence of the feminine( Put another way in the
formulation of a later authority who in this re&ard is entirely abo$e
suspicion6 in lo$e as the natural relation of man to woman @the re4
lationship of man to nature is immediately his relationship to man
as his relationship to man is immediately his relationship to nature(@
"
If
one accepts this interpretation then the be&innin& of )aust=s
monolo&ue in &ald und Ho'e4@0ublime spirit you &a$e me &a$e
me e$erythin& for which I as%ed@ 5w( <"-?G-/74can more reason4
GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6 J -".
ably be related to the world4spirit and the now4apparent meanin& of
his discourse9 @Mou are li%e the spirit which you comprehend@
5$( 2-"7( )or it is the lo$e for Gretchen that @opens up the pre$ious4
ly loc%ed =secret deep wonder= of outer and inner nature@
<1
for him
and &i$es him the power @to feel to enBoy them@ 5$( <""-7(
Thus understood the e8perience with Gretchen answers in the af4
firmati$e the Huestion of the myth that Goethe newly posed :
whether stri$in& toward %nowled&e is compatible with desire for hap4
piness:but only in a limited manner( In a theolo&ically suspicious
manner Kante had preceded Goethe in seein& the epistemolo&ical
function of lo$e as access to nature6 Goethe=s redisco$ery of this in
the end reburdened it with a function of sal$ation as a borrowin&
from theolo&y with a $iew toward the outcome of the wa&er and
thus toward the theodicy remains eHually suspicious( Gretchen=s
intercession %una poenitentium' with a transcendental authority
%Mater dolorosa' is needed to ma%e possible the final homa&e to the
world4immanent authority 5@The eternal4feminine draws us onward@7(
In this ele$ation of Gretchen nature embodied in the pure feminine
to the eternal feminine as the authority of sal$ation one can &rasp
the be&innin&s of a remythification that can also be disco$ered else4
where in Goethe:one need only thin% of his (phienie,
:
> The new
myth of the 1#vi SMeiblicben, le&itimated with Goethe=s name did
more than preser$e some remainder of the @aura@ of the Gretchen4
tra&edy otherwise de&raded into the fate of all the world in the
nineteenth century( It also dis&uised the epistemolo&ical function of
)aust=s lo$e for Gretchen ori&inally realiFed in the claim to happi4
ness so that !alery first had to redisco$er it in his own way as he
went a&ainst the &rain of the nineteenth century=s reception in order
to return the affaire Maruerite to the status which it had achie$ed
with Goethe(
!I
The &arden4scene in Mon !aust is !alery=s answer to the Huestion
concernin& the possibility of human happiness( But it is an answer
that must satisfy the demands that are to be made after Goethe9 it
can no lon&er lie in the endlessness of )austian stri$in& after the ab4
sorption of the old curiositas into modern science6 nor can it hope
any lon&er for a transcendental &oal for @sal$ation@ at the end after
the shatterin& of the final idealist theodicy in the face of the un4
reason of history( Dnly one who o$erloo%s this relationship of the
answer could maintain alon& with Iurt 'ais that !alery=s )aust here
-<1 D GDATHA=0 A*K !ALAR!=0 !*0-6
enBoys @the Goethean fulfillment ( ( ( as delimitation %=infmi est
defini', as breathin& as &aFin& then ( ( ( the findin& of the thou
OKa; throu&h the sense of touch(@
<"
!alery= s concept of plenitude
contradicts the )austian happiness that is supposed to lie in ne$er4
satisfied stri$in& and that nonetheless is rewarded with a final @beau4
tiful instant( @ The &reat monolo&ue in the course of which !alery=s
)aust totally for&ets the co4presence of Lust is as far from Goethian
fulfillment of e8istence4such as !alery had already ironically opposed
to all )austian impatience in his 5iscours en (>honneur de Goethe
5-.<"7:as his +AM4formula is from classical cosmolo&y( The lucid
interpretation by Iarl Lowith de$oted to !alery=s philosophical
thou&ht lea$es no doubt about this e$en if one should add to this
interpretation:which opens up a first penetratin& &lance into the
CahiersBthat Mon !aust leads one step beyond !alery=s +artesian4
ism and s%epticism about lan&ua&e(
<<
As already mentioned in the fifth scene of the second act !alery
recalled the lo$ers= meetin& between )aust and Mar&arete in Marthe=s
&arden throu&h $arious scenic and $erbal echoes( @It=s di$ine this
e$enin&@9 what Lust at first still ta%es for the be&innin& of the ne8t
dictation is already the instant that with the hesitation of dictatin&
further effaces the past of the memoir4writer:the !aleryan $ersion
of the instant of the @!erweile doch du bist so schon@ 5@This mo4
ment is of such a &reat $alue@7( As such for !alery=s )aust it neither
redeems:as in Goethe=s wa&er:an e8pectation or anythin& at all
that no lon&er is nor is it:li%e the last words of Goethe=s stri$in&
)aust:the =orefuhl of somethin& which is not yet(
<3
The @beau4
tiful instant@ in Mon !aust at once ne&ates the Goethean feelin& of
happiness in the ne$er4satisfied )austian stri$in& and the e8ceptional
character of an e$entful final fulfillment of e8istence( To lend hi&h4
est $alue to the instant it is not the proBect of an e8traordinary ac4
tion that is called for 5li%e the conHuerin& of a piece of @the newest
earth@ $( --2>> in !aust ((', but rather only an e$eryday beautiful
summer e$enin& 5@it=s di$ine this e$enin&@ in an intentionally tri$ial
phrasin&7( And such happiness which allows all thou&ht of the pos4
sible to be absorbed into the present
<2
can appear as soon as @one
accepts oneself as the one one is as tel ?uelF 5Lowith p( /17 or in
)aust=s words when @my person is e8actly wedded to my presence
in e8chan&e with whate$er comes to pass(@
But !alery=s answer to Goethe=s @presentiment of such &reat
happiness@ also ne&ates the idealist notion that this e8perience of the
- in the self s pure bein& mi&ht stand in harmony with the whole of
the world( @Mour eyes seem to contemplate the uni$erse in the me4
GOETHE'S AND VALERY'S F.41K7' 131
dium of this little &arden@ :what Lust here belie$es she understands
with her inspired words is reBected by !alery=s )aust e$en more de4
cisi$ely than Goethe=s Huestion of Gretchen9 @The uni$erse means
nothin& to me and - am thin%in& of nothin&(@ )or !alery as for his
)aust the whole is not the uni$erse9 @It is not a &od who creates and
maintains the world and man( *or is it the cosmos e8istin& from na4
ture onward but rather the connection and distinction the relation4
ship and mis4relationship between corps, esprit and monde which in
the Cahiers he formulaically denotes with =GAM= and calls bis whole@
5Lowirh p( 2.7( Mon !aust ta%es up the critiHue of the idea of the
uni$erse in the followin& manner( The constitution of the whole is
described as a function of the sensual perception of the particular in
accordance with the +AM formula( As an e8perience of the purity of
the self s bein& %Moi pur', it is thus remo$ed from the imprisonment
of the empirical I( But then it is surprisin&ly corrected throu&h an
inter$ention by the for&otten Lust, and then at the end contrasted
with the )austian natural science4li%e attitude of the student(
@Ha$e I reached the summit of my artL I am ali$e( And I am only
li$in&( There=s an achie$ement(@ )aust who has set out to enBoy the
@&reatest instant@ spea%s of the e8ception( The Moi pur can attain
the purity of the selfs bein& only to the e8tent that it detaches itself
from all &i$ens from the en$ironment and shared world that are
dressed up in the possessi$e pronoun as well as from the empirical I
and its history( +oncernin& this Iarl Lowith remar%s9 @The pure I4
itself that sees e$erythin& which is called thus4and4so and is already
familiar ( ( ( as if for the first time and does not merely reco&niFe
it is a function of the most e8treme wa%efulness ( ( ( To be able
to detach oneself at any time from e$erythin& that e8ists at that
moment in order to see oneself and all phenomena of the world in
their ori&inal stran&eness as if for the first time may be considered
to be the authentically philosophical motif of !alery=s system for
which he is indebted to Kescartes@ 5Lowith p( >27( As if for the
first time )aust here e8periences the simplest function of life9 @-
breathe:I see :- touch(@ The function of the body to breathe 5@I
am born from each instant for each instant@7 the function of the
mind to see 5@'hat does it matter what one seesL It suffices to see
and to %now that one sees( There=s a whole science there@7 and the
function of the hand to &rasp an obBect 5@And with a sin&le stro%e I
find and I create the real@7 describe )aust=s ecstasy as a state of
perfection for which he claims the same di&nity as for the ecstasies of
reli&ious e8perience(
<>
If the description up to this point corre4
sponds to a step4by4step interpretation of the +AM4formula Mon
-<" D GDATHA=0 A*K !AL)(RM=0 !*0-6
!aust then &oes far beyond the conceptual ar&umentation of the Ca+
biers with a fourth step which ironiFes and o$ercomes the seemin&ly
perfect self4satisfaction of the !aleryan Moi pur(
As if )aust is to ha$e the double meanin& of the description of the
third function4@My hand feels itself touched as much as it touches(
Real means that( And nothin& more(@ :demonstrated for him Lust
softly lays her hand on his shoulder( This &esture does not e8actly
correspond to the line from Lucretius that )aust has Bust cited here
@Tan&ere enim et tan&i nisi corpus nulla potest res(@ It is much
more the case that it re$eals a meanin& in the materialistic principle
that could scarcely ha$e been intended by Lucretius Bust as it also
responds with an ironic e8cess to )aust=s precedin& Huestion9 @'hat
could be more realL I touchL I am touched(@ There is somethin& yet
more real than the arm of the bench which one can &rasp oneself
in order to feel touch and bein&4touched( Lust>s forei&n hand has a
&reater de&ree of present dans la presence, for it reaches out on its
own and thereby &rants the etre touche the second fuller meanin&
une8pected by )aust( An une8pected subBect has appeared in the
place of the e8pected obBect the body of the other as an autono4
mous thou in the place of the body as disposable thin&9 !aust"
@0omeone is touchin& me ( ( ( 'hoL ( ( ( Is it thou LustL ( ( (@
Lust" @It=s I ( ( ( 'hy say =thou= to meL@ !aust" @Because you
touched me(@ In this play of hands the continuation of which scarcely
needs a commentary nothin& less than the e8tension of the whole
from corps+esprit+monde to other is achie$ed thus a fourth function
that brea%s throu&h the solipsism of the +AM4formula( !alery=s con4
cept of the pure I4itself that ne&ates all that is &i$en in order to con4
stitute a whole recei$es an ultimate correction in Mon !aust, the
state of perfection attainable by man 5@la connaissance pleine et
pure@7 needs the other in its corporeal presence to become truly
whole(
But this (whole 5@that is therefore born of you and me and not of
you or of me@7 is now drawn out throu&h an intermeFFo that brea%s
throu&h the celebratory tone in the paradisiac &arden in a pronoun4
cedly comic manner( 'hat is the business with the @youn& widow
sad and ardent@ supposed to mean with which )aust continues the
dictation of his memoirs at precisely this momentL 'ere it only su4
perfluously to ma%e Lust Bealous the cost would be decidedly too
&reat( It only becomes comprehensible when one reco&niFes the philo4
sophic position to which it is addressed( )or the story initially intro4
duced so abstrusely appears in the conte8t of )aust=s memoirs as a
reply to a famous philosophic e8perience of awa%enin& and thus
GOIiTIIE#S AND VALERY#S FAUST D 133
responds to the Huestion:already implied in the first scene of Mow
!aust, and no lau&hin& matter for !alery: of why philosophers do
not also use their hands in thin%in&( It is @Kescartes= dream@ familiar
to e$ery )rench lycee student accordin& to which )aust styliFes his
own &reat philosophic disco$ery( The scenery is the same4 the where4
abouts of a German nei&hborhood a winter e$enin& @in front of the
bi& fire@ the moment of a monumental disco$ery :only that the
philosophiFin& )aust additionally needs the abo$e4mentioned youn&
widow to occupy his idle hand( Met here be&ins the ironic re$ersal9
whereas Kescartes found his principle for a &eneral method for all
sciences in the abstraction from all sensual e8perience )aust4!alery
disco$ers @the error common to all philosophers@ in their failure to
reco&niFe the connection between the concrete presence of thin&s
and abstract thin%in&(
T h e i d e a c a me t o me ( ( ( t h a t ( ( ( b e t we e n a l l t h e s e t h i n & s t h a t a r e p r e s e n t
( ( ( t h i s f i r e ( ( ( t h i s c o l d ( ( ( t h i s c o l o r o f t h e d a y l i & h t ( ( ( t h i s ( ( (
t e n d e r ( ( ( f o r m o f e H u i l i b r i u m i n ( ( ( i n t h e mo s t ( ( ( l o $e l y ( ( ( a ba n 4
d o n me n t ( ( ( t h e $ a & u e ( ( ( f e e l i n & s wh i c h mo $ e d i n t h e s h a d o ws ( ( ( o f
my mi n d ( ( ( a n d ( ( ( o n t h e o t h e r h a n d ( ( ( o n t h e o t h e r h a n d ( ( ( my
a b s t r a c t t h o u & h t ( ( ( a p r o f o u n d ( ( ( a n d f i 8 e d ( ( ( r e l a t i o n s h i p ( ( (
wh i c h e 8 t e n d e d e $ e n i n t o my p a s t ( ( ( a n d d o u b t l e s s ( ( ( t o wh a t mi & h t b e
t o ( ( ( t o ( ( ( come ( ( ( t o come( ( ( ( 5 I I 27
The certainty of the cnito ero sum is the error of Kescartes and
all philosophers who as philosphes sans mains et sans yeu/ o$erloo%
the fundamental role of the body in their systems
<?
and thereby forfeit
that certainty of present thin&s as well as of present cohumanity a
certainty that is not only subBecti$e and that alone can fulfill the
instant 5here alon& with past and futureN7 and ma%e possible a @hap4
piness@ that is not only @spiritual(@ The motif of the cothin%in&
hand be&ins in Best with )aust=s @while I= m awaitin& my thou&ht ( ( (
the distracted hand pets and caresses@ and Lust=s @a beautiful %itty
$ery soft and warm@ 5- -7( it is then ele$ated throu&h the une8pected
interpretation of the line from Lucretius:@the hand which touches
and which is touched@ 5II 274to a hi&hly serious si&nificance 5@to
introduce into the arid story of a metaphysical disco$ery a little bit
of truth ( ( ( secondly a nothin& of life of ( ( ( li$eL ( ( ( flesh@
-- 27( To&ether this &i$es Mori !aust an unmista%ably anti4+artesian
turn( But perhaps it also allows one to thin% of a still more distant
ori&in(
The philosophiFin& )aust who needs his hand and an obHet de ten+
dresse to escape throu&h Lust, from the illusions of abstract thou&ht
-<3 K GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6
is not lac%in& in analo&y to the Dld Testament creation myth
accordin& to which God too% a rib from the sleepin& Adam and made
woman from it to pro$ide the lonely man with the missin& obHect de
tendresse 5@adiutor similis eius@ Gen( "9"14""7( The Biblical narra4
ti$e implies the creatin& hand of God 5@aedifica$it ( ( ( costam
Huam tulerat de Adam in mulierem@7 without actually referrin& to
it Bust as later in the icono&raphic tradition the creator stretches his
hand toward the arisin& creation only as a sort of $erbal &esture
7-prachestus8 5as with Michelan&elo=s creation of Adam7( Met there
e8ists alon&side this a literary tradition %nown to me from the
Middle A&es but also ta%en up by Milton accordin& to which it is
the hi&hest praise of female beauty to say that God himself created
her @with the mere hand(@
</
A$en if the interpretation I am ris%in&
4that the co4thin%in& hand of the philosophiFin& )aust appears in
the in$ented bio&raphic4mythic narrati$e in the place of the co4creat4
in& 5if already heterodo87 hand of the Biblical &od of creation4
cannot be supported throu&h any historically concretiFable filiation
it would presumably not ha$e displeased !alery( This may also be
concluded from the fact that he himself used the Biblical myth of
the )all to answer with this reprise in his own way the old Huestion
of the possibility of happiness that sprin&s from the fullness of
human %nowled&e:throu&h a pro$ocati$e in$ersion of the 0atanic
prophecy @Aritis sicut Keus scientes bonum et malum(@
The +hristian myth that is supposed to e8plain the ille&itimate
curiosity throu&h which man%ind itself forfeited its happiness winds
up &roundin& )aust=s and Lust>s happiness at the end of !alery=s
four4act play( The common consumption of the fruit &ets the Bump
on the traditional seducer 5II >76 seals an understandin& inter pares
that already be&an with the hand4play 5@that is therefore born of you
and me and not of you or of me@76 and refutes the theolo&y of
ori&inal sin and sal$ation throu&h the @transformation 5in the scene7
of the state of Aros into the state of *ous@ that was foreseen for the
fourth act(
<.
Thus after the process of theoretical curoisity had been
e8hausted !alery in Mon !aust concludes that older process that
Goethe :as the album4$erse used only ironically for the student
shows 5$( "13/74did not yet dare to touch9 the re$ision of the
Biblical Bud&ment on man=s claim to be li%e God( The sur$i$in&
drafts of a fourth act offer to the state of affairs after the eatin& of
the fruit a meanin& opposed to the Biblical tradition9 @'e would be
li%e the Gods the harmonious intelli&ent ones in an immediate
correspondence with our sensual li$es without words :and our
minds would ma%e lo$e with one another as our bodies can do(@
31
GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6 K -<2
!II
@iTime paust( All that Goethe i&nored@ :this early note of !alery=s
%Cahiers WII /.37 may be &i$en still more wei&ht by our consideration
from the perspecti$e of the connection between Huestion and answer
that constitutes the historical chan&es in the modern )aust myth( The
role that Goethe played for !alery as the predecessor of the classical
)aust drama as well as the world4literary fi&ure of the poet itself
remytholo&iFed durin& the course of the nineteenth century may be
better &rasped with the cate&ories of Harold Bloom=s @antithetical
criticism@ than with @or&anic@ metaphors( 0uch metaphors suppose
harmonious further de$elopments when in fact the formation of a
tradition achie$es itself from author to author in a leapin& unor&anic
manner and mostly in the forms of a @creati$e misinterpretation(@
This must be said abo$e all with respect to Iurt 'ais who starts
from !alery=s Goethe lecture 5-.<"7 in order to be able to sal$a&e a
@considerable a&reement@ between the two poets e$en for their
di$er&ent $ersions of )aust(
3-
It is with the cate&ories of this
supposed a&reement that in our consideration Goethe=s and !alery=s
)austs de$iate most sharply from one another9 !alery=s Moi pur and
+AM4formula ha$e $irtually nothin& in common with @Goethe=s
fullness of e8istence@ 5@the past within the present@7 and concept
of nature and !alery=s pri$ile&in& of the possible o$er the actual
contradicts @Goethe=s discontentedness(@
3"
0imilarly those
pro$ocati$e in$ersions of the wa&er 5reBu$enation7 the role of
Gretchen 5sal$ation7 the situation of the @!erweile dochN@ and
finally the @album4$erse=s@ 1ritis sicut deus scarcely allow one to
locate Mon !aust historically other than as an anti4)aust 5the Mon
in the title and the date of -.31 also spea% for this7( I would ha$e
&ladly spared myself this polemic were it not that it ser$ed the
methodolo&ical demonstration of what meta4le$els of mystical
continuities and harmoniFed poetic dialo&ues one can arri$e at
@comparati$ely@
3<
when the process of reception between two
authors is not hermeneutically e8plained( The si8 cate&ories of
@creati$e misinterpretation@ %clinamen, tessera, $enosis, daemont#a+
tion, as$esis, apopbmdes' with which Harold Bloom has attempted
to e8plain the literary formation of a tradition throu&h the modalities
of the father4son relationship show ima&inable inner relationships
between two @&reats of world literature@ other than theV
ne
T
dimensional notions of influence imitation or @mid4wifery4my
interpretation has correctly &rasped the relationship between !alery
and Goethe as tessera it mi&ht also e8plain that it is entirely
-<> K GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6
possible to attain the intuiti$e results of antithetical criticism in a
manner that is subBect to hermeneutic control(
The unfinished shape of the te8t in the case of !alery=s )aust
fra&ments lea$es many a su&&ested solution unconfirmed in the end
e$en from my perspecti$e( That !alery mi&ht ha$e completed the
two fra&ments throu&h for e8ample puttin& -olitaire before Lust
30
in
a manner that is close to the s%etch in Cahiers WWI! -> 5@Lust must
ha$e a stru&&le within )Oaust; which effects the transformation : in
the scene : of the state of Aros into the state of *ous@7 is probably
too beautiful to be true( )or this same s%etch foresees in addition to
this a @scene of well4bein&@ that is e$idently supposed to put an end
to the restored paradise(
3>
Is *ed Bastet ri&ht when he would
conclude from se$eral fra&ments of the third scene of the fourth act
that )aust would refuse Lust in the end when she implores him to
share the future with him with the ar&ument9 @AhN LustN Mou are
one who comes too late( ( ( ( I %now only too well what will
happen and what there is in the little coffer@L
3?
'ould the four4act
Lust then already be nothin& other than that which the three4act Le
-olitaire seems to ta%e up as its main theme9 @)aust as $ictim of the
eternal return chastised for ha$in& wanted to be&in a&ain@L
3/
Then
both fra&ments would stand under the new problem &oin& bac% to
*ietFsche of how man can escape from the @eternal return@ brea%
out of the circle of the endless reproduction of life or put another
way in$ent a different death one which would be fulfillment and
not merely interruption(
*ed Bastet has shown that Le -olitaire can indeed be understood
as !alery=s answer to this Huestion9 if )aust is man then the @soli4
tary@ would be the consciousness that amid the @curses of the
uni$erse@ arri$es $ia ne&ation after ne&ation at the outermost
possibility of the Moi pur to thin% the @ultimate thou&hts@ :@the
purity of non4bein&@ :in suicide(
3.
Met this interpretation lea$es
une8plained that )aust as sur$i$in& obser$er cannot be identical
with the -olitaire, e$en when for his part he refuses the fairies=
offer of rebirth( Must one not also consider whether the -olitaire, as
opposed to )aust is supposed to ta%e up the now4empty place of the
antiHuated Mephisto and thereby ta%e on the role of a more con4
temporary e8perimenterL
21
But what remains to a @last )aust@ who
has turned down the seduction of a caliulisme intellectuel 5@All
%nowled&e in one head and to cut it off to cut off one=s own@7@
and resisted the temptations of reBu$enated return alon& with e$ery4
thin& else:e8cept ( ( ( to write his memoirsL
Lin%ed to this new ar&ument for a post4orderin& of Lust after the
GOETHE#S AND VAL$%&Y# S HAUST G 137
-olitaire is the fact that the problem of how man can escape from
the circle of the eternal return is indeed replayed in )aust=s en4
counter with Lust, Here a lon& description in the Cabiers, entitled
!aust (((, is especially instructi$e( It ta%es off from the ma8im @all
e8perience already done is worth nothin&@ and then applies it to the
problem of lo$e @to find its li%e or rather the person with whom
the relation of lo$e will lead to that brea% with %nown conditions(@
This @hi&her de&ree of lo$e@ is then defined 5WWI! <?34?27 in a way
that can be refound in the dialectic of the +liM4formula and the
other as well as in the reprise of the Garden of Aden( )aust=s confes4
sion that @I am your maitre, Lust and it is you who ha$e tau&ht me
the one thin& that neither %nowled&e nor crime nor ma&ic tau&ht
me@ 5I! "7 would then be the precarious instant of a con$er&ence
between %nowled&e and the feelin& of happiness which fulfills itself
in the moi fini of the other on the far side of e8hausted %nowled&e
and the mere reproduction of life(
2"
)ulfills itself and yet cannot
obtain a duration as the foreseen departure scene shows( 'hether
with this the e8plicit character of Mow !aust, which !alery indicated
in another note with !inal" Harmoni?ues %Cabiers WWIII .-<7
would ha$e been attained cannot be pro$ed( If - alon& with many
interpreters prefer this endin& I am also conscious that Le -olitaire
cannot be subsumed under Lust without a reste 5as well as the
in$erse7 probably because it was not by accident that !alery left
both plays unfinished9 their contradictions lie in the matter itself
in the $arious attempts to escape from radical s%epticism(
!III
Hermeneutic reflection cannot and need not deny the horiFon of
contemporary interests that continually co4conditions the %ind and
manner of Huestionin& e$en if the selection and seHuence of Hues4
tion and answer must be corrected and decided from the perspecti$e
of the obBect of in$esti&ation( If in concludin& we loo% bac% upon
this process the Huestion of the )aust myth renewed by Goethe :
whether and how the world left to human %nowled&e mi&ht be able
to fulfill the human claim to happiness4 has certainly not lost any of its
interest( )or today=s interpreter Goethe=s answer would be Huestion4
able less because of the idealistic formulation of happiness which
would already lie in stri$in& and not only in definiti$e possession
'L i
y
'( )* r- \ s: _____((+,(U n
-</ D GDATHA=0 A*K !ALARM=0 !*0-6
whole@ was not indeed @made only for a &od@6 e$en if at the end of
!aust ((, one still only wants to see an instance of poetic Bustice this
aesthetic solution nonetheless lets the e8istence and fate of others
fall bac% unBustified upon the seculariFed path to sal$ation of self4
enBoyin& subBecti$ity(
)or !alery the historical de$elopment since Goethe eliminated
the interest in the Huestion of a theodicy and thereby also the
problem of the Bustification of e$il and sal$ation( Meanwhile the
Huestion of eudaemonia renewed by Goethe was for !alery not
o$ercome throu&h the triumph of theoretical curiosity but rather
increasin&ly sharpened throu&h the truth4claim of scientific %nowl4
ed&e( !alery= s new answer contains a renouncin& of all )austian
stri$in& includin& the illusions of technolo&ical domination of the
world leads to the o$ercomin& of the +artesian idol of pure mind
and arri$es finally at a formulation of happiness that promises to
in$ert the mytholo&y of the fall into sin( In this threefold re&ard
Mon !aust also always leads beyond positions that !alery himself
had adopted earlier( The student who with his threefold %ey of
IN<&L15G1 + P<&1R W &(LL 5HI 27 represents the concept of
poiesis from the Leonardo essays from which the destructi$e capa4
bility of the positi$e sciences proceeds stands in contrast to the
ecstasy of the @maitre@ with the opposin& functions of .R1*6H(NG
+ -11(NG + 6<0CH(NG, Thus e8plained the system of the +AM4
formula de$eloped in the Cahiers is pro$ed to be deficient in the
@hand4play@ as well as later in the disco$ery of the +artesian error so
lon& as it can not become a whole throu&h the co4presence of the
other( And the lo$e between man and woman which !alery often
4as still cited at the be&innin& of Mon ftaf4debun%ed as a @&ross
con$ulsion@ arri$es in the encounter between )aust and Lust at a
@tenderness which lo$e always is in its state of bein& born and
reborn@ which was to redeem once a&ain the promise of happiness
of the denied paradise in the mytholo&ical reply of the planned
fourth act( Admittedly a no less poetic conclusion than that of
Goethe=s !aust, and surely still less a solution to the problematic ot
human society and historyN But for that $ery reason one of the most
beautiful and4for the poet of the Moi pur4most surprisin& Bustifi4
cations of poetry9 @This harmonious a&reement would be more than an
a&reement of thou&ht6 is there not as well there the fulfillment or the
promise which poetry represents which is after all nothin& but the
attempt at communionL@
Chapter ;
The Poetic Te8t within the +han&e of
HoriFons of Readin&9 The A8ample of
Baudelaire=s @0pleen II@
I. The Di4tingui43ing of Variou4 "ori5on4 of +6a7ing a4 a
.robl6$ for Lit6rary "6r$6n6uti84
The followin& study has the character of an e8periment( - will
attempt to distin&uish methodolo&ically into three sta&es of interpre4
tation that which normally remains undistin&uished in the interpre4
ti$e practice of philolo&ical commentary as well as te8tual analysis( If
it is the case there that understandin& and interpretation as well as
immediate reception and reflecti$e e8e&esis of a literary te8t are at
once blended in the course of interpretation then here the horiFon
of a first aesthetically perceptual readin& will be distin&uished from
that of a second retrospecti$ely interpreti$e readin&( To this I will
add a third historical readin& that be&ins with the reconstruction of
the horiFon of e8pectations in which the poem @0pleen@ inscribed
itself with the appearance of the !leurs du mat, and that then will
follow the history of its reception or @readin&s@ up to the most
recent one that is my own(
The three steps of my interpretation :no methodolo&ical inno$a4
tion of mine4are &rounded in the theory that the hermeneutic
process is to be concei$ed as a unity of the three moments of under4
standin& %intelliere', interpretation %interpretare', and application
%appl$are', Hans4Geor& Gadamer deser$es the credit for ha$in&
brou&ht the si&nificance of this triadic unity of the hermeneutic
process bac% to li&ht(
-
This unity has determined in a manner more Rr
less one4sidedly realiFed all te8tual interpretation from time
immemorial6 it was e8plicitly formulated by pietistic hermeneutics
durin& the Anli&htenment as the doctrine of the three subtilitatesK it
-31 J PDATI+ TAWT
became discredited with the $ictory of the historicist and positi$ist
ideal of scholarship9 and it too% center sta&e in the de$elopment of
theory with the renewal of theolo&ical and Buridical hermeneutics
The ob$ious bac%wardness of literary hermeneutics is e8plainable by
the facts that here the hermeneutic process reduces to interpretation
alone that no theory of understandin& has been de$eloped for te8ts
of an aesthetic character and that the Huestion of @application@ has
been rele&ated to boo% re$iewers= criticism as an unscholarly one(
Gadamer=s su&&estion @to redefine the hermeneutics of the human
studies from the perspecti$e of the hermeneutics of Burisprudence
and theolo&y@ is thus an opportunity for literary hermeneutics
"
for
the sa%e of which I as% the Huestion whether and how the hermen4
eutic unity of all three moments realiFes itself in the interpretation
of a poetic te8t(
I direct my hermeneutic e8periment at this problem by di$idin&
into three steps the interpretation of a poem that already has a
history of reception( The steps mi&ht be described phenomenolo&i4
cally as three successi$e readin&s( In di$idin& the hermeneutic process
into these steps the distinction between the three readin&s must be
fabricated to a certain de&ree6 yet only in this manner is it possible to
demonstrate what %ind of understandin& interpretation and applica4
tion mi&ht be proper to a te8t of aesthetic character( If there is to be
an autonomous literary hermeneutics it must pro$e itself in the fact
: as Peter 0Fondi correctly demanded:@that it does not Bust con4
sider the aesthetic character of the te8t to be interpreted in an
appreciation that only follows upon the interpretation but rather
that ma%es the aesthetic character the premise of the interpretation
itself(@
<
This premise cannot be fulfilled with the methods of tradi4
tional stylistics 5in the sense of Leo 0pitFer=s @critiHue des beautes@7
lin&uistic poetics and @te8tual analysis@ alone( 'hate$er may be
reco&niFed in the final te8ture of the te8t in the closed whole of its
structure as a $erbal function bearin& si&nificance or as aesthetic
eHui$alency always presupposes somethin& pro$isionally understood(
That which the poetic te8t than%s to its aesthetic character pro4
$isionally offers to understandin& proceeds from its processli%e
effect6 for this reason it cannot be directly deduced from a descrip4
tion of its final structure as @artifact@ howe$er comprehensi$ely this
mi&ht ha$e construed its @le$els@ and its aesthetic eHui$alencies(
Today the structural description of te8ts can and should be &rounded
hermeneutically in an analysis of the process of reception9 the debate
between Roman Ja%obson and +laude Le$i40trauss and Michael
Riffaterre teaches as much(
3
The poetic te8t can be disclosed in its
PDATI+ TAWT K -3-
aesrhetic funcrion only when the poetic structures that are read out
of the finished aesthetic obBect as its characteristics are retranslated
from out of the obBectification of the description bac% into the
process of the e8perience of the te8t that allows the reader to ta%e
part in the &enesis of the aesthetic obBect( Put another way and usin&
the formulation with which Michael Riffaterre in -.>" introduced
the turn from the structural description to the analysis of the recep4
tion of the poetic te8t9 the te8t which structural poetics described
as the endpoint and sum of the de$ices actualiFed in it must from
now on be considered as the point of departure for its aesthetic
effect6 and this must be in$esti&ated in the succession of the pre&i$en
elements of the reception that &o$ern the process of aesthetic per4
ception and thereby also limit the arbitrariness of readin&s that are
supposedly merely subBecti$e(
2
'ith the e8periment be&un here I &o further and in another
direction than Riffaterre who recently de$eloped his structural
stylistics into a -emiotics of Poetry 5-.?/7 which is more interested
in the pre&i$en elements of reception and in the @rules of actualiFa4
tion@ than in the aesthetic acti$ity of the reader who ta%es up or
recei$es the te8t(
>
I on the other hand see% to di$ide this acti$ity
into the two hermeneutic acts understandin& and interpretation in
that I distin&uish reflecti$e interpretation as the phase of a second
readin& from immediate understandin& within aesthetic perception as
the phase of the first readin&( This distinction was necessitated by
my interest in ma%in& once and for all the aesthetic character of the
poetic te8t e8pressly and demonstrabiy into the premise of its
interpretation( To reco&niFe how the poetic te8t than%s to its
aesthetic character allows us to initially percei$e and understand
somethin& the analysis cannot be&in with the Huestion of the si&nifi4
cance of the particular within the achie$ed form of the whole6 rather
it must pursue the si&nificance still left open in the process of per4
ception that the te8t li%e a @score@ indicates for the reader( The
in$esti&ation of the aesthetic character proper to the poetic te8t in
distinction to the theolo&ical the Buridical or e$en the philosophical
one must follow the orientation &i$en to aesthetic perception
throu&h the construction of the te8t the su&&estion of its rhythm
and the &radual achie$ement of its form(
In the poetic te8t aesthetic understandin& is primarily directed at
the process of perception6 therefore it is hermeneutically related to
the horiFon of e8pectations of the first readin&4which often
specially with historically distant te8ts or with hermetic lyrics can
only be made $isible in its shaped coherence and its fullness ot
-3" J PDATI+ TAWT
si&nificance throu&h repeated readin&s( The e8plicit interpretation in
the second and in each further readin& also remains related to the
horiFon of e8pectations of the first i(e( perceptual readin&:as lon&
as the interpreter claims to ma%e concrete a specific coherence of
si&nificance from out of the horiFon of meanin& of this te8t and
would not for e8ample e8ercise the license of alle&oresis to translate
the meanin& of the te8t into a forei&n conte8t that is to &i$e it a
si&nificance transcendin& the horiFon of meanin& and thereby the
intentionality of the te8t( The interpretation of a poetic te8t always
presupposes aesthetic perception as its pre4understandin&6 it may
only concretiFe si&nificances that appeared or could ha$e appeared
possible to the interpreter within the horiFon of his precedin&
readin&(
Gadamer=s dictum @To understand means to understand some4
thin& as an answer@
?
must therefore be limited in re&ard to the
poetic te8t( Here it can only concern the secondary act of interpre+
tive understandin& insofar as this concretiFes a specific si&nificance
as an answer to a Huestion6 it may not howe$er concern the primary
act of perceptual understandin& that introduces and constitutes the
aesthetic e8perience of the poetic te8t( To be sure aesthetic percep4
tion also always already includes understandin&( )or as is well
%nown the poetic te8t as an aesthetic obBect ma%es possible in
contrast to e$eryday perception that de&enerates into a norm a
mode of perception at once more comple8 and more meanin&ful
which as aesthetic pleasure is able to reBu$enate co&niti$e $ision or
$isual reco&nition %aistbesis',
R
Met this accomplishment of aisthesis
capable of meanin&ful understandin& is not already in need of
interpretation and thus it also does not necessarily ha$e the char4
acter of an answer to an implicit or e8plicit Huestion( If it should hold
for the reception of a poetic te8t that here:as Gadamer himself
followin& Husserl has formulated it4@the eidetic reduction is
spontaneously achie$ed in aesthetic e8perience=@ then the under4
standin& within the act of aesthetic perception may not be assi&ned
to an interpretation that :by the $ery fact that somethin& is under4
stood as an answer4reduces the surplus of meanin& of the poetic
te8t to one of its possible utterances( In the eidetic reduction of
aesthetic perception the reflecti$e reduction on the part of the
interpretation that would understand the te8t as an answer to an
implicit Huestion can for the time bein& remain suspended while at
the same time an understandin& can be at wor% allowin& the reader
to e8perience lan&ua&e in its power and thereby the world in its
fullness of si&nificance(
PDATI+ TAWT J -3<
The distin&uishin& of reflecti$e interpretation from the perceptual
understandin& of a poetic te8t is thus not as artificial as it mi&ht at
first ha$e seemed( It is made possible throu&ht the self4e$ident
horiFonal structure of the e8perience of rereadin&( A$ery reader is
familiar with the e8perience that the si&nificance of a poem often
discloses itself only on rereadin& after returnin& from the end to the
be&innin&( Here the e8perience of the first readin& becomes the
horiFon of the second one9 what the reader recei$ed in the pro&res4
si$e horiFon of aesthetic perception can be articulated as a theme in
the retrospecti$e horiFon of interpretation( If one adds that the
interpretation itself may in turn become the foundation for an
application:more precisely that a te8t from the past is of interest
not only in reference to its primary conte8t but that it is also inter4
preted to disclose a possible si&nificance for the contemporary
situation:then what comes to li&ht is that the triadic unity of
understandin& interpretation and application 5such as it is accom4
plished in the hermeneutic process7 corresponds to the three hori4
Fons of rele$ance :thematic interpreti$e and moti$ational :the
mutual relation of which accordin& to Alfred 0chiltF determines the
constitution of the subBecti$e e8perience of the life4world 7Lebens+
weltN,
i3
In e8ecutin& the e8periment of a repeated readin& that will see% to
identify thematically the three acts of the hermeneutic process I
may ta%e up and de$elop further notions that Michael Riffaterre
'olf&an& Iser and Roland Barthes ha$e introduced into the analysis
of the processes of reception( Riffaterre analyFes the course of the
reception of a poem as the play of anticipation and correction
conditioned throu&h the cate&ories of eHui$alence of tension sur4
prise disappointment irony and comedy( An @o$erdetermination@
is common to these cate&ories that demands attention throu&h the
respecti$e correction of an e8pectation thereby steerin& the reader=s
course of (reception and conseHuently pro&ressi$ely determinin&
the meanin& of the te8t to be interpreted( In my e8perience Riffa4
terre=s cate&ories are more appropriate to narrati$e te8ts than to lyric
ones9 the readin& of a poem awa%ens not so much tension re&ardin&
its continuation as the e8pectation of what I would li%e to call
lyrical consistency4the e8pectation that the lyrical mo$ement will
allow one to &rasp $erse by $erse a coherence at first hidden and
thus allow the spectacle of the world to arise anew from a particular
situation( Inno$ation and reco&nition become complementary in
lyrical aisthesis so that the positi$e cate&ory of satisfied e8pectation
may be placed alon&side Riffaterre=s ne&ati$e cate&ories ot surpns
-33 J PDATI+ TAWT
and disappointment in which he spea%s of satisfied e8pectation only
perBorati$ely as if it were eHui$alent to the effect of a cliche(@
)inally his model for the reception of a poem presupposes the
ideal reader 5@superreader@7 who is not only eHuipped with the sum
total of literary historical %nowled&e a$ailable today but also is
capable of consciously re&isterin& e$ery aesthetic impression and
referrin& it bac% to the te8t=s structure of effect( Thus the interpret4
in& competence o$ershadows the analysis of the perceptual under4
standin& e$en thou&h Riffaterre interprets within the open horiFon
of the synta&matic unfoldin& and correction of the system( To escape
this dilemma I ha$e not fabricated somethin& li%e a @nai$e reader @
but rather ha$e transposed myself into the role of a reader with the
educational horiFon of our contemporary present( The role of this
historical reader should presuppose that one is e8perienced in one=s
associations with lyrics but that one can initially suspend one=s
literary historical or lin&uistic competence and put in its place the
capacity occasionally to wonder durin& the course of the readin&
and to e8press this wonder in the form of Huestions( Beside this
historical reader from -.?. I ha$e placed a commentator with
scholarly competence who deepens the aesthetic impressions of the
reader whose understandin& ta%es the form of pleasure and who
refers bac% to the te8t=s structures of effect as much as possible( 5In
what follows this commentary is indicated throu&h indentation(7
0ince I still do not yet suffer from not ha$in& become an empiri4
cist I can calmly put up with the fact that my solution does not yet
pro$ide the model for the o$erdue empirical research into reception(
I will probably brin& upon myself the reproach of not bein& typical
enou&h as a reader and not bein& sufficiently $ersed in lin&uistics or
semiotics as an analyst6 and yet - hope to ha$e tested practically the
theoretical postulate of combinin& structural and semiotic analysis
with phenomenolo&ical interpretation and hermeneutic reflection(
To find a methodolo&ical startin&4point capable of further de$elop4
ment it was for me abo$e all a matter of separatin& more sharply
than has been done before the le$els of aesthetic perception and
reflecti$e interpretation in the interpretation of poetic te8ts( An
initial methodolo&ical ad$ance may already result from this separa4
tion namely that with the help of the Huestion4answer relationship
the te8tual si&nals may now be specified within their synta&matic
coherence as the &i$ens of the course of the reception that establish
consistency( The @structures4of4appeal@ @offers4of4identification@
and @absences of meanin&@ 7*ppellstru$turen, (dentifi$ationsane+
bote, und -innliic$en8 that 'olf&an& Iser has concei$ed as cate&ories
PDATI+ TAWTK -32
in his theory of aesthetic effect are most easily made concrete in the
course of the reception as inducements toward the constitution of
meanin& when one describes the effecti$e factors of the poetic te8t
as e8pectations and transposes them into Huestions that the te8t in
such passa&es either produces lea$es open or answers(
-"
If Iser in
6he *ct of Readin Bin contrast to Riffaterre who $iews the process
of reception under the dominant cate&ory of o$erdetermination and
interprets it nolens volens B has rehabilitated the aesthetic character
of fictional te8ts under the dominant cate&ory of @indeterminacy@
5and @redeterminability@7 it nonetheless remained to me to describe
the course of the reception in the first perceptual readin& as an
e8perience of accumulatin& e$idence that is also aesthetically more
con$incin& which in turn as the pre&i$en horiFon for a second
interpreti$e readin& at once opens up and delimits the space for
possible concretiFations(
Accordin&ly the chan&e of horiFons between the first and the
second readin&s may be described as follows9 the reader:who
performs the @score@ of the te8t in the course of the reception of
$erse after $erse and who is led toward the endin& in a perceptual
act of anticipation from the particular toward the possible whole
of form and meanin&:becomes aware of the fulfilled form of the
poem but not yet of its fulfilled si&nificance let alone of its @whole
meanin&(@ 'hoe$er ac%nowled&es the hermeneutic premise that the
meanin&ful whole of a lyric wor% is no lon&er to be understood as if
substantial as if its meanin& were pre&i$en and timeless6 rather it is
to be understood as a meanin& to be performed :whoe$er ac%nowl4
ed&es this premise awaits from the reader the reco&nition that from
now on he may in the act of interpreti$e understandin& hypostasiFe
one amon& other possible si&nifications of the poem the rele$ance of
which for him does not e8clude the worth of others for discussion(
)rom now on the reader will see% and establish the still unfulfilled
si&nificance retrospecti$ely throu&h a new readin& from the perspec4
ti$e of the fulfilled form in a return from the end to the be&innin&
from the whole to the particular( 'hate$er initially resisted under4
standin& manifests itself in the Huestions that the first &oin&4throu&h
has left open( In answerin& them one may e8pect that from the
particular elements of si&nificance :in $arious respects still indeter4
minate4a fulfilled whole may be established on the le$el of meanin&
throu&h the labor of interpretation which whole is e$ery bit as much
on the le$el of meanin& as on the le$el of form( This meanin&ful
whole can be found only throu&h a selecti$e ta%in& of perspecti$es
and cannot be attained throu&h a supposedly obBecti$e description :
-3> K PDATI+ TAWT
this falls under the hermeneutic premise of partiality( 'ith this the
Huestion of the historical horiFon is posed the horiFon that condi4
tioned the &enesis and effect of the wor% and that once a&ain de4
limits the present reader=s interpretation( To in$esti&ate it is now the
tas% of a third historical readin&(
This third step insofar as it concerns the interpretation of a wor%
from the premises of its time and &enesis is the one most familiar to
historical4philolo&ical hermeneutics( Met there the historically recon4
structi$e readin& is traditionally the first step to which historicism
adds the inBunction that the interpreter has to i&nore himself and his
standpoint to be able to ta%e up e$er more purely the @obBecti$e
meanin&@ of the te8t( #nder the spell of this scholarly ideal the
obBecti$istic illusions of which are e$ident to almost e$eryone today
the hermeneutics of the classical and modern philolo&ies sou&ht to
pri$ile&e historical understandin& o$er the aesthetic appreciation
which for its part was rarely attempted at all( 0uch historicism
failed to reco&niFe that the aesthetic character of its te8ts4as a
hermeneutic brid&e denied to other disciplines4is that which ma%es
possible the historical understandin& of art across the distance in
time in the first place and which therefore must be inte&rated into
the e8ecution of the interpretation as a hermeneutic premise( But
in$ersely aesthetic understandin& and interpretation also remain in
reference to the controllin& function of the historicist4reconstructi$e
readin&( It pre$ents the te8t from the past from bein& nai$ely assimi4
lated to the preBudices and e8pectations of meanin& of the present
and thereby:throu&h e8plicitly distin&uishin& the past horiFon from
the present:allows the poetic te8t to be seen in its alterity( The
in$esti&ation of the @otherness@ the uniHue distance within the
contemporaneity of the literary te8t demands a reconstructi$e
readin& that can be&in by see%in& out the Huestions 5most often
une8plicit ones7 to which the te8t was the response in its time( An
interpretation of a literary te8t as a response should include two
thin&s9 its response to e8pectations of a formal %ind such as the
literary tradition prescribed for it before its appearance6 and its
response to Huestions of meanin& such as they could ha$e posed
themsel$es within the historical life4world of its first readers( The
reconstruction of the ori&inal horiFon of e8pectations would none4
theless fall bac% into historicism if the historical interpretation could
not in turn ser$e to transform the Huestion @'hat did the te8t sayL@
into the Huestion @'hat does the te8t say to me and what do - say
to itL@ If li%e theolo&ical or Buridical hermeneutics literary hermen4
eutics is to mo$e from understandin& throu&h interpretation to
PDATI+ TAWT K -3?
application then application here certainly cannot dissol$e into
practical action but rather instead can satisfy the no less le&itimate
interest of usin& literary communication with the past to measure
and to broaden the horiFon of one=s own e8perience $is4a4$is the
e8perience of the other(
The omission of the distin&uishin& of horiFons can ha$e conse4
Huences such as may be indicated with the analysis of the reception
of a Poe story by Roland Barthes(
-<
Its stren&th lies in the demon4
stration of how the structuralist description of the narrati$e principle
:which e8plains the te8t as a $ariant of a pre&i$en model:can be
transformed into the te8tual analysis of @si&nificance@ that allows
one to understand the te8t as a process as an on&oin& production of
meanin& or more precisely of possibilities of meanin& 5@the forms
the codes accordin& to which meanin&s are possible@7(
-3
Its wea%ness
lies in a nai$e fusin& of horiFons9 accordin& to its own intention the
readin& is supposed to be unmediated and ahistorical 5@we will ta%e
up the te8t as it is as it is when we read it@
ls
7 and yet this readin&
only comes about throu&h a @superreader@ who brin&s a comprehen4
si$e %nowled&e of the nineteenth century into play and who in the
course of the reception notes those passa&es abo$e all where cultural
and lin&uistic codes can be recalled or associated( Dne cannot spea%
of a Boinin& of the interpretation to the process of aesthetic percep4
tion for this as the @code of the =actants= @ in combination with the
@symbolic code or field@ can itself only be one more code amon&
others 5the @scientific rhetorical chronolo&ical destinatory code@
etc(7(
->
Thus a readin& arises that is neither historical nor aesthetic
but rather is as subBecti$e as it is impressionistic and yet is supposed
to &round the theory that each particular te8t is a tissue of te8ts :
the interminable play of a free4floatin& interte8tuality in @the
stru&&le between man and si&ns(@
-?
Literary hermeneutics which Barthes not accidentally $iews as a
5for him7 (@aeni&matic code@ is on the contrary surely no lon&er
interested today in interpretin& the te8t as the re$elation of the
sin&le truth concealed within it(=
/
A&ainst the theory of the @plural
te8t@ with its notion of @interte8tuality@ as a limitless and arbitrary
production of possibilities of meanin& and of no less arbitrary inter4
pretations literary hermeneutics poses the hypothesis that the con4
cretiFation of the meanin& of literary wor%s pro&resses historically
and follows a certain @lo&ic@ that precipitates in the formation and
transformation of the aesthetic canon( )urthermore it postulates
that in the chan&e of horiFons of the interpretations one may
distin&uish absolutely between arbitrary interpretations and those
-3/ K PDATI+ TAWT
a$ailable to a consensus between those that are merely ori&inal and
those that are formati$e of a norm( The fundamental aspect that
supports this hypothesis can lie only in the aesthetic character of the
te8ts9 as a re&ulati$e principle it allows for there bein& a series of
interpretations but that are also capable of bein& reinte&rated with
respect to the meanin& made concrete( Here I may recall the attempt
at a pluralistic interpretation of Apollinaire=s poem @L=arbre@
underta%en at the second colloHuium of the Poeti$ und Hermeneuti$
&roup( Dn the one hand the distance $is4a4$is the poem adopted by
each reader itself allowed for a different aesthetic perception to arise
and each specific concretiFation of the si&nificance necessarily had to
i&nore other no less plausible interpretations( And yet the surprisin&
confirmation that the indi$idual interpretations did not contradict
one another despite their differences led to the conclusion that e$en
this @pluralistic te8t@ can pro$ide a unifyin& aesthetic orientation for
perceptual understandin& within the horiFon of the first readin&(
-.
To be sure one may obBect that after Baudelaire a modern poem
cannot furnish the reader with this e$idence of a compellin& whole
after only the first readin& but rather only in rereadin&( And one
may obBect that mutatis mutandis a poem from an older tradition
or from another culture often only discloses itself for aesthetic
understandin& when historicist understandin& has remo$ed the
obstacles to its reception and rendered possible an aesthetic percep4
tion of the formerly unenBoyable te8t( I am also thorou&hly of this
opinion
"1
so that I can use these obBections for precisely one last
point(
The priority of aesthetic perception within the triad of literary
hermeneutics has need of the hori#on, but not the temporal priority
of the first readin&6 this horiFon of aesthetic understandin& may also
be &ained only in the course of rereadin& or with the help of histori4
cist understandin&( Aesthetic perception is no uni$ersal code with
timeless $alidity but rather4li%e all aesthetic e8perience4is inter4
twined with historical e8perience( Thus for the interpretation of
te8ts from other cultures the aesthetic character of poetic te8ts
from the western tradition can only offer heuristic ad$anta&es(
Literary interpretation must compensate with the three achie$ements
of the hermeneutic process for the fact that aesthetic perception
itself is subBect to historical e8chan&e( It thereby &ains the oppor4
tunity of broadenin& historicist %nowled&e throu&h aesthetic under4
standin& and perhaps of constitutin& throu&h its unconstrained %ind
of application a correcti$e to other applications that are subBect to
situational pressures and the compulsions of decision4ma%in&(
PDATI+ TAWT J -3.
II( The Pro&ressi$e HoriFon of Aesthetic Perception
5a Hermeneutic Reconstruction of the )irst Readin&7
0pleen
J=ai plus de sou$enirs Hue si B=a$ais mille ans( #n &ros
meublc a tiroirs encombre de bilans Ke $ers de billets
dou8 de proces de romances A$ec de lourds che$eu8
roules dans des Huittances +ache moins de secrets Hue
mon triste cer$eau( > +=est une pyramide un immense
ca$eau
Eui contient plus de morts Hue la fosse commune( :Je suis un
cimetiere abhorre de la lune Du comme des remords se
trainent de lon&s $ers Eui s=acharnent touBours sur mes morts
Ies plus chers( Je suis un $ieu8 boudoir plein de roses fanees
-" Du &it tout un fouillis de modes surannees Du Ies pastels
plaintifs et Ies pales Boucher 0euls respirent l=odeur d=un
flacon debouche(
Rien n=e&ale en lon&ueur Ies boiteuses Bournees Euand
sous les lourds flocons des nei&euses annees L=ennui fruit
de la morne incuriosite -/ Prend Ies proportions de
l=immortalite(
: Kesormais tu n=es plus > matiere $i$anteN
Eu=un &ranit entoure d=une $a&ue epou$ante
Assoupi dans Ie fond d=un 0ahara brumeu8N
#n $ieu8 sphin8 i&nore du monde insoucieu8
Dublie sur la carte et dont l=humeur farouche
"3 *e chante Hu= au8 rayons du soleil Hui se couche(
I ha$e more memories than if I were a thousand years old( A
lar&e chest of drawers cluttered with accounts 'ith poems
lo$e letters le&al briefs son&s( 'ith thic% loc%s of hair
wrapped in receipts +onceals fewer secrets than my sad brain(
> It=s a pyramid an immense $ault
That contains more dead than a communal &ra$e(
: I am a cemetery abhorred by the
moon
'here li%e remorse lon& worms crawl
'ho always wor% on my dearest dead(
- am an old boudior full of faded roses -"
'here a whole Bumble of outmoded fashion lies
24 -21 E PDATI+ TAWT
'here plainti$e pastels and wan Bouchers
Alone breathe in the scent of an uncor%ed
bottle( *othin& eHuals the haltin& days in
len&th 'hen under the hea$y fla%es of the
snowy years Boredom fruit of &loomy
incuriosity Ta%es the proportions of
immortality( : Henceforth you are no more
D li$in& matterN Than a bloc% of &ranite
surrounded by a $a&ue terror 0lumberin& in
the depths of a haFy 0aharaN An old sphin8
i&nored by a careless world )or&otten on the
maps and whose ill humor 0in&s only to the
rays of a sun that sets(
@0pleen@9 A poem that announces itself with this title poses se$eral
initial Huestions for the contemporary reader( 'hat does spleen mean
and what can the word mean precisely as the title to a poemL Koes it
hint at a condition li%e depression or only at the eccentric mood of
one personL 'ill someone spea% of himself here of the world includ4
in& our world or only of his ownL 5Please remember9 the indented
passa&es represent the commentary of my @historical reader of the
present(@7
)or the reader of our present time the title @0pleen@ disclos4
es the horiFon of an open lar&ely still4indeterminate e8pecta4
tion and with this initiates the suspense of a word=s meanin&
that can only be clarified throu&h the readin& of the poem( )or
in today=s German usa&e 5and in )rench as well7 @spleen@ has
sun% to the tri$ial si&nificance of a @tic%@ a @fi8ed idea@6 it
scarcely still allows one to suspect what sort of aura of sin&ularity
could be fittin& for a person who presented his @spleen@ as an
attitude of wantin& to be different in the face of his world( )elt
as an anachronism and allowin& one to for&et its ori&inal
si&nificance the word may still recall connotations of depres4
sion 5as 0tefan Geor&e translated it7 or of an eccentric mood for
the educated reader:connotations of a consciously adopted at4
titude to distin&uish it from the natural characteristics of a per4
son( The a$era&e reader can scarcely understand more by the
@spleen@ of a fellow person than a beha$ioral tic% that remains
fundamentally harmless that does not hurt anyone else and
that can e8press itself in a fi8ed idea that for the person con4
cerned ob$iously determines his relationship to the world as a
whole in a monomaniacal way( This e$eryday si&nificance re4
PDATI+ TAWT K -2-
turns the placement of the word in the title to the condition of
the mysterious:than%s to the e8pectation established by all
lyric poetry that in the medium of poetry the e$eryday and the
occasional can ta%e on a new and deeper si&nificance or reco$er
an older for&otten meanin&(
@J=ai plus de sou$enirs Hue si B=a$ais mille ans@ 5-( -79 The $oice of
an un%nown @I@ spea%s into the space of the e8pectation awa%ened
by the title word of @0pleen(@ It names itself already with the first
word and with the first line it stri%es a tone that surprises the reader
throu&h the o$erpowerin& claim @to possess more memories than a
life of a thousand years could comprehend(@ The word4seHuence as
well as the rhythm of this first line separated off li%e a preamble
hei&htens the &eneral impression that the realm e$o%ed by the mem4
ories stretches into the immeasurable( The comparati$e phrase
@More memories than@ is redeemed in the second half of the line
throu&h the une8pectedly hi&h number @thousand@6 and yet pre4
cisely this wei&hty ma&nitude 5with the connotation of @millenium@7
is in its namin& already surpassed the number e8tendin& into the
limitless throu&h the precedin& @plus de(@ Read as a line of $erse the
followin& accents may be noted9
"-
A>ai plus de souvenirs ?ue si H>avais
mille ans" also noted is a rhythm that in the first half4line wor%s har4
monically with the re&ular 5@pseudoiambic@7 seHuence of wea%ly and
stron&ly accented syllables but that in the second half4line wor%s in
a troublesome way with the main accents suspended and bumpin&
up ne8t to one another throu&h the four unaccented syllables(
The accents on the @stron& words@ souvenirs, mille, and ans
could be supplemented throu&h secondary $erse accents(4 in the
first half4line on plus in the second syllable 5to brid&e the lar&e
distance to the si8th syllable with the main accent7 and possibly
also on the fourth syllable But in the second half4line the first
four syllables can on &rammatical &rounds scarcely support
an accent so that special wei&ht falls on the last two words sus4
pended throu&h the four unaccented syllables(
'ith mille, the reader can scarcely miss hearin& the echo of the
main4accented i of souvenirs, which it=s placement before the middle
caesura accents e$en more so that the repeatin& $owel renders e$en
more conspicuous the delimitation of the memories to the number
thousand and @more than a thousand@ as well as the re$ersal of the
harmony of the first half4line in the disproportion of the second(
0ymmetry and asymmetry are peculiarly enfolded in the first
-2" J PDATI+ TAWT
line( 'ith the middle caesura which see%s to &uarantee metrically
the eHui$alence of the two half4lines Baudelaire composition4ally
opened the symmetrical construction of the classical ale8andrine
onto the asymmetry of the immeasurable9 a phonetic
preponderance of the G4sound in the second half4line which re4
inforces the meanin& %souvenirs, hi&hli&hted throu&h the final
position of the syllablebefore the caesura as opposed to a two4
fold repetition of the C in si and tnille', corresponds to the se4
mantic surpassin& of mille arts throu&h the plus de in the first
half4line so that the hyperbolic number @thousand@:phonetic4
ally announced as the pea% of the 54series:becomes the counter4
point to souvenirs, .ut as one retrospecti$ely reco&niFes spleen
5throu&h the lon& i7 also already belon&s to this si&nifyin& series
of sounds so that between the title word and the first line eHui4
$alence of si&nificance is su&&ested that recalls the reader=s sus4
pended Huestions at the outset and allows one to concretiFe
them anew(
If the first line already states somethin& about the spleen of the @I@
who spea%s is it a condition of the &reatest happiness or the deepest
sufferin&L Is it self4presumption or doubt that spea%s out of itL Koes
a boldness encroach here or an a&ony predominateL
Lines "429 The readin& of the lines followin& the first comes to a
halt after line fi$e(
The halt is syntactically mar%ed by the end of the sentence6 in
the on&oin& continuation of the readin& as well the ends of
sentences will pro$ide the most ob$ious subdi$isions within the
two uneHual strophes of the poem(
The be&innin& of line two @#n &ros meuble a tiroirs@ is transition4
less and throu&h a moti$ation that is at first unreco&niFable it arouses
the tension of wonderin& whether and how the description of a
dressin& or writin& table:e8tendin& e$er further throu&h three lines
: mi&ht then han& to&ether with the initial leadin& theme of the
memories of the spea%in& @I@ that is struc% up in line one( This ten4
sion only resol$es itself4and e8plosi$ely as it were4at the end of
line fi$e with the lon&4delayed fi&ure of a scarcely awaited compari4
son9 @+ache moins de secrets Hue mon triste cer$eau(@
The tension produced by the structure of this $erse con4
struction allows one to &rasp once a&ain the e8pectation of lyric
consistency that is essential for aesthetic perception( Here e$ery4
thin& wor%s to&ether in the &rammatical and phonetic or&ani4
PDATI+ TAWT J -2<
Fation to allow the shoc%in& resolution of the thematic e8pec4
tation posed with @un &ros meuble@ to appear as a decisi$e con4
trast9 the surpassin& constructed once a&ain in a comparati$e
@moins de secrets Hue@ 5after the @plusde@ of -(-7 and the fall
from the stylistic hei&hts and thin&4filled plenitude of the bu4
reau into the prosaic character of the technical medical term
cerveau that is also already announced phonetically and then as
it were e8ploded throu&h a doubled series of s4alliterations and
consonantal r4connections %secrets ( ( ( triste ( ( ( cerveau',
Dne can also spea% of an e8plosi$e effect of the rhyme4word on
the semantic le$el where the re$ersal appears in the middle of
the ti&ht combination of adBecti$e and substanti$e 5one would
e8pect @soul@ or @heart@ after the poetic epithet @sad@ and
hardly @brain@N7 and is hei&htened e$en more throu&h the rhyme(
If one follows the chain of rhymes then throu&h the eHui$a4
lences of a with the transition from the simple to the comple8
rhymes 5from a in --( <G37 the effect is produced of a steady
&rowth hei&htened throu&h the homonymy 5from ans+bilans to
romances+?uittances', which the o4rhyme of line fi$e then sud4
denly disrupts(
'ith the comparison between writin& des% and brain the reader is
offered a solution to the Huestion re&ardin& the connection between
the openin& line and the ne8t &roup of $erses9 isn=t the old des% co$4
ered with a Bumble of mementos also a place of memories the sum4
total of time used up perhaps e$en a possession of that @I@ who at
the be&innin& &aFed bac% on an immeasurable plenitude of memoriesL
Is the chaotic state of the des% with its unfathomed secrets a si&n
for how the @-@ possessed of @spleen@ comes upon its plenitude of
memories within its remembranceL Koes @0pleen@ as the title word
mean precisely this $iew of the mute relics of a past ossified into
chaosL Met opposed to this solution is the fact that in its compari4
son the lyric @I@ also once a&ain already distin&uishes itself from the
compared term9 the @remembrance@ of the bureau conceals fewer
secrets than its @sad brain@ so that the disorder of the thin&s in lines
"43 is a different state of affairs( In lin&erin& with one=s first readin&
the reader can already &ain the impression that prosaic and poetic
thin&s contrast charmin&ly in the mess on the chest of drawers and
that the catalo& pea%s with the &rotesHue ima&e of @loc%s of hair
wrapped in receipts@4in brief that it is a matter of a @beautiful dis4
order(@ Toward what mi&ht it be leadin&L
'hile the thematic traBectory as a whole allows the recountin&
-23 K PDATI+ TAWT
of the lefto$ers of the past to de$elop symmetrically the
smaller ima&istic units constitute symmetrical contrasts also
supported by the metrical system( In all the $erses the re&ular
middle caesura creates symmetrical half4lines that &i$e a har4
monious sense of di$ision to the recountin& of the contents
of the chest of drawers( Dn closer inspection the recountin&
itself allows one to reco&niFe a semantic orderin& principle4
prosaic and poetic obBects follow one another with beautiful
re&ularity( In line two the series is be&un with @accounts@
upon which @poems and lo$e letters@ follow in line three
The counterwei&ht to these is created after the middle caesura
by @le&al briefs@ with which @son&s@ contrast once a&ain in
the same half4line( In the ne8t line this method of producin&
a beautiful disorder is dri$en into a %ind of bottlenec%9 the
succession of hetero&eneous thin&s turns into their admi8ture
when @loc%s of hair@ appear that are rolled up in @receipts(@
Thus the poetic catalo& of a past stored up in disorder cul4
minates in the profanation of the beautiful in a final &rotesHue
ima&e of sentimental lo$e(
@+=est une pyramide un immense ca$eau@ 5--( >G?79 as if the
@I@ that spea%s would not itself pro$ide an answer to the implicit
Huestion of what its remembrance mi&ht then be if it is to be still
more and different than the des% in the comparison the ne8t pair
of lines be&ins with a pro$ocati$e utterance on the part of the self
that is surprisin& in its immediacy and that stri%es up anew the meas4
ured tone of the first line( Dnce a&ain a mo$ement toward the o$erly
lar&e comes into play that is not satisfied with the ima&e of the
pyramid but that surpasses e$en the representation of the immense
&ra$e throu&h the comparati$e construction of a further comparison9
@Hui contient plus de morts Hue la fosse commune(@ But the se4
Huence of ima&es that carries this mo$ement toward e8cess also
su&&ests a second line of si&nificance that is stri%in& in its contrast9
the far4reachin& mo$ement of memory can e$idently &rasp only
what is dead( It culminates in the past4become4stone of the pyramid
and in the heap of bones of the mass &ra$e( Koes the decay of mem4
ory into a remembrance that contains only what is dead accordin&ly
allow us to understand what @spleen@ can mean for the lyric @I L
The pro$ocati$e element in the renewed utterance on the
part of the self lies not only in the reprise of the apodictic
tone of line one but also in the concealed synchroniFation ot
the newly appearin& pair of lines with line fi$e( Here the analy4
PDATI+ TAWT a -22
sis can ma%e note of the eHui$alences of the @stron& words@
as well as a syntactic countersymmetry between line fi$e and
lines si8 and se$en( The stron& accent before the e$er4preser$ed
middle caesura and at the line4ends establishes a positional
orderin& of si&nificance of secrets, pymmide, and marts on
the one hand and of cerveau, caveau, and fosse commune
on the other( Between the small secrets of the bureau and
the lar&e ones of the pyramid as between the small container
of the brain and the lar&e one of the &ra$e a disproportion
arises that sets the de$elopment toward the immeasurable
into play for a third time 5after the memories of line one
and the relics of lines two to four7( Dnly with morts does
the third member of the two lines of si&nificance brin& the
tertium comparationis to li&ht and then brin& about 5as pre4
$iously with cerveau of line fi$e in contrast to lines two to
four7 the fall from the stylistic hei&hts9 with fosse commune
as the final member of the comparison for the abstruse remem4
brance the crassest representation of a worthless &ra$esite
destroys the aura that surrounded a pyramid as the most sub4
lime sort of &ra$e( The syntactic parallelism of the opposin&
comparati$e formulations moins de 5-( 27 and plus de 5-( ?7
can ser$e $arious functions( It arran&es secrets and morts
with one another so that one can as% oneself whether those
secrets of the remembrance were to mean its dead( It hei&htens
once a&ain the mo$ement toward e8cess throu&h the fi&ures
of surpassin&( And finally it ser$es here as well to distin&uish
once a&ain the @I@ in its comparisons from the compared ele4
ments( To the e8tent that this $iew already holds for the com4
parati$e formulation plus de in the first line as well as for
all of the pre$ious three utterances on the part of the self
the effect of a discontinuous mo$ement arises(
- he lyrical @I@ underta%es a&ain and a&ain the attempt to iden4
tity itself in that it poses one comparison after another and then
ta%es them bac%( 'ill this mo$ement come to an end and will the
=Tperhaps arri$e at itselfL
@Je suis un cimetiere abhorre de la lune@ 5--( /4--79 a dash is
scarcely needed here as a typo&raphical si&nal that would ma%e the
new be&innin& of the followin& &roup of lines unmista%able( )or
here where the new line once a&ain4as pre$iously only at the
Poem=s be&innin&4be&ins with @-@ as the first word the self4pro4
cV
amation ta%es on the stran&est form9 @I am a cemetery abhorred
-2> J PDATI+ TAWT
by the moon(@ If a certain distance of obser$ation had still been
maintained in the series of comparisons of the self with the bureau
pyramid and mass &ra$e then the mo$ement now turns into a self4
identification that demands of the reader that he step across a
threshold into the unreal and the uncanny( The uncanny is rendered
most stron&ly perceptible throu&h the onomatopoetic abhorre
which introduces a series of &ra$eyard thou&hts that is once a&ain
more familiar( The reader who Othe scholarly analyst would point
out; is led by the parallel line4openin&s and loo%s bac% from the
&ra$eyard lines to the openin& line can as% himself whether the
connection now brou&ht to li&ht mi&ht mean that the immeasur4
able collection of memories of which the @I@ boasted in the first
line has now passed into the uncanniness of the Gol&otha that the
same @I@ after line ei&ht is or belie$es it is( 'ould this mean that
the Huestion of what @0pleen@ means for the @I@ that spea%s is al4
ready answeredL
The syntactic parallelism in the stron& openin& positions
of @J=ai@ 5-( -7 and @Je suis@ 5-( /7:which hi&hli&ht the first
and fourth sentences in front of the inter$enin& ones throu&h
the @I@ as a repeatin& subBect4can hardly be missed( )or the
syntactic correspondence is furthermore also supported throu&h
phonetic eHui$alences9 @Je suis un cimetiere@ 5-( /7 repeats
the si&nifyin& i4series of line one three times o$er( Lines nine
and ten with the ima&ery of the &ra$eyard lyric that has be4
come cliched for us would indeed fall into the cate&ory of
the tri$ial were it not that the or4syllable of the onomato4
poetically uncanny abhorre is maintained in remords 5-( .7
and morts 5-( -17 and that the double4meanin& of vers 5worms
or $erses7 &i$es a &rotesHue pointe to the familiar topos of
vanitas,
@Je suis un $ieu8 boudoir@ 5--( --4-379 The e8pectation that
the attempts of the lyric @I@ to describe his state of mind had come
to rest with the @&ra$eyard of memories@ :this e8pectation is not
fulfilled( The unrest that e$en in that ima&ery had not been thor4
ou&hly pacified 5@de lon& $ers Hui s=acharnent touBours@ --( .G-17
ta%es the upper hand once a&ain( As if this @I@ dri$en by an ine84
plicable moti$ation:is it doubt an8iety or a certain unnamed
sufferin&L :must always see% its identity in a different realm of
used4up time it now reaches out toward a space that conBures up a
new parade of memories( It is an old boudoir with a decor within it
that allows one to recall the old bureau6 Othe scholarly analyst
PDATI+ TAWT K -2?
adds that; e$en the distant but still audible internal rhyme meuble
a tiroir ( vieu/ boudoir encoura&es this retrospecti$e comparison(
Dnce a&ain the thin&s ta%e on the shape of a beautiful disorder(
But this time they offer not the $iew of an accidental heap of in4
compatible elements but rather conBoin into the harmonious en4
semble of an ele&ant lady=s room(
The first impression of a finely tuned harmony all the more
stron&ly noticeable after the dissonant &ra$eyard $erses arises
abo$e all from the effect of two rich rhyme4pairs that con4
trapuntally maintain the main accent of the $owel e in the end4
rhyme for ei&ht lines in a willed monotony that allows for a
delicate play with the minimal de$iation within the al4
ternation between feminine %faneesMsurannees' and mascu4
line %.oucherMdebouche' rhymes( Baudelaire= s concept of
poetic lan&ua&e :which must correspond to @the immortal
needs for monotony symmetry and surprise@ in man
""
:could
scarcely be better illustrated(
Dn closer e8amination the harmony of this beautiful disorder is
nonetheless already bathed in the li&ht of decay9 the thin&s of the
decor are all accompanied by an adBecti$e e8pressin& decline 5@roses
fanees@ @modes surannees@ @pastels plaintifs@ @pales Boucher@
@flacon debouche@7 and in their solitariness 5@seuls respirent
l= odeur d=un flacon debouche@7 they allow one to feel an empti 4
ness not to say the disappearance of an occupant 5one of the
@dearest dead@ of -( -1L7( Koes this mean that the renewed effort
by the lyric @I@ to find sal$ation in a past has once a&ain become
lost in an empty world of thin&s decayed within themsel$esL The
alliteration of three p=s in line thirteen which then falls to a b,
ironiFes as it were a decrescendo 5@Du les pastels plaintifs et
les pales Boucher@7 that turns the word play &oin& on between
the rhyme4word .oucher and debouche into the &rotesHue9 the
still harmonious representation of the last perfume escapin& from
the uncor%ed bottle o$erturns into the dissonant connotation of
a @decapitated@ rococo painter Boucher(
@Rien n=e&ale en lon&ueur les boitcuses Bournees@ 5II( -24-/79
The transitionless be&innin& of the ne8t &roup of $erses four lines
lon& is not only typo&raphically mar%ed throu&h a second lar&e
strophic unit but is also mar%ed throu&h the fact that the @-@
has une8pectedly disappeared 5the two precedin& sentences be&an
-2/ G PDATI+ TAWT
with @Je suis@7( The $oice that now be&ins to spea% appears unim4
plicated in the e8perience it first portrayed in hi&h lyrical tones
and then as it were allowed to appear on sta&e in personified form
and thereafter commented on in a tone of definitional formality
Alon& with the disappearance of the @I@ the theme of memory
also appears to ha$e been e8hausted9 the ennui steps forth not
from out of the past but rather as the shape of an endless present
from out of the @haltin& days@ and the @snowed4in years(@ Already
with the first readin& the sta&in& of its appearance must stri%e one9
in their e8traordinary onomatopoetic beauty the precedin& two
lines seemed to open onto the $iew of a winter landscape and did
not yet allow one to anticipate that which only the delayed namin&
of the ennui allows one to percei$e4the all4permeatin& power of
that @&loomy indifference@ that before our eyes &rows to an in4
finite siFe 5as also manifest in the monstrous rhyme4pair %incuri+
ositelimmortalite', 'ith this mo$ement whether the answer to the
si&nificance of @0pleen@ is to be sou&ht in the appearance of ennui
is not the only Huestion that poses itself( There is also the further
Huestion of what it mi&ht indeed mean that this forei&n power e$i4
dently raises its head and rules the sta&e of the world that is from
now on the present precisely at the moment when the @-@ has
stepped off that sta&e and has ceased to spea% as a subBect(
'ith the be&innin& of this &roup of $erses the surprisin&
chan&e of subBect le$el of tone and temporal dimension is
nonetheless pro$ided with a transition and a contrast in that
lines fifteen throu&h ei&hteen immediately continue the rhyme4
scheme of the precedin& lines ele$en throu&h fourteen( Thus
the two four4line strophes eHui$alently rhymed constitute
a symmetrical whole precisely at the brea% between the two
lar&e strophic units 5--( "4-3 --( -24"27 a whole that immedi4
ately resynchroniFes the strophic di$ision and su&&ests that one
ou&ht to disco$er lines of si&nificance in the phonetic eHui$a4
lences that had remained concealed at first &lance( The sym4
metry of the feminine rhymes establishes a relation between
roses fanees and boiteuses Houmees, then between modes
surannees and neieuses annees, In the first case the mo$e4
ment falls from the beauty of the withered roses into the ne&ati$e
temporal e8perience of the @haltin& days@6 in the second case
the passin& character of yesterday=s fashions is ele$ated up to
the beautiful monotony of the @years that are li%e hea$y
snowfla%es(@ The symmetry of the masculine rhymes allows
PDATI+ TAWT K -2.
one to e8pect and to reco&niFe that the second &roup of four
lines as already with the first 5with .oucher ( debouche', also
carries alon& with it an ironic si&nificance in the bac%&round(
It manifests itself in the chan&e of tone when first the two
lines of beautiful monotony so perfect in their onomatopoeia
5as well as in the internal rhyme of the preciously placed
adBecti$es boheuses(neieuses', delay the entrance onto the
sta&e on the part of ennui 5throu&h enBambment and syntactic
in$ersion7 and then two contrary lines follow that &loss this
appearance as if @paintin& with concepts(@ The appearance
is ele$ated to personification defined in terms of its ori&in
%fruit de' in an alle&oriFin& manner and described in its effects
all with a display of learned words that fall out of the lyric
rhythm throu&h polysyllabic character alone( Alon& with this
the representation of the endlessly &rowin& ennui ta%es on
sensorial and audible form in the return of the e$er more
si&nificant B=4series and in the threefold p4alliteration 5@prend
les proportions de l=immortalite@ -( -/7(
The ironiFation culminates in that most stri%in& rhyme4pair in+
curiosite ( immortalite, and lea$es behind it the Huestion of whether
in the end if the incuriosite has achie$ed the proportions of im+
mortalite, the immortality must not also fall to the @&loomy in4
difference(@
@4Kesormais tu n=es plus > matiere $i$anteN@ 5--( -.4"379 Here
the new be&innin& of a final &roup of si8 lines is so transitionless
that it scarcely needs the dash as a typo&raphical si&nal( 5esormais
turns the precedin& scene around into the future and seems to &i$e
the followin& lines the character of prophetic discourse( 'ho can
spea% in such a manner and with what authorityL 'ho is the @you@
on whom this anonymous Bud&e turnsL Is it a matter of a self4address
in the pathetic @you@4form or does this @you@ mean another per4
sonL 'hat does @matiere $i$ante@ meanL Is it man as a li$in& bein&
opposed to matter6 is it a fi&ure in the still unreco&niFed meta4
morphoses of the lyric subBect6 or is it the part of his corporeal
appearance that stands opposed to the @I@ in its spiritual e8istenceL
But now further surprisin& metamorphoses seem to fall immediately
upon the @you@ itself that is so mysteriously e$o%ed9 from out of
li$in& matter@ a &ranite bloc% appears 5the hardest stone hard
Oi%e the ]4sound with which line twenty be&ins in its enBambment9
Hu=un &ranit@76 from out of the &ranite bloc% the old sphin8
appears4but now opposed to the e8pectation that it would be
->1 K PDATI+ TAWT
a silence4made4stone it be&ins to sin& althou&h in$ited by no one
since no one %nows of it any lon&er thereby burdenin& the reader
with the eni&ma of what it mi&ht indeed be sin&in& of with its &estur of
wild but sullen fury 5@dont l=humeur farouche ne chante@7 Alon with
this final hi&hly une8pected reshufflin& of the role of the lyric
subBect the e8ternal scene has also chan&ed9 in the place of the decor
laden with the past and the e8ternal world that was wintered and
dar%ened yet nonetheless still homey the fear4producin& 5@entoure
d=une $a&ue epou$ante@7 no man=s land 5@oublie sur la carte@7 of a
desert has appeared in which only the sun4already settin& and e$i4
dently indifferent 5doesn=t @Hui se couche@ respond ironically to
@humeur faroucheL@7:remains to hear the sphin8=s son&(
The three rhyme4pairs &i$e $ariation to the semantic contrast of
matiere vivante in such a way that the contradiction between
matter and life is continually reformulated up to the end( After
vivante, there follows:emphasiFed throu&h the hiatus of the
half4accented e from vaue to the main4accented eBthe peBorati$e
word epouvante for the petrifyin& terror6 in response to
brumeu/ 5dar%7 which with its connotation of @misty@ still al4
lows one to thin% of the life4&i$in& element of water there is the
ne&ati$e composite4word insoucieu/, The power of ne&ation is
phonetically sharpened in line twenty4two throu&h contrasti$e
eHui$alences9 the alliteration of i and in 5@#n $ieu8 sphin8 i&4
nore du monde insoucieu8@7 and the double recurrence of s
%sphin/ , , , insoucieu/' ha$e the effect that the rhyme4word :
to the e8tent that it reuses nearly all the phonetic elements of vieu/
sphin/ 5e$en the o4sound of the epithet returns in the last syllable7
: not only semantically ne&ates the e8istence of the old sphin8 5the
si&n of ne&ation in ta%es up the sound of sphin/ and is further
stren&thened throu&h the morpholo&ical eHui$alence with the
prefi8 of inore'K it also as it were literally refutes it sound by
sound( Dn the syntactic le$el the participial constructions of lines
twenty throu&h twenty4three arran&ed as parallels rather describe
the pro&ressi$e process of a materialiFation of the matiere vivante
X, the series of past perfect participles entoure+assoupi+inore+publie
increasin&ly remo$es the lyric subBect from the life4sphere of the
shared world( All the more astoundin& then the effect in line
twenty4four of the turn around from the ossified condition of the
past perfect into the present tense of chante, Kelayed in the
enBambment after humeur farouche, the acti$e $erb allows one to
reco&niFe that the &esture of re$olt that was no lon&er e8pected
actually already be&an with the aa4
PDATI+ TAWT K ->-
$ersati$e et, The precedin& rhyme4word farouche has an especial4
ly important poetic function in this turnaround( As the third
and last representati$e of life amon& the rhyme4words 5after vi+
vante and brumeu/', it on the one hand de$iates with its main4
accented $owel from the precedin& series of a4sounds that in
the words entdiire>+assdupi+insducieu/ and finally 5the oppositi$e
at the be&innin& of the same line7 oublie, supports the pro4
cess of the threatenin& materialiFation( But on the other hand
the final ironic pointe is constructed with the hi&hest art9 that
the sun indifferently @&oes to sleep@ on the side of the material
world emptied of man whereas the sphin8 &i$es $oice to its
final son& of re$olt on the side of life( F@ui se coucbeF is e84
pressed syntactically 5as an uncommon attributi$e phrase7 and
rhythmically 5as an assymmetrical $iolation of the middle cae4
sura that is otherwise maintained7 in such a way that the seman4
tic coincidentia oppositorum in the rhyme4pair faroucheM?ui se
coucbe can be said to e8plode(
"I. The +6tro4968ti'6 "ori5on of Int6r9r6ti'6 Un76r4tan7ing 5the
Mo$ement of an Int6r9r6tation in t36 0econd Readin&7
@I ha$e found the definition of beauty:of my beauty( It is somethin&
ardent and sad somethin& a bit $a&ue lea$in& free play to conBec4
ture(@
"<
Baudelaire=s definition of beauty $ia an indeterminacy that
lea$es free play to @conBecture@ while at the same time also already
bein& delimited by the coincidentia oppositorum of ardent and triste,
may here ser$e to be&in the second mo$ement of the interpretation(
The first mo$ement was to follow the reader=s aesthetic perception
step by step until with the last line of the poem its form :if not ne4
cessarily also its meanin&:fulfilled itself as a whole for him( To find
the still unfulfilled meanin& demands as I already stated the return
from the end to the be&innin&:so that from the perspecti$e of the
achie$ed whole of the form the still indeterminate particulars mi&ht
be illuminated the series of conBectures clarified in their conte8ts
and the meanin& still left open sou&ht within the harmony of a co4
herence of meanin&( The conBectures of and Huestions left open by
the first readin& of the @0pleen@ poem allow themsel$es to be brou&ht
formally and thematically into a certain common denominator( The
percei$in& understandin& fell from $erse4&roup to $erse4&roup upon
&aps in the lyric consistency upon new be&innin&s or transitions e/
abrupto, so that at first an o$erarchin& moti$ation remained imper4
ceptible( Thus one should as% whether a latent principle of unity re4
->" K PDATI+ TAWT
co&niFable only within the horiFon of the second readin& lies in that
manifestly fra&mentary character of the lyric mo$ement that ma%es
itself felt as much in the irre&ular units of $erse as in the une8pected
representati$es who stand for the lyric subBect( And if the e8pecta4
tion of lyric consistency is fulfilled with the second readin& is the
Huestion then also resol$ed re&ardin& the meanin& of the title the
still un%nown si&nificance that spleen is supposed to ha$e for the
lyric @-@L
If one loo%s at the whole of the lyric form then Baudelaire=s
poem is uniHue in that on the one hand the strict norms of the ale84
andrine are preser$ed and played upon with $irtuosity and on the
other hand the symmetrical law of construction of this classical &enre
of poetry par e8cellence is continually $iolated by an asymmetrical
unfoldin& and retraction of the lyric mo$ement( If one recalls
Baudelaire=s definition of poetry4that it @responds with rhythm and
rhyme to the immortal needs of man for monotony symmetry and
surprise@
"3
4 then the surprisin& feature of this @0pleen@ poem lies in
the power of the asymmetrical tendency that in the strophic4symac4
tic units of $erse as well as in the boldness of the comparisons and
self4identifications increasin&ly wor%s a&ainst the harmoniFin& system
of $erse rhyme and syntactic parallelism only to be brou&ht to a
standstill at the end as if by command in the final strophe that
shoots across the rest 5Q=:Kesormais tu n=es plus > matiere $i$anteN@7(
This manifests itself most stri%in&ly in the irre&ularly de$elopin&
len&th of the se$en sentence units(
The lyrical mo$ement passes from the smallest4$erse4unit 5one line
-( -7 to the lar&est 5si8 lines --( -.4"37 and within this tensional arc it
hei&htens itself syntactically throu&h a twofold start as it were( That
is a sentence of four lines 5--( "427 follows upon the smallest sentence4
unit of line one whereupon the mo$ement be&ins anew this time
with a sentence two lines lon& 5--( >G?7 and then de$elops asymmetri4
cally accordin& to a formula of acceleration9 first three lines 5II( /4-17
then four 5--(--4-37 then four a&ain 5--( -24-/7 and finally si8 5--( -.4
"37( The asymmetrical acceleration is itself unconstant9 after the
steady mo$ement from two to three to four lines 5II( >4-37 the four4
line sentence4unit reduplicates itself so that amidst the impetuously
de$elopin& asymmetry a symmetrical structure of twice four lines
une8pectedly emer&es which is also bound to&ether most harmoni4
ously throu&h the sameness of the rhymes( The reader can ne$ertheless
afterwards repercei$e this confi&uration in the rhythm of the whole
mo$ement as a re$ersal of the acceleration into a monotony that
seems to &row into the immeasurable( This effect is similarly
PDATI+ TAWT K -><
produced throu&h the rhyme seHuence of the fourth and fifth sentence4
units where first the rhyme4pair versMchen follows upon lune, then the
doubled rhyme on eMee, which e8tends itself monotonously upon the
twice four rhyme4words( 'hen the asymmetrically de$eloped total
mo$ement is then brou&ht to a standstill at the end by the final
sentence4unit once a&ain harmoniously or&aniFed in three rhyme4
pairs the whole of the lyric structure confirms what was also to be
disco$ered in its parts from the be&innin& onward( The first fi$e
lines throu&h the chain of rhymes from ans+bilans to romances+
?uittances, already led to the effect of a de$elopin& mo$ement that
was then suddenly cut throu&h by the e8plosi$ely prosaic rhyme4
word cerveait, The formal principle that as the composite fi&ure of
an assymmetrical de$elopment and a sudden cuttin& off or&aniFes
the discontinuous total rhythm of the poem :this principle ob$ious4
ly corresponds to a thematic disco$ery on the part of the first read4
in&9 that the lyric @I@ in the course of his self4comparisons contin4
ually distin&uishes himself from the compared element and under4
ta%es new attempts at identification( Let us now see whether in the
reco&niFed or&aniFation the si&nificance of spleen mi&ht also be dis4
co$ered which si&nificance seemed to conceal itself from us in the
metamorphoses of the lyric @I@ and of the world of thin&s that it
e$o%ed(
Throu&h its bein& set off li%e a preamble the first $erse awa%ens
the e8pectation that memory could constitute the principle that es4
tablishes the unity of all the e$ocations and further that it could
pro$e to be the ori&in of the spleen of that eni&matic state of mind
of the @I@ who is spea%in&( At first the type and manner of the e$o4
cations does in fact seem to correspond to this e8pectation( )or re4
memberin& here leads neither to the happiness of time refound nor
to the melancholy sufferin& of the @no lon&er(@ Rememberin& e$i4
dently be&ins here with a &esture of self4transcendence which then
unHuestionin&ly turns into doubt as the $arious and always fruitless
attempts of the lyric @-@ to refind himself in a past then only present
him with the $iew of a world of thin&s that is emptied of meanin&(
'ithin this process the lyric @I@ as well can no lon&er remain self4
inte&ral in the mode of a self4certain subBect( This is indicated abo$e
all by the pro&ressi$e reshufflin& of the &rammatical person of the
subBect and its predicates9 the H>ai, the @I@ that has its memory is
followed by the distancin& il for the first obBect with which it com4
pares itself4 then by a e>est that cancels the distance as it compares
the subBect with the pyramid and &ra$e6 and thereafter by a distance4
less He suis that allows the comparandum and comparatum to become
->3 J PDATI+ TAWT
indistin&uishable within an @-@ that is first the cemetery then the
boudoir( 'ith the il of the personification which then comes on the
sta&e as ennui in the enBambment of the Taanii4sentence the former
lyric subBect is effecti$ely erased and at the same time the process of
memory is bro%en off( And when the $anished @-@ is finally apostro4
phised once a&ain in the &rammatical person of the tu, the lost iden4
tity is also apparent in the fact that the @I@ that no lon&er has or is
anythin& has one last and endurin& identification imposed upon it
by the anonymous and unreco&niFable authority of this apostrophe
: the identification with an il, the sphin8 as third person( Accord4
in&ly we can no lon&er consider memory as the principle that estab4
lishes unity6 it already succumbs to an obscure power that alienates
all the forms of the recalled past times the same power a&ainst which
the lyric subBect as well e$idently cannot maintain the inte&rity of its
consciousness of itself as an @I@ :so that both memory and auton4
omous subBect are at once destroyed( The ine8plicable moti$ation
that compels this @I@ to see% its identity in the space of a memory
that has become immeasurable the moti$ation that immediately al4
lows all of the past life that the subBect would &rasp either to disinte4
&rate chaotically or to ossify morbidly:what lies nearer at hand than
to reco&niFe this moti$ation in the power that Baudelaire with alle4
&orical e8a&&eration e8pressly allows to ta%e the place of the muF4
Fled @I@ and e$en names9 @(=ennui fruit de la morne incuriositeL@ If
ennui is in fact supposed to be able to unco$er the sou&ht4after
meanin& of spleen then first of all the @definition@ &i$en it as @fruit
of &loomy indifference@ must be ta%en seriously must be tested as
the %ey to an interpretation that at this point is not yet to ha$e re4
course to whate$er the history of the words spleen and ennui in
Baudelaire=s usa&e can tell us(
If one loo%s bac% from lines fifteen throu&h ei&hteen to line one
one can become aware that the ennui enters into the same mo$ement
of a de$elopment into the immeasurable as memory did at the be4
&innin&( 'ith the formulation @enters into@ - intend to call into
Huestion the understandin& that the ennui also causes the mo$ement(
)or it is precisely this that the syntactic structure of these lines lea$es
entirely uncertain9 the endless present of the @haltin& days@ that can
be compared with nothin& and the ennui that has de$eloped out of
the @snowed4in years@ into the immeasurable are temporally eHuated
by way of the ?uand+phrase, The ennui that allows the beauty of a
winter landscape at first recalled e/ neativo, to turn into &loomy
indifference :is it itself perhaps supposed to be only one amon& the
PDATI+ TAWT J ->2
other $iews of pro&ressi$e reification in which the lyric @I@ e8per4
iences the loss of its worldL In the first &o4throu&h we already no4
ticed that the ennui came forth not from the past but rather as a fi&4
ure of monotony from the present and that it allowed this present
to appear to last eternally( The aspect of @morne incuriosite@ thus is
also lac%in& to the e$ocations of the past that the first line produces(
Euite the contrary9 what be&ins with @J=ai plus de sou$enirs Hue si
B=a$ais mille ans@ therefore precisely produces the further attempts
at the search for identity for this @I@ is o$erpowered by memories
that could not become a matter of indifference to i t :since it is in
terror of not bein& able to for&et but at the same time not bein& able
to redisco$er itself in that which is remembered( 'hat in the first
readin& we could ha$e ta%en for a &esture of self4presumption now
announces much more a terror in the face of the limitless that opens
up with the first comparati$e 5@plus de sou$enirs@7 and returns with
the second one 5@moins de secrets@7( The terror renews itself when
the @I@ haphaFardly recalls remembered or represented places in a
hasty mo$ement as if it had to see% a halt to a &rowin& emptiness
and yet in e$erythin& where it lin&ers :des% pyramid &ra$e ceme4
tery or boudoir:can always &rasp hold only of thin&s from a dead
time9 emblems of a ceaseless reification that allows the past life to
which they refer to become un%nowable and that in the end falls
upon the autonomous subBect itself(
In this interpretation the formal disco$ery coincides with the
thematic one9 the compositional fi&ure of the asymmetrical de$elop4
ment of the rhythmic mo$ement then suddenly bein& cut off a&ain
coincides with the fra&mented continuity of an e8perience of self
become ceaseless in which the lyric @I@ tries a&ain and a&ain in $ain
to rebuild the collapsed world within the ima&inary( 'ith this the
Huestion of what spleen can mean as an e8perience of the lyric @I@
finds an answer that can be Huite simply stated( )rom now on spleen
can ta%e on the meanin& of an une8pressed an8iety:the world4
an8iety
"2
that as a principle establishin& unity is able to e8plain the
latent ori&in as well as the manifest conseHuences of the spleen6 the
collapse of all e&o4centered orientation accordin& to which space and
time open up onto the unencompassable as well as the $anishin&
path of the @I@ see%in& a halt who obBectifies himself in the relics of
his $ainly proBected world( This hypothesis should first be stren&th4
ened by way of an e8ternal mode of ar&umentation and then tested
when we follow the interpretation throu&h to the end(
In morality as in physics I ha$e always had the sensation of the abyss
->> K PDATI+ TAWT
Nouffre8 not only the abyss of sleep but the abyss of action dream
memory desire sorrow remorse beauty number etc( I ha$e culti$ated
my hysteria with pleasure and terror(
">
+ontained in this famous note in =on coeur mis a nu is the first
premonition of the mental illness to which Baudelaire was to suc4
cumb four years later( The Huoted te8t has been drawn upon abo$e
all for the interpretation of the @Gouffre@ poem and a noteworthy
@poetics of the fall@ has been deri$ed from it that ma%es the double
meanin& of la chute B theolo&ical as well as psychoanalytic:useful
for the understandin& of Baudelaire=s poetry(
"?
But the note can also
be read as a commentary that is surprisin&ly closer te8tually to our
@0pleen@ poem( Then it describes world4an8iety as a brea% in e8per4
ience that tends to enter amidst the accomplishments and states of
mind of the familiar world in memory as well as in remorse or de4
sire in e$eryday acti$ity as well as in the e8perience of beauty( Dne
reco&niFes here without difficulty the stations alon& the $anishin&
path of the @-@ in the @0pleen@ poem 5@le &ouffre du sou$enir de
-=action du beau@ in the turn to the past the present and the future6
reret and remords are not represented while nombre is to be related
to memory des$ perhaps to beauty76 e8cept that in the poem the
abyss of an8iety is obBectified not as the undercurrent from a depth
but rather as terror in the face of the limitless a&ainst which the en4
thralled @I@ can at first still oppose representations of enclosure 5the
des% pyramid &ra$e cemetery boudoir7( In passin& I mi&ht refer
to the fact that if one ta%es spleen as the e8perience and poetic ob4
Bectification of world4an8iety Baudelaire=s poem corresponds
throu&h and throu&h to disco$eries brou&ht to li&ht by the pheno4
menolo&ically oriented psychiatry of an8iety4psychoses(
"/
An8iety is
described there as the collapse of the primordial situation that is of
the construction of the world from out of the @I@4body center6 the
conseHuence of this collapse is the destruction of the certainty our
senses deri$e from our spatial and temporal e8perience( After the
body has lost its anchorin& in the world in the catastrophe of an8iety
the followin& symptoms appear9 one=s own space and alienated space
collapse to&ether6 pro8imity and distance can in$ert themsel$es6 in the
middle of the world a$ailable for e8perience a locus of corporeal
emptiness can delimit itself that can no lon&er be disclosed by one=s
own body but rather is e8perienced as the $erte8 of an infinite
$anishin& line6 the fra&mentation of the natural e8perience of time
manifests itself in an emptied @time without for&etfulness@6 and finally
the loss of orientation that is hei&htened to the point of world4
PDATI+ TAWT K ->?
catastrophe tends to be compensated for by the psychotic in see%in&
to rebuild his lost world in the ima&inary in producin& delusi$e spa4
tial ima&es amon& which the prison has predominant si&nificance(
If this bio&raphic4psycholo&ical e8cursus ser$es to identify world4
an8iety as a possible latent ori&in of @0pleen@ then now it is a matter
of pursuin& the poetic obBectification of such world4an8iety in the
course of which :as is to be e8pected :the poem increasin&ly
transcends its psychopatholo&ical substratum( In its literary represen4
tation an8iety is always an8iety that has already been mastered in
the achie$ement of form throu&h aesthetic sublimation( Just as Bau4
delaire=s poem %nows how to brin& into lan&ua&e the most e8treme
alienation of the consciousness that has been o$erpowered by an8iety
it in fact brin&s about its own catharsis( As ineluctably as the process
of self4alienation pro&resses into a loss of the world traces of rebel4
lion are nonetheless indicated in the counterima&es that are e$o%ed(
The recalled spaces of memory are not immediately handed o$er to
chaos and ossification but rather first ta%e on a form of @beautiful
disorder@ before they succumb to the emptiness of meanin&( A$en in
the terrible the @I@ filled with an8iety disco$ers unanticipated spec4
tacles of beauty alon& its escape path( The first readin& came upon
a poetry of details in the ima&ery of the bureau=s contents the bou4
doir and the wintery ennui a poetry that can inBect itself as it were
into the catalo& of the dead thin&s 5most beautifully in @a$ec de
lourds che$eu8 roules dans des Huittances@7( And e$en in the fear4
inducin& no4man=s4land of the @0ahara brumeu8@ the hi&hly poetic
repertoire of slumberin& &ranite for&otten sphin8 unheard son& and
settin& sun is offered up in opposition to the space of an8iety pre4
sented by the petrification( )inally in response to @farouche@ as the
epithet of sa$a&e doubt @Hui se couche@ appears in the final couplet
as an ironic &esture reconciled in rhyme of decline within beauty(
The sphin8 in the e$ocation of which the @re$erie petrifiante@ is
completed is the ultimate form of the reification of the lyric @I@
the place4holder of the fallen subBect and the ori&in of the son& the
sublation of terror into poetry4all combined into one(
'ith what ri&ht can one in this manner interpret the sphin8 as the
last in the series of @metamorphoses@ of the lyric @-@L Tal% of @meta4
morphoses@ presupposes the representation of or&anic transforma4
tion of a preser$ed substantial identity of the subBect and it is there4
fore not appropriate to the e8perience of the lyric @I@ in this @0pleen@
poem an @-@ that precisely loses its substantial identity as a subBect
step by step( Its path of e8perience is therefore also not defined
->/ J PDATI+ TAWT
throu&h a continuous transformation of forms of the alien world
and of one=s own person that e$en in its fall would lea$e the suffer4
in& self with the final refu&e of an opposin& or otherwise e8cluded
standpoint( The path of e8perience under the spell of spleen is much
more conditioned throu&h a discontinuous re$ersal of the @-@ into
a non4@l@ of the most proper into the most alien6 the boundary
between inside and outside collapses and what was internally sub4
lated can now return from outside as a forei&n power in which the
@I@ can no lon&er reco&niFe the alienation of itself(
Baudelaire found in alle&ory the poetic instrument that first
and foremost allows this process of a destruction of the self to
be made representable( This @0pleen@ poem brin&s to $iew in an
e8emplary manner the new re$i$al of the alle&orical method that
had been declared dead( At the be&innin& in lines two throu&h fi$e
the classical form of the de$eloped comparison is first still em4
ployed but with the peculiarity that the comparatum 5@mon cer4
$eau@7 delayed across the three lines only retrospecti$ely allows
the &reatly drawn4out comparandum 5@un &ros meuble@7 to be4
come reco&niFable as such( Thus the effect arises that the real e84
ternal scene of the decor:@un &ros meuble a tiroir@ etc( :un4
noticeably re$erses into the internal scene9 @cache moins de secrets
Hue mon triste cer$eau( @ In the ne8t step the classical boundary
between comparandum and comparatum is annulled throu&h the
fact that the lyric @I@ unnoticeably combines itself with the com4
pared element in the act of comparison9 @Je suis un cimetiere ( ( (
Je suis un boudoir(@ Here one can spea% absolutely of alle&orical
identification 5for which no precedent is %nown to me from the
earlier Romance tradition7 for with the cancellation of the com4
parison the @I@ posits itself as the same as what it is not(
".
The
failure of this desperate and powerful attempt at identification im4
mediately introduces a second attempt that demonstrates once a&ain
that the @I@ in spleen can no lon&er master the alien world on its
own( )or the subseHuent step Baudelaire introduced the personi4
fyin& alle&ory( If it traditionally allowed a state of mind such as
ennui to come onto the sta&e in alle&orical di&nity:as well as to
&loss its ori&in in a pseudo4learned way and to ele$ate its effect into
the realm of the cosmic:here it attains a new function namely
to ma%e $isible the o$erpowerin& of the self throu&h the alien or
5as one may now also put it7 the e&o throu&h the id( The wintery
world that has imperceptibly become the sta&e on which ennur
alone still rules has at the same time e8cluded the @I@ from the
PDATI+ TAWT J ->.
sta&e e$en thou&h the forei&n power is nothin& other than @&loomy
indifference@ than an alienation of itself(
The @I@ e8cluded from the sta&e of the world appears distanced
in a threefold manner in line nineteen9 it has become a @you@ that
must cede the central place of the subBect to another @I@6 it is
e8iled out of the present into an unchan&eable future beside the
world and it has e$idently forfeited its corporeal as well as its
spiritual form since now it is addressed only as @matiere $i$ante(@
'hate$er is still li$in& in it will succumb to a materialiFation that
at the sta&e of disappearance represented by the &ranite bloc% turns
as it were the @hard core@ of the innermost self toward the out4
side and threatens the lyric @I@ with total ossification( The apodic4
tic tone of a Bud&ment bein& handed down and the ironically celeb4
ratory address of line nineteen : @Kesormais tu n=es plus > matiere
$i$anteN@ :su&&est this interpretation( Koes this mean that in the
end the world4an8iety in$erts into an an8iety about bein& Bud&edL
In fa$or of this idea is the possibility of interpretin& archetypally
the authority of a super4e&o that imposes this Bud&ment and remains
anonymous9 accordin& to Gaston Bachelard the dream of bein&
petrified can si&nify terror of God=s worth(
<1
There is e$en an
archetypal meanin& for the sphin89 it can stand for the fi&ure of
the fallen so$erei&n into which the disempowered autonomous
subBect can be transposed(
<
=
Met the poem precisely does not end in such archetypal sym4
bolism( In its final ima&e two secular myths:sphin8 and pillars
of memory:are brou&ht to&ether and employed a&ainst the tradi4
tion in a new way to prepare for the lyric mo$ement=s final re$er4
sal( The sphin8 normally conceals a truth especially for him who
mi&ht sol$e its riddle but here it has become a @remembrance for
no one@ an alle&ory of the for&otten( But as the sphin8 itself now
brea%s its petrified silence and be&ins to sin& the mytholo&ical
reminder of the statue of memory immediately indicates one final
thin& and a first thin& for a second time9 the last hour of sin&in&
since it sounds here not at dawn but at the settin& of the sun6 and
the risin& of beauty into son& which o$ercomes an8iety and atones
for the loss of the @-(@ Thus at the end the poem leads the reader
bac% to its be&innin&9 throu&h the final form of its subBect which
now becomes retrospecti$ely reco&niFable in the firstT form 5for
who may say with &reater ri&ht than the sphin8 @B=ai plus de
sou$enirs Hue si B=a$ais mille ans@L7 and throu&h the compositional
fi&ure of a @poetry of poetry@ that describes its own comin& into
-?1 K PDATI+ TAWT
bein& 5for what is the sphin8 to sin& about if not of that which
the poem already encompassesL7(
I!( Baudelaire=s @0pleen@ within the +han&in& HoriFon of
the History of its Reception 5Historical
#nderstandin& and Aesthetic Jud&ment7
To the e8tent that we decided to arran&e the historical interpretation
accordin& to a first aesthetic one and a second interpreti$e one
the reconstruction of the primary literary4historical conte8t within
which the poem was recei$ed must introduce the historical in$es4
ti&ation of our e8ample( 'hich e8pectations on the part of its
contemporary readers can this @0pleen@ poem ha$e fulfilled or
deniedL 'hat was the literary tradition and what was the historical
and social situation with which the te8t mi&ht ha$e come to ha$e
a relationL How mi&ht the author himself ha$e understood his poemL
And what was the meanin& &i$en to it by the first reception and
which meanin&s were only made concrete in the later history of its
receptionL In such Huestions historical understandin& is not only
directed toward the reconstruction of the past( It should at the
same time brin& to $iew the temporal distance that was leapt o$er
in the first and second sta&es of our readin&s and allow one to
reco&niFe throu&h the e8plicit separation of the past and present
horiFons of understandin& how the meanin& of the poem has un4
folded itself historically in the interaction between effect and recep4
tion:up to those $ery Huestions that &uide our interpretation and
to which the te8t in its own time did not yet ha$e to be the answer(
It must first be ac%nowled&ed that our poem can be the paradi&m
for such a hermeneutic demonstration only with considerable Huali4
fication( In the nineteenth century the contemporary criticism was
directed abo$e all to wor%s as wholes which after the obli&atory
and for the most part only rhetorically intended praise or blame of
the style were immediately seen within the relationship of the
author=s wor% and life and were rather Bud&ed morally than ap4
preciated aesthetically( An e8ception is pro$ided by Baudelaire=s
reception throu&h the followin& &enerations of poets who be4
&innin& with Gautier=s famous foreword to the -/>/ edition of
!leurs du mal, ele$ated him to the position of &odfather of the
postromantic moderns( But e$en there one rarely finds interpreta4
tions of indi$idual poems6 they are to be e8pected only when
Baudelaire be&an to ma%e it into the academic literary canon( The
theme of our poem nonetheless allows us to follow the footprints
PDATI+ TAWT K -?-
of its immediate reception for spleen was much discussed as a %ey
word within Baudelaire=s pro$ocati$e aesthetics( A$en the harshest
attac% which G( Bourdin the trend4settin& !iaro critic launched
a&ainst the !leurs du mal in -/2? culminates in a Huotation from
our @0pleen@ poem9 @Dne line of M( Baudelaire admirably sum4
mariFes his manner6 why did he not ma%e it the epi&raph to the
!leurs du mal)BAe suis un cimetiere abhnrre de la lune,F
::
An
e8tended analysis of the !leurs du mal>s horiFon of e8pectations
and pro$ocati$e effect could reconstruct the aesthetic and moral
norms from out of the numerous documents of its misunderstand4
in& which precipitated abo$e all in the trial a&ainst Baudelaire and
his publisher :norms with which Baudelaire bro%e in a way that
e$idently struc% at the self4satisfaction of the 0econd Ampire=s
bour&eois society in its most sensiti$e area and startled it from
its easy belief in pro&ress( )or the purposes of our in$esti&ation
the procedure can be abbre$iated by appealin& to an eyewitness
of particular competence who from a distance of ten years &a$e
one of the first &reat appreciations of the wor% and accurate defenses
of his friend and reco&niFed more clearly than other contemporaries
Bust what %ind of horiFonal chan&e had une8pectedly been intro4
duced here by a scant $olume of poems(
Theophile Gautier=s @*otice@ of -/>/ already saw Baudelaire=s
turnin& away from romanticism in its full literary aesthetic and
social importance(
<3
The !leurs du mal were mar%ed by a @final
hour of ci$iliFation@ 5p( ".7( They arose in opposition to the illusions
of bour&eois democracy as well as to those of its reformers 5@the
philanthropists the pro&ressi$ists the utilitarians the humanitarians
the #topians@ p( -.7( And they had created a new @style of deca4
dence@ that for the first time at all could brin& to li&ht the maladie
de i>epo?ue moderne 5p( 2"7 the hitherto unac%nowled&ed sufferin&
under the unnatural conditions of the contemporary society( The im4
morality that one attributed to Baudelaire would obscure the
stren&th of his critiHue of the rulin& ideolo&ies and especially of
materialism a critiHue that was also publicly announced in his
articles on Poe(
<s
If Baudelaire=s lyrics could descend into the u&ly
the repulsi$e or the sic%ly they also %now how:in opposition
to the @realist school@ 5p( 2"7:to raise themsel$es once a&ain into
the @bluest re&ions of the spiritual@ so that the subtitle @0pleen et
Ideal@ mi&ht $ery well ha$e stood for the boo% as a whole 5p( "17(
'ith this Gautier made recourse to an ar&ument that Baudelaire
himself had already used in defendin& the !leurs du malK his boo%
would be misunderstood in its @terrible morality@ if one did not
-?" K PDATI+ TAWT
Bud&e it as a whole9 @To blasphemy I oppose fli&hts toward hea$en6
to obscenity Platonic flowers ( ( ( O I t is; a boo% destined to
represent the spirit=s state of a&itation within e$il(@
<>
Thus the in4
di$idual poem can and should thorou&hly offend the moral sen4
sibility of the contemporary reader a&ain and a&ain6 its pro$ocati$e
amorality is nonetheless balanced out within the conception of the
cycle of poems and only then would it be understood in accord
with Baudelaire= s intention as a critiHue of the present a&e of
the ideolo&y and the morality of appearances of the society of
the 0econd Ampi re4 as a crit iHue of it s t ime in t he medium of
a pure poetry that is supposed to surpass in its moral ri&or the
mimetic realism of the no$el as well as the direct complaint of
satire and caricature(
The testimonial $alue of his interpretation is raised precisely by
the fact that Theophile Gautier reco&niFed and praised the latent
function as social criticism of the !leurs du mal, e$en thou&h it
contradicted his doctrine of =an pour =an or at least &a$e a meanin&
to it that could scarcely ha$e been e8pected( In its e8planation of
the misunderstandin& that precipitated in the reactions on the part
of the literary public of -/2? his interpretation already specifies
e$erythin& that the ideolo&ical research of our time mi&ht %now how
to in$esti&ate re&ardin& the social e8pectations and illusions the
material conditions of the life4world and the residue of the failed
re$olution of -/3/ in the historical consciousness of Baudelaire=s
contemporaries( 'ithin the confines of my historical readin&
Gautier=s interpretation can therefore stand for the analysis of the
!leurs du mat> s horiFon of e8pectations within the li$ed world
which analysis cannot be carried out here( A materialist interpreta4
tion mi&ht not be satisfied with the disco$ery of this percepti$e
eyewitness and mi&ht want to find in Baudelaire=s wor% more
concrete reflections of the social4historical process within the 0econd
Ampire or traumatic traces of the defeat of -/3/6 but it would ha$e
to do so throu&h purchase of the method of alle&oresis without
which an interpretation of the literary superstructure from the con4
ditions of the economic infrastructure is seldom to be had( 'alter
BenBamin for e8ample saw in @Re$e parisien@ @the phantasy of the
forces of production ha$in& been shut down@6 D( 0ahlber& sees
suppressed memories of -/3/ in the $ersions of an8iety of the
@0pleen@ poems as well as in wishful erotic ima&es such as @Moesta
et Arrabunda@ or @Les BiBou8@6 'olf&an& )iet%au sees in the ne&a4
ti$e Platonism of *ndroma?ue, He pense a vousY Baudelaire=s poetic
as well as political effort to come to &rips with the coup d=etat of
PDATI+ TAWT K -?<
" Kecember -/2-6 K( Dehler sees in @+orrespondances@ an @attac%
upon official nature6 i(e( upon the order of the rulin& class(@
<?
'hoe$er would ac%nowled&e such findin&s cannot do without com4
pensatin& for the lac% of an obBecti$e mimetic relation throu&h the
subBecti$e mediation of an alle&orical meanin&( In my opinion
such alle&oresis in its modern usa&e is not to be flatly dismissed
but rather is thorou&hly le&itimate hermeneutically when it reco&niFes
its subBecti$e heuristics and therefore its partiality and conseHuently
no lon&er ma%es the do&matic claim of ha$in& achie$ed the true
and :now finally:@obBecti$e@ readin&( Another Huestion is the one
first posed by 'alter BenBamin9 whether the @$iew of the alienated@
in the !leurs du mal mi&ht not ha$e been the $iew of an alle&oriFer
of modernity6 - shall return to this Huestion later(
Gautier e8plains spleen throu&h a description of the alienated
life of metropolitan ci$iliFation9 @He OBaudelaire; lo$es to pursue
the man withered shri$elled up contorted con$ulsed by the artifi4
cial passions and the real ennui of modernity to pursue him across
the sinuosities of this immense madrepore of Paris in order to sur4
prise him in his unhappiness his an&uish his misery his prostrations
and his e8citements his ner$ousness and his despair@ 5p( "-7( The
@flowers of e$il@ &row there where the @for&et4me4nots roses
daisies and $iolets@ of romantic nature surely can thri$e no more(
0pleen as sufferin& from modern reality is accordin&ly as sharply
distin&uished from the indeterminate &eltscbmer# of the romantic
poets as the @blac% filth of the pa$ement@ is from the @sprin&4li%e
&reen of the rural suburbs(@
</
But Gautier also reco&niFes that
there is a @philosophy and metaphysics@ at the bottom of the anti4
naturalism of the !leurs du mal 5pp( 2 < 2>79 the thesis of fallen
nature applied to aesthetics from the theolo&y of ori&inal sin
which has as its conseHuence for the modern concept of art the fact
that the beautiful may no lon&er owe anythin& to nature(
<.
Gautier
therefore praises the @Re$e parisien@ as one of the poems in which
Baudelaire had dri$en nature completely out of a landscape 5p( <.7(
His preference for the artificial which his ima&ination often allows
to e8tend to the border of the hallucinatory 5p( 317 is for Gautier
the appropriate attitude for the poet to adopt toward his time the
nineteenth century that can no lon&er return to nai$ete 5p( ->7(
The poet of the !leurs du mal is therefore eirher unintentionally
mannered or as it were born already mannered %naturellement
maniere', in the same way that in other times one simply and natur 4
ally be&an to li$e 5p( -27( Amon& the necessarily artificial features
of Baudelaire=s modern lyrics belon&s abo$e all a pro$ocati$e deper4
-?3 J PDATI+ TAWT
sonaliFation of poetry that Gautier reco&niFes in the reBection
of the romantic doctrine of the unconscious creati$ity of the inspired
poet 5pp( "3 and ?"7 as well as in the renunciation of immediate
e8pression of indi$idual feelin& 5p( <27( In the place of romantic
subBecti$ity the necessarily di$ided consciousness of the modern
poet has come upon the scene9 @All sensation becomes for him the
motif of an analysis( In$oluntarily he doubles himself and lac%in&
any other subBect becomes the spy of himself@ 5p( -"7(
'ith this Gautier s%etches the new aesthetic canon that e8plains
se$eral thin&s historically9 the public uproar and the prosecution of
the !leurs du maY in the name of bour&eois morality6 the refusal
of reception on the part of the maBority of contemporary readers6
and its first concretiFation as a trailblaFin& wor% of decadence
by the appro$in& literary a$ant4&arde( If we now as% which e8pec4
tations on the part of a reader educated in romantic poetry would
ha$e allowed one to reBect a poem li%e our @0pleen@ poem then
the norms of the @lyrics of e8perience@ 71rlebnislyri$8 stand wholly
in the fore&round9 the correspondence between nature and soul
the communication of &eneral human feelin&s and the transparence
of self4e8pression in the medium of poetry( Dn the other hand
in the continual in$ersions of outer and inner reality Baudelaire=s
poem no lon&er allows one to reco&niFe the harmony of nature
landscape and psyche( In the unforeseeable chan&es of shape of the
lyric @I@ the continuity of a meanin&ful e8perience can no lon&er
be reco&niFed( And in the worlds proBected by consciousness the
e8pressions of an inte&ral self are no lon&er reco&niFable( Here the
poet no lon&er presupposes the most familiar feelin&s and moods
in which the reader could find himself confirmed6 rather he demands
that the @hypocrite lecteur mon semblable mon frere@ reco&niFe
himself in e$erythin& that his poetic alter e&o %nows how to brin&
to li&ht in the unfamiliar terrifyin& or shameful from out of the
@deepest and ultimate hell of the soul( @
31
)or this Gautier also
coined the formulation @an unedited side of the soul and thin&s@
5p( -.76 if one adds the already Huoted @spy of himself@ to the
@unedited side of the soul@ then these phrases testify to the still
&ropin& attempt to describe somethin& for which the theory of the
unconscious was not yet a$ailable( Here one can &rasp the threshold
that Baudelaire stepped across as the poet of modernity9 the pro$o4
cati$e effect of his !leurs du mat arose finally from his renderin&
romantic interiority asubBecti$e or put another way from the
attempt to ma%e poetry into the medium of a return of the repressed
PDBT-+TAWTD -?2
and the tabooed an attempt before which e$en the @blac% roman4
tics@ had still remained inhibited(
This manifests itself abo$e all in the poetic method that Baudelaire
put to use as the first poet to do so for a lon& time:alle&ory( @Dne
of the most primordial and natural forms of poetry@ :thus did
Baudelaire in the l>aradis artificiels 5-/2/7 name this @so $ery
spiritual &enre@
3-
that had been brou&ht into disrepute in the
nineteenth century particularly throu&h paintin&( He renewed its
function in that he made it into an instrument for the deper4
sonaliFation of poetic e8pression( I ha$e in$esti&ated elsewhere how
Baudelaire in the course of &roundin& his @supernatural@ theory of
modern poetry came to rehabilitate the literary form of alle&ory
upon which he had stumbled in describin& the hei&htened percep4
tions under the influence of hashish and how thereafter the alle4
&oriFin& personification achie$ed an une8pected resurrection in the
!leurs du mal,
444
There as the e8uberant use of capitaliFed sub4
stanti$es already shows Baudelaire helped the discredited personifi4
cation toward a new @substantial maBesty@ in that he opposed it
to the immediate e8pression of feelin&s on the part of romantic
poetry( He thereby won bac% for the modern lyric a new means of
renderin& abstractions sensible and he created the poetic model of
a modern psycbomachia that:as with )reud= s psychoanalysis
shortly thereafter:puts into Huestion the supremacy of the self4
conscious @I@ within the psychic economy(
3<
The historical interpretation of our te8t has thus led to a recon4
struction of its counterposition within the horiFons of e8pectations
of romantic poetry a reconstruction that is now to be secured
throu&h the hermeneutic method of widenin& the conte8t( )or this
I can refer the reader to the already mentioned study in which I
commented on Baudelaire=s recourse to alle&ory poetolo&ically as
well as in an interpretation of the four @0pleen@ poems(
33
The
conte8t pro$ided by this &roup of poems confirms the historical
readin& of our @0pleen@ poem in a twofold manner9 there as here
Baudelaire had recourse to the alle&orical method to undo the
romantic e8pectation of a harmony between nature and psyche
and to call the powers of the unconscious into play a&ainst the self4
masterin& subBect( There as here he deepened the recei$ed theme
of weariness with life or 'eltschmerF :which romantics had cul4
ti$ated as ennui:into that of world4an8iety9 and the new %ey word
spleen + ele$ated from patholo&y into poetry:can be considered
the reification of this an8iety( Around this time the word=s history
-?> a PDATI+ TAWT
e8pressly re&isters this chan&e in meanin& from the @An&lish disease@
to that of a %ey word for modern )rench poetry(
32
The definition
&i$en in the 5ictionnaire universel du JlJeme siecle of -/?2
3>
e$en applies a theory of decadence to this @new word for an old
thin&@ that could ha$e been drawn from Theophile Gautier=s
@*otice(@ Gautier himself had there actually distin&uished spleen
in the new sense of Baudelaire=s poetry of decadence, from ennui
as a shop4worn aesthetic norm now considered typical for @bour4
&eois cra$enness(@ He did this as he &lossed the introductory poem of
the !leurs du mal, and found that Baudelaire had not spared his
reader @accusin& him despite his hypocrisy of ha$in& all the $ices
that he condemns in others and of nourishin& in his heart that
&rand modern monster Annui6 the reader who with his bour&eois
cra$enness tamely dreams of Roman debauches and acts of fero4
ciousness:a bureaucrat=s *ero a shop4%eeper=s Helio&abal(@
3?
In the chapter of Paul Bour&et=s Psycholoie contempomine
5-//<7 de$oted to Baudelaire the &roup of @0pleen@ poems is es4
pecially emphasiFed( Bour&et belie$es himself able to &round on these
pieces his thesis that Baudelaire=s nihilism 5now named as suchN7
arose from the loss of +atholic faith( )irst is a description of the
@uni$ersal nausea@ from which contemporary society suffers in a
continuation of Gautier=s theory of decadence that Bour&et allows
to culminate in a pro&nosis that has since become hi&hly contem4
porary9 @But slowly surely the belief in the ban%ruptcy of nature
unfolds itself which promises to become the sinister faith of the
twentieth century if science or an in$asion by barbarians does not
sa$e humanity which has become too reflecti$e of the lassitude
of its own thou&ht(@
3/
Baudelaire as the contemporary of deca4
dence is said to ha$e made himself into its theorist and as poet
to ha$e combined three persons within himself in the most modern
manner9 he is at once mystic libertine and the analyst of both(
This coincidentia oppositorum is most easily e8plained psycho4
lo&ically when one refers the @analyFin& libertine@ bac% to a @dis4
abused +atholic(@ Baudelaire=s spleen would not be so abysmal
and his nihilism would not be so sharply distin&uished from romantic
lamentations of lost happiness were it not that his poetry pre4
supposed a horror vacui left behind by the abandoned faith(
3
0ince in the &roup of @0pleen@ poems there is no trace of this ten4
dency to be found it is not surprisin& that Bour&et must ha$e re4
course to @Madri&al triste@ and to a strophe of @Le !oya&e@ to
brin& to li&ht within the manifestations of spleen the still pulsin&
conscience and the unHuenchable desire for God on the part of one
PDATI+ TAWT n -??
who is fundamentally a @mystical soul(@ The wea%nesses of this
interpretation are certainly more e$ident today than in Bour&et=s
time9 if in the tension between spleen et ideal, one wanted to find
only an unintentional seculariFation of +hristian beliefs then the
modernity of the !leurs du mal would not be essentially different
from the e8perience of @empty transcendence@ already disco$ered
lon& before by the romantic poetry of solitude( But contrary to
this $iew Baudelaire not only consciously and pro$ocati$ely pro4
faned mystical e8periences 5as in @A une Madonne@7 and litur&ical
models 5as in @Les litanies de 0atan@76 he also radicaliFed the
+hristian theolo&y of ori&inal sin itself when he le&itimated the
antinaturalism of his aesthetics a&ainst the nature reli&ion of roman4
ticism with an interpretation of Genesis < accordin& to which all
of nature was corrupted alon& with the fall of Adam and A$e into
sin(
0i
Dnly with this @pro$ocati$e seculariFation@ does the deroman4
tiFation of romanticism be&in and the !leur du mat>s threshold to
modernity become reco&niFable(
2"
Bour&et=s thesis of seculariFation was almost epochal in the
history of Baudelaire=s reception( The concretiFation of the meanin&
of the !leurs du mal as a decadent modern=s poetry of nihilism was
ta%en up shortly thereafter by Huysmans and ele$ated to an aesthetic
cult in * rebours 5-//279 Kes Asseintes ta%es Baudelaire=s wor%
printed and decorated in a pri$ate edition in the most e8pensi$e
fashion and places it on a pri$ate altar as a missal opened to the
poem @Anywhere out of the world(@ Met Huysmans offers another
reason for spleen9 it is no lon&er the bac%lash of lost +atholic faith
but rather the unintentional return of repressed dri$es that Baudelaire
was supposed to ha$e been the first to decipher in the @hiero&lyphs
ot the soul(@ The interpreti$e model for this psycholo&ical concreti4
Fation would predominate for a lon& time and later enter into the
psychoanalytic interpretation( In this it is stri%in& that the cathartic
side of the !leur du mat>s @moral psycholo&y@ :and to&ether with
it the sublimation of spleen into @the beautiful within the ter4
rible@4did not come into the picture at all( The aesthetic apprecia4
tion of Baudelaire had its &round bro%en only slowly by his recep4
tion throu&h !erlaine Rimbaud Mallarme and !alcry4the later
classicists of the epoch of the modern lyric that was initiated by
him(@ In the reception on the part of these poets there is no direct
testimony for the history of the interpretation of our @0pleen
poem( In his eslay of -.3" which demonstrates why Baudelaire
has now reached; the pea% of his fame !alery introduces only tne
poem @Recueilletnent(@ It is let me note in passin& the only poem
-?/ J PDATI+ TAWT
in the whole cycle in which the method of alle&orical personification
is employed not for alienation but for the transfi&uration of a
situation(
23
'hen !alery praises Baudelaire for ha$in& understood
@how to construct a lan&ua&e within lan&ua&e@ and thereby ha$in&
reBu$enated the )rench lyric
22
this formulation also includes the
compositional fi&ure cut by our @0pleen@ poem :a @poetry of
poetry@ that describes its own comin& into bein& and that !alery
himself perpetuated in his @+imetiere marin@ and elsewhere(
F-pleen e8hibits e8perience in its bare essentials( 'ith terror
the melancholic sees the world fallen bac% into a bare state of
nature( *o breath of pre4history surrounds it( *o aura(@
2>
These
lines from the unfinished body of 'alter BenBamin=s Baudelaire
studies read li%e an interpretation of our @0pleen@ poem( Althou&h
BenBamin left behind no finished interpretation of this poem his
name nonetheless may not be left absent from this history of recep4
tion( )or it was BenBamin who in the Thirties reco&niFed the
@modern alle&orist@ in Baudelaire and thereby laid the &round for
a concretiFation of the @0pleen@ poems that e$en today is still
une8hausted( To him we owe the insi&ht that brou&ht to li&ht the
buried connection between the older tradition of alle&ory that
declined after its last flowerin& in the baroHue and its reawa%enin&
in the !leurs du mal" @The alle&orical mode of intuition is always
built upon a de$alued world of appearances( The specific de$alua4
tion of the world of thin&s that lies in the commodity is the founda4
tion of the alle&orical intention in Baudelaire(@
2?
'hat has radically
chan&ed between the baroHue and the modern because of the social
and economic process may be read out of the transformed e84
perience of nature9 whereas the melancholy of the baroHue alle&orist
responds to an e8perience of transience @which $alues history as
natural history or more precisely as the =Passion story of the
world=@
2/
the spleen of the modern alle&orist responds to a con4
dition of the commodity4producin& society that:in $iew of a
ceaseless technical de$elopment :no lon&er allows one to still e84
perience the thorou&hly reified world as nature( 'hat distin&uishes
Baudelaire=s spleen from the a&e4old taedium vitae is the conscious4
ness of this self4alienation that has appeared
2.
a feelin& @that
corresponds to a permanent catastrophe@
>1
a @na%ed terror@ wholly
different from !ictor Hu&o=s @cosmic horror(@
>-
The alle&orical
intention that accordin& to BenBamin has always laid to ruin the
coherence within life in order to appropriate for thin&s:a&ainst
their appearances:a si&nificance within an emblematic conte8t9
in the nineteenth century this intention comes upon a world of
POETIC TE-T . 179
thin&s transformed throu&h the commodity4form and in itself al4
ready emptied of meanin&6 @the de$aluation of the world of thin&s
in alle&ory is within the world of thin&s itself surpassed by the
commodity(@ The return of the old emblem that modern alle&orists
reco&niFe under the co$er of the new commodity4form
>"
customarily
remains concealed from their contemporaries throu&h the fetishistic
character of the commodity throu&h the price that allows its use4
$alue to $anish into purely Huantitati$e e8chan&e4$alue as well as
throu&h the ad$ertisement that lends the beautiful semblance of
the poetic to the world of commodities6 while in the wor% of art
the commodity4form is e8pressed more stron&ly than before(
><
In li&ht of this attempt to Bustify a materialist &enesis for
Baudelaire=s recourse to alle&ory one can see the destructi$e ten4
dency of the alle&orical intention at wor% in our @0pleen@ poem
and interpret what is struc% by it as the @e8perience of a world
in a state of ri&or mortis(@
>3
Alsewhere BenBamin remar%ed about
the poem that it is @oriented throu&h and throu&h toward an em4
pathy with a material that is dead in a double sense( It is anor&anic
Omaterial;( ( ( ( The ima&e of the sphin8 with which the poem
closes has the obscure beauty of the stalls of shops as one still comes
upon them in the arcades Oof Paris;(@
>2
In my opinion neither
the @empathy@ with the anor&anic nor the @commodity4character@
of the sphin8 :if one ta%es this interpretation admittedly only made
in passin& at its word4appear to measure up to BenBamin=s insi&hts
into the modern function of alle&ory in the !leurs du mal, The aes4
thetic re$aluation of nature with which Baudelaire seals the brea%
with romanticism=s idealistic ima&e of the world does not stop e$en
at the anor&anic6 in the desert landscape of our @0pleen@ poem this
ima&e appears e$ery bit as emptied of meanin& as the dead material
into which all the products of human labor in the old boudoir had
decayed( Dn the other hand the alle&orical intention pursued to the
final ri&or mortis of the world can re$ert from the e8ternal aliena4
tion into ah appearance of the beautiful6 this cannot arise from any
@natural correspondence@ for it can be produced only by the
cathartic effect of the poem that the sphin8=s sin&in& thematiFes(
'ith its sin&in& the spell of materialiFation is bro%en and the sphin8
is immediately withdrawn from the reified world9 ha$in& become
the alle&ory of uncomprehended beauty it redeems what was already
said of La beaute> in the cycle:@Je trone dans l=aFur comme un
sphin8 incompris(@
The @poetry of poetry@ is not the only resource that Baudelaire
summoned in the !leurs du mal a&ainst the e8perience of self4aliena4
-/1 K PDATI+ TAWT
tion in a reified world( BenBamin sou&ht to anchor this @sal$ation@ in
a @theory of natural correspondences@ that nonetheless could not
be united with Baudelaire=s famous renunciation of @natural nature(@
>>
Here Gerhard Hess has been more insi&htful as he interpreted the
landscape of the !leurs du mal within the cyclical contrast of
upswin& and de&radation &limpses of paradise and then falls and
described the formation of worlds of ecstasy and of ennui within a
pro&ressi$e de$elopment of e$eryday reality and natural surroundin&s(
The neutral e8perience of the world of the Huotidian now appears as
a transitional phase or a place for the re$ersal between the li&htin&
up of the beaute fuitive and the fall into the timeless monotony of
spleen9 @Acstasy the e8perienced and fantasiFed participation in the
world is only momentary( The fantasy in ima&es see%s to hold on to
a wea% reflection of this ephemeral e8perience of the profondeur de
la vie, It can only proBect it as a memory into the past or as an
e8pectation into the future( +ompared to the charm and the profit
of the ima&es of the landscapes which announce only their most
fleetin& possession the ennui has its own =depth(= Monotony filled
with an8iety is not e8perienced as momentary but rather as an
unlimited condition( The time of its representation is the
present(@
>?
Than%s to the @spiritual@ @eternal@ character of the
personified abstractions4as Hess ac%nowled&es independently of
'alter BenBamin:alle&ory is the &enuine poetic medium for
renderin& perceptible the re$ersal from outer into inner landscape
and from the melancholic e&o into the un4&raspable and chan&eless
id as well as for achie$in& the most concrete effect with the hi&hest
de&ree of abstraction(
>/
In his interpretation of our @0pleen@ poem
Hess shows abo$e all how the derealiFation of natural e8perience of
the world &oes to&ether with a pro&ressi$e emptyin&4out of time(
Already in the first line the fullness of the rememberable becomes a
&i&antic space of a thousand years6 the further attempts at self4
identification lead without fail to the representation of enclosed
spaces then to the timeless monotony of the all4fillin& ennui and
finally to the @I@ that has itself become material as the final obBect
of alle&orical space9 @As a &ranite bloc% in the desert as the
for&otten sphin8 it has e$en lost the &ift of concealment( The
monotony is ossified(@
>.
Judd Hubert who did not yet ha$e the hermeneutic %ey of
the alle&orical method at his disposal wor%s with the formal prin4
ciple of @poetic ambi&uity(@ This methodolo&ical operation allows
him to repeatedly ma%e his way to &eneral antitheses similar to
those of Geistes&eschichte 5li%e Ber&son=s matiere et memoire, or
PDITI+ TAWT K -/-
Pascal=s fini et infini', and with our @0pleen@ poem it seduced him
into a moraliFin& %ind of alle&oresis(^ Poetic ambi&uity is here seen
and pursued in the $ariations of the @ima&e of the cas%et@ which
alto&ether are supposed to symboliFe the @s%ull@ until with line
fifteen an ine8plicable e$ent occurs that une8pectedly in$erts the
relationship between container and contained and allows the s%ull
to mo$e inward the ennui outward :which latter in the end is
nothin& other than the -ahara brumeu/, Thus the sphin8 can incar4
nate at once material secret and humanity and beyond this can
@symboliFe@ the poet=s acti$ity as a @metaphor for the s%ull(@
The tal% of e$erythin& that a word can @symboliFe@ betrays the
hermeneutically inadeHuate application of a uni$ersal code of sym4
bolic meanin&s meanin&s that could be decided only within the
consistency of the succession of perceptions and the structure of
meanin& in the poem :to say nothin& of the alle&oresis as arbitrary
as it is edifyin& that allows for the conclusion re&ardin& the bio4
&raphical element that itself tells us nothin&(@ My critiHue none4
theless would not e8clude the reco&nition that in particulars Hubert
has also disco$ered poetic ambi$alences that:as abo$e all with his
interpretation of the end as the @settin& of the romantic sun@ or as a
death4wish:in an o$erarchin& concretiFation could ha$e achie$ed
a more specific si&nificance than simply the confirmation of the
formal principle of poetic ambi$alence( )or this one mi&ht su&&est
that which Hubert says elsewhere about ennui9 that with Baudelaire
it presents a @satanic eHui$alence between thin&s and ideas@ that
as spleen poeti?ue it becomes the poet=s critical weapon and that
finally it can pro$ide a %ind of catharsis(
?"
But since the hermeneutic
step to the inte&ration of the disco$ered ambi&uities within a sin4
&ulariFin& meanin& that establishes consistency is not ta%en it must
appear as if the formal principle must itself also be eHual to the
meanin& of the poem(
I he sin&ular meanin& and indi$idual shape of the poem also not
infreHuently becomes lost in interpretations that appropriate for
Tif
m0e

thc

stricter
descripti$e demands of lin&uistic poetics( Ihus
Iarl Bluher has interpreted our @0pleen@ poem in its contrasts
with Paul Aluard=s @Le Mai@ in order to show the differin&
realiFations of the poetic function in @symbolist@ and surrealist
lyrics( In contrast with Ja%obson and I(e$i40trauss his analysis
Rt le$els be&ins with the thematic one because it ultimately deter4
mines the or&aniFation of the other te8tual le$els and &uides the
aesthetic perception( But since the interpreter always %nows in ad4
$ance what spleen means in this poem and does not first as% how
-/" J PDATI+ TAWT
the reader learns throu&h the poem what spleen mi&ht mean precisely
here e$en the perfect 5if unreco&niFedly selecti$e7 analysis of the
semantic morpho4syntactic and phonolo&ical le$els of e8pression
can only wind up confirmin& the initial &rasp of the content4le$el
The analysis of the poetic function of the lan&ua&e leads to the con4
clusion that @the morpho4syntactic and phonolo&ical le$els than%s
to the symmetry of the meter the well4proportioned character of
the sentence constructions and the &radual coherence of the sound
structure offer a harmoniFation that see%s to neutraliFe $erbally
what is ne&ati$e and unharmonious in the thematics( The dissonance
of the e8pression is aesthetically compensated for throu&h the as4
sonance and measure of these te8tual le$els(@
?3
To this there cor4
responds the fore%nowled&e deri$ed from literary history that
Baudelaire=s state of ennui is beyond romanticism actually @the
e8treme fascination of the ne&ati$e4satanic character of spleen,
combined with a dandy4li%e and playful moment that see%s to enBoy
aesthetically the ne&ati$ity and especially the u&ly(@
?2
@uod erat
demonstrandum, I do not need to fence with the ri&or of this struc4
tural analysis and I can e$en brin& the reco&niFed effect of aes4
thetic sublimation into harmony with my interpretation of the
endin& to our @0pleen@ poem e$en if on the other hand I must
doubt whether Bluher=s initial &rasp of the poem :which conceals
essential aspects of the establishment of the theme of spleen :
could withstand a historical critiHue( The proton pseudos of his
initial &rasp lies in the e8pectation of a @symbolist@ poem which
allows him to misBud&e what is actually harmoniFed in the passa&e
throu&h the ne&ati$e e8perience of the lyric @I(@ The world4an8iety
obBectified in spleen can no lon&er be enBoyed in a @dandy4li%e
and playful@ manner by the lyric @I@ when to&ether with the
world4catastrophe it loses the reassurin& middle position of the
autonomous subBect( The $ariously and une8pectedly renewed shoc%
of this e8perience :which e$en the reader cannot a$oid within the
horiFon of the first readin&:is not simply neutraliFed throu&h the
opposin& harmoniFin& means pro$ided by the construction of the
lines so that the aesthetic sublimation is only arri$ed at and reco&4
niFable in a final counterthrust the concludin& line with the sphin8=s
sin&in&( The historically no$el medium of the redisco$ered alle&ory
which Baudelaire introduced to render perceptible the reification
and depersonaliFation of the e8perience of the world distin&uishes
the !leurs du mal most sharply from late romanticism( The !leurs
du mal also stand as%ew $is4a4$is what a dubious literary4historical
con$ention calls @symbolism@4e$en if sometimes with this name
PDATI+ TAWT D -/<
one understands the old symbolic art4form that Bliiher=s analysis
fundamentally presupposes as the classicist harmony of form
and content(
In a further structuralist analysis 0ebastian *eumeister under4
too% the e8periment of &i$in& up alto&ether on an interpretation of
the meanin& of spleen in Baudelaire=s poem in order to be able to
wor% out more purely his @poetic idea@ from out of the mo$ement
within the te8t=s web of relationships(
?>
This mo$ement which
lin&uistic poetics:as *eumeister ri&htly criticiFes:often i&nores in
fa$or of a description of the static structure and its archi4techtonic
eHui$alences may be understood in the case of our @0pleen@ poem
as a play around the a8is of symmetry which then produces the fi&ure
of a spiral( Dnce a&ain one could Bud&e the formal analysis as already
decided in itself and mo$e on to a semantic interpretation were it not
that the former depends on a problematic initial assumption that
remains unconsidered hermeneutically( )or *eumeister blithely
separates the first line from the body of twenty4four lines 5lea$in& the
rhyme4chain unnoticed7 as @a %ind of second title@ and brin&s
symmetry into the formal structure of the poem only throu&h this
approach which cannot be &rounded philolo&ically either( Thus the
point becomes totally lost that our @0pleen@ poem: as was
demonstrated abo$e :is Huite unmista%ably oriented toward an
asymmetrical de$elopment and brea%in&4off of the lyric mo$ement
in its strophic4syntactic $erse4units but also in its far4reachin&
comparisons and discontinuously appearin& identifications( To be
sure the mirror symmetries that *eumeister %nows how to brin&
to li&ht are not a purely arbitrary proBection( They can often enrich
our aesthetic perception if one introduces them into the intended
course of the lyric mo$ement and its perspecti$es on the poem=s
meanin&(
??
*eumeister missed the poem=s direction and successi$e
unfoldin& in that his pseudotitle ele$ates the memory to bein& the
first theme from out of which the ennui is then supposed to proceed
@without effort@ one minute constitutin& the a8is of the mo$e4
ment the other runnin& throu&h the whole poem as a @red thread(@
Thus the impression of a consistency on the le$el of the lyric subBect
is awa%ened which consistency resubstantialiFes the subBect a&ainst
the intention of the poem( )rom which the conclusion may be
drawn that in structural analyses one e$idently cannot dispense
with the Huestion of the meanin& concretiFed in the poetic struc4
tures without ha$in& to suffer the conseHuences(
Laurent Jenny=s most recent interpretation of our @0pleen@
poem is especially interestin& for our hermeneutic demonstration(
-/3 J PDATI+ TAWT
since it ma%es use of the same disco$ery of the syntactic4forward
structure to arri$e at a different concretiFation of the meanin&( Jenny
as well reco&niFes the discontinuity of the syntactically unbound
conditions or spaces and refers this discontinuity bac% to a @nar4
rati$e s%eleton@ conditioned by a play of the &rammatical persons
of the lyric subBect( Dn the semantic le$el this &rammatical play
is ele$ated to the le$el of an @ad$enture of the subBect@ that fol4
lows a metaphoric law the identification that is always sou&ht and
continually fails6
?/
its abstraction would be poetically compensated
for throu&h a fullness of metonymic references: the four fields of
the obBecti$e world in which the @I@ see%s its identity( Dnly the
final ima&e the sphin8 sin&in& at dus% ma%es the teleolo&y of the
poem 5the @orientational process@7 reco&niFable9 @The petrified =I=
who sin&s to the li&ht arri$es at its whole meanin& only because it
has been preceded by an =e8ca$ated I= an =I= who portrays in him4
self the abyss of memory( That which leads from memory to son&
is what one is accustomed to call an itinerary an itinerary that is not
only intellectual but also charnel since it is also the passa&e from one
sort of death of the body to another9 from putrefaction to mineral4
iFation(@
?.
The unnamed hermeneutic premise for this concretiFa4
tion as the @swan son& of the subBect@ is ob$iously the theory of the
@death of the subBect@ %Fdecentrement du suHetF' that in recent
years has been brou&ht to hi&h honor by the FsemanalyseF of the
Parisian a$ant4&arde( This is not meant as a rebu%e particularly since
Jenny=s interpretation enriches this theory with an application that
restores $alue to the aesthetic function of the te8t that is otherwise
ne&lected there( 'hat is not posed is the Huestion why this last ad4
$enture of the subBect is ad$ertised precisely as @0pleen@ by Baude4
laire( Interpreted as the @path from memory to son&@ and so titled
does the poem still at all need the title @0pleen@L
'hat is different in my interpretation ta%es off from a different
readin& of the first line( In it the @real I@ compares itself with an
@ima&inary I@ 5ima&inary because introduced in an if4clause9 @si
B=a$ais mille ans@7 in order to find in it its measure as a subBect :and
precisely with this it enters into a $icious circle( In the di$ision of the
self4doublin& @I@ there nestles the fiction in the shape of a memory
that unflinchin&ly produces ima&es and appears before the @I@ li%e
an inner abyss( In the face of this threatenin& abyss of memory the
mo$ement of the search for identity be&ins in which the @I@ mea4
sures itself a&ainst obBects that pro$e alto&ether to be either hollow
closed off or themsel$es threatenin&( After ennui=s triumph the tri4
umph of the third person o$er the first person that has now $anished
PDATI+ TAWT J -/2
the re$ersal appears that can scarcely still be e8pected9 the apostrophe
of the second person ma%es the doublin& of the @I@ final6 the limitless
open space of the desert opposes itself to the empty enclosed spaces
the fate of petrification to that of decomposition6 and the place of
the fe$erishly searchin& memory is ta%en by the son& that has
produced its own sta&e(
/1
Jenny=s interpretation con$er&es with mine
not only in the interpretation of the final line where he puts the
emphasis more stron&ly on the @death in son&@ while I recall La
beaute as the @uncomprehended sphin8(@ Both interpretations also
enter into a possible relation of supplementarity where Jenny
reco&niFes the @abyss of memory@ in the be&innin& line as the cause
of the @I=@s self4di$ision while I would inHuire further into what
this abyss mi&ht well mean:and would find in the world4an8iety
an answer that contains the be&innin& of a new interpretation of the
te8t(
/-
Euestions left unposed are opportunities for the subseHuent inter4
preter( They must not lead to the point of completely abolishin& the
answer that the predecessor found in the te8t to his Huestions( The
coherence of Huestion and answer in the history of an interpretation
is primarily determined by cate&ories of the enrichment of under4
standin& 5be they supplementation or de$elopment a reaccentin& or
a new elucidation7 and only secondarily by the lo&ic of falsifiability(
'hen a precedin& interpretation can be falsified for the most part
this indicates neither historical errors nor obBecti$e @mista%es@ but
rather falsely posed or ille&itimate Huestions on the part of the in4
terpreter( In reference to literary wor%s Huestions are le&itimate
when their role as initial comprehensions for the sa%e of interpreta4
tion is borne out in the te8t6 put another way when it is shown that
the te8t can be understood as a new response :and not Bust an inci4
dental one( A nonincidental response demands that the te8t be con4
sistently interpretable as the meanin& of this response( 'hen different
responses within the history of interpretations of wor%s of art do not
reciprocally falsify one another but rather testify to the historically
pro&ressi$e concretiFation of meanin& in the stru&&le of interpreta4
tion to what else would one attribute this if not to the unifiability Rf
le&itimate Huestions manifest at least in the e8perience of art(
*otes
*otes
Introduction
-( H( R( Jauss=s first full4len&th boo% is a study of the narrati$e structure of
Marcel
Proust=s * la recherche du temps perdu, well ahead of its time and all too little %nown out
side Germany9 Zeit und 1rinnerun in Marcel Proust >* la recherche du temps perdu>" 1in
.ehra#ur6heorie des Romans 5Heidelber& -.227(
"( The term was coined by 0tanley )ish in an article that &oes bac% to -.?1
published
in New Literary History, )ish later stated that it was @not the happiest of desi&nations@ for
reasons howe$er that ha$e little to do with the point stressed here( )or a &ood brief sur$ey
of reader4response criticism in the #nited 0tates see Leopold Kamrosch Jr( @0amuel John
son and Reader4Response +riticism@ in 6he 1ihteenth Century, 6heory and (nterpretation
WWI " 50prin& -./17 pp( .-4-1/7 who Huotes )ish( Antholo&ies of reader4response criti
cism such as amon& others 6he Reader in the 6e/t, 1ssays on *udience and (nterpretation,
ed( 0usan 0uleiman and In&e Grossman 5Princeton #ni$ersity Press -./17 ha$e recently
been published in this country(
<( Raincr 'arnin& Re#eptionsastheti$, 6heorie und Pra/is 5Munich -.?27(
3( The seHuence of $olumes containin& the proceedin&s of the yearly meetin&s
of the
research &roup ha$e appeared since -.>< under the &eneral title Poeti$ und Hermeneutt$, At
this date ei&ht $olumes ha$e been issued(
2( 0ee for e8ample Martin Heide&&er=s introductory statement in
1rlauterunen #u
Holderlim 5ichtun 5)ran%furt a( Main -.2-7 p( /(
>( Aristotle Rhetoric, p( 3(
?( Rainer 'arnin& @ReFeptionsastheti% als literaturwissenschaftliche
Pra&mati%@ in
Re#eptiortsastheti$, p( "2(
/( Jauss directly refers to Bloom in the essay on !alery and Goethe included in
this
$olume(
.( 0ee for instance Admund Husserl (deas" General (ntroduction to
Phenomenoloy,
trans( '( R( Buyer Gibbon 5LondonG*ew Mor% -.>.7 X X "? "/ 33 3?(
-1( The German @un&edaclu@ or the )rench @inpense@ would be better terms not
a$ailable in An&lish(
--(@0ilhouetted@ appro8imately translates the
Husserlian term @Abschattun&(@
-"( 'alter BenBamin @Kie Auf&abe des
#bersetFers@ in lll
-
.>-7 p 2> A l i h h
& p(
2>( An&lish translation in (llumin
nen
_)ran%fur ns( Harry `ohn 5*ew
Mor%( -.>/7(
.
-.1 J *DTA0 TD PP( 8$88$
-<( 'arnin& Re#eptionsastbeti$, p, C,
-3( 0ee Husserl Loical (nvestiations, trans( J( *( )indlay 5London -.?17
!ol( n4
also J( P( 0chobin&er =ariations FS &alter .enHamins -prachmeditationen 5BaselG0tutt
&art -.?.7 p( -1" and JacHues Kerrida La =oi/ et le pbenomene 5Paris -.>?7
especially
chapter !II @Le supplement d=ori&ine@ pp( ./4--?(
-2( 'arnin& Re#eptionsastbeti$, p( /.(
->( Jan Mu%aro$s%y 6he &ord and =erbal *rt, trans( John Burban% and Peter
0teiner
with a foreword by ReneT 'elle% 5Male #ni$ersity Press -.??7 p( >/(
-?( )ricdrich *ietFsche @*achlass@ in &er$e in drei .anden, ed( Iarl
0chlechta
5Munich -.2>7 III p( >/<(
(-, (bid,, Ill p( >/2(
-.( BenBamin (lluminationen p( >"9 @Kamit ist allerdin&s Fu&estanden
dass alle
#bersctFun& nur eine ir&endwie vorlaufie Art ist sich mit der )remdheit der
0prachen
ausein ande rFusetFen(==
"1( H( R( Jauss *stbetiscbe 1rfahrun und literariscbe Hermeneuti$ ( 5Munich
-.??7
"-( )riedrich 0chle&el @#ber die #ni$erstandlich%eit@ in Iritische -chriften, ed(
'olf4
dietrich Rasch 5Munich -.?17 pp( 2<143"(
""( H( R( Jauss @The Poetic Te8t 'ithin the +han&e of HoriFons of
Readin&9 The
A8ample of Baudelaire=s =0pleen II= @ 5+hapter 2 of this $olume7(
"<( In @#ber eini&e Moti$e bei Baudelaire@ (lluminationen, p( "-1 BenBamin
Huotes
the lines from another of the !leurs du Mai poems9
Je $ais m=e=8ercer seul a ma fantasHue escrime )lairant
dans tous les coins les hasardes de la rime ( ( ( 5Le
0oleil7
"3( =orlesunen uber die *stbeti$ 5'er%aus&abe7 I p( 2-"(
(-, (bid,, I p( 2-"(
">( F1rscbeinun des -cbonenF is of course the traditional He&elian
$ocabulary for
the aesthetic e8perience( The @um%ippen@ of Jauss=s earlier corrosi$e obser$ation on
Baudelaire=s play on .oucberMdebouche 5-2?7 which su&&ests the demolition of the
aesthetic
idol as if it were the colonne =endome or any monument honorin& a tyrant is now
replaced
by the more di&nified @umschla&en(@ Ta%en literally howe$er scblaen 5to beat7 in
the
cliche umscblaen is rather more threatenin& than $ippen 5to tilt7(
"?( The use of @tradition@ in this conte8t is one of the numerous occasions in
which
one can share Rousseau=s nai$e re&ret that we ha$e no diacritical mar% at our disposal by
which to indicate irony( It also indicates that try as I may when I seem to be reproachin&
Jauss for not freein& himself from classical constraints I am not more liberated from them
than he is(
"/( A complete te8t of @0pleen II@ appears on pp( -3.421(
".( @Poesie der Poesie@ is a concept freHuently de$eloped in connection with
Paul
!alery whose authority as a poetician is for $arious and comple8 reasons o$errated in
Germany( The @!aloriFation@ of Mallarme and of Baudelaire is a case in which Harold
Bloom=s notion of belatedness would ha$e a salutary effect(
<1( 1n#y$lopddie der philosopbischen &issenschaften 5'er%aus&abe7 III X
32< p( ">1(
<-( (bid,, Ill X 32/ p( "?1(
<"( (bid,, Ill X 3>3 p( "/"(
<<( That the coincidence may be due to common occult sources in He&el and
Baudelaire
obscures rather than e8plains the passa&e( It distracts the reader from wonderin& why the
use of this particular emblematic code can be @ri&ht@ in a lyric poem as well as in a philo
sophical treatise(
*DTA0 TD PP( <4> J -.-
+hapter -( Literary History as a +hallen&e to Literary Theory
-( In this critiHue - follow M( 'ehrli who most recently wrote on @0inn und #nsinn
der Literatur&eschichte@ 5in the literary supplement of the Neue Ziircher Zeitun of "> )eb4
ruary -.>?7 and from another perspecti$e similarly predicted the return of literary studies
to history( Df the earlier wor% on the problem of literary history 5henceforth cited only
with the date7 I am aware of9 Roman Ja%obson @Dber den Realismus in der Iunst@
5-."-7 in 6e/te der ntssiscben !ortnalisten I ed( JuriB 0triedter 5Munich -.>.7 pp( <?<4.-
5An&( @Dn Realism in Art@ in Readins in Russian Poetics, !ormalist and -tructuralist
=iews, eds( Ladisla$ MateB%a and Irystyna Pomors%a O+ambrid&e Mass( -.?-;76 'alter
BenBamin @Literatur&eschichte und Literaturwissenschaft@ 5-.<-7 in *nelus Novus
5)ran%furt -.>>7 pp( 32142>6 Rene 'elle% @The Theory of Literary History@ in 1tudes
dediees au ?uatrieme Conres de linuistes + 6ravau/ du Cercle Linuisti?ue de Praue
5-.<>7 pp( -?<4.-6 'elle% @The +oncept of A$olution in Literary History@ in Concepts of
Criticism 5*ew Ha$en -.><76 #( Leo @Kas Problem der Literatur&eschichte@ 5-.<.7 in
-eben und &ir$licb$eit bet 5ante 5)ran%furt a(M( -.2?76 'erner Irauss @Literatur&es4
chichte als &eschichtlicher Auftra&@ 5-.217 in -tudien und *ufsat#e 5Berlin -.2.7 pp(
-.4?"6 J( 0torost @Kas Problem der Literatur&eschichte@ in 5ante+Aahrbucb </5-.>17pp(
-4-?6 )(rich TrunF @Literatur&eschichte als Ausle&un& und als Geschichte der Kichtun&@ in
!estschrift A, 6rier 5Meisenheim -.2376 H( A( Hass @Literatur und Geschichte@ in Neue
deutscbe Hefte 2 5-.2/7 pp( <1?4-/6 Roland Bardies @Histoire ou litterature@ in -ur
Racine, Paris I.>1 pp( -324>? 5An&( @History or Literature@ in <n Racine, trans( Richard
Howard 5*ew Mor% -.>37 pp( -2-4?"76 )( 0en&le @Auf&aben der heuti&en Literatur4
&eschichtsschreibun&@ in *rcbiv fur das -tudium der neueren -pracben "11 5-.>37 pp(
"3-4>3(
"( Thus abo$e all Rene 'elle% -.<> pp( -?<4?2 and 'elle% and Austin
'arren
6heory of Literature, <rd ed( 5*ew Mor% -.>"7 p( "2<9 @Most leadin& histories of litera
ture are either histories of ci$iliFation or collections of critical essays( Dne type is not a
history of Cm6 the other not a history of art(@
<( Geor& Gottfried Ger$inus -chriften #ur Literatur 5Berlin -.>"7 p( 3 5in an
-//<
re$iew of recent literary histories79 @These boo%s may ha$e all %inds of usefulness but of
historical usefulness they ha$e almost none( They trace chronolo&ically the $arious %inds of
literature 75ichtun8, they set the writers in chronolo&ical order one after another as
others do the titles of boo%s and then characteriFe the writers and literature respecti$ely(
But that is no history6 it is scarcely the s%eleton of a history(@
3( @'as heisst und Fu welchem Ande studiert man #ni$crsal&eschichteL@ in
-cbtllers
-amtliche &er$e, 0a%ularaus&abe Bd( WIII p( <(
2( )irst published in -/<? under the title Grund#ue der thstori$, in -chriften,
pp(
3.-1<(
>( -chriften, p( 3?(
?( @Dber die Auf&abc des Geschichtsschreibers@ in &er$e in funf .anden, ed( G
Hitner and I( Giel 5Karmstadt -.>17 Bd( I p( >1"9 ==
Gree
@
tlierehy

d
=
0
national indi$iduality that was ne$er present either before
e8istence lies in indi$iduality so docs all world hisotrical pro&ress o
the de&ree the freedom and the uniHueness of its reciprocal influe
/( Grund#ue der Histori$, sees( "?G"/(
C,-cbriften,p,O9,
-1( (bid,
nce and as t e sccre of
hum(mty depen =
-." K *DTA0 TD PP( ?4/
--( Grund#ue derHistori$, sec( ">(
-"( &abrheit und Metbode+ Grund#ue einer philosopbiscben Hermeneuti$
5Tubin&en
I.>17 pp( -/24"12 esp( p( -/?6 An&( 6ruth and Method+ !undamentals ofa Philosophical
Hermeneutics, no trans( 5*ew Mor% -.?27 pp( -?<4." esp( p( -?>9 @A$en the =historical
school= %new that fundamentally there can be no other history but uni$ersal history be
cause the uniHue si&nificance of the detail can be determined only from the whole( How
can the empirical researcher to whom the whole can ne$er be &i$en mana&e without
losin& his ri&hts to the philosopher and his a priori arbitrarinessL@
-<( Grund#ue der Histori$, sec( <"(
-3( Gescbicbte der poetiscben Nationalliteratur der 5eutscben, Bd( I! p $ii4
@Dur
literature 75icbtun8 has bad its time and if German life is not to stand still then we
must attract the talents that now lac% a &oal toward the real world and the state where
new spirit is to be molded in new material(@
-2( In the Ad$ertisement to his Gescbicbte der poetiscben
Nationatliteratur der
5eutschen %-chriften, p( -"<7 where Ger$inus4there still the champion of Anli&htenment
historicism a&ainst romantic historicism: contradicts this fundamental rule and decisi$ely
distances himself from the @strictly obBecti$e manner of most of today=s historians(@
->( @#ber die Apochen der neueren Geschichte@ in Geschicbte und Politi$+
*us+
ewahlte *ufsat#e und Meisterscbriften, ed( H( Hofmann 50tutt&art -.317 p( -3-(
-?( @But if one wants ( ( ( to assume that this pro&ress subsists in the fact that in
each
period the life of humanity reaches a hi&her le$el that each &eneration thus completely
surpasses the precedin& one with the last always bein& the fa$ored one while the precedin&
one would only be the carrier of the followin& one4then that would be an inBustice to
the &odhead@ %ibid,', Dne may spea% of a @new theodicy@ because the idealist philosophy
of history reBected by Ran%e could as D( MarHuard has shown already raise the hidden
claim of a theodicy insofar as it dischar&ed God and made man the subBect responsible for
history and understood historical pro&ress as a process of law or alternati$ely as pro&ress
in human le&al relationships 5cf( @Idealismus and TheodiFee@ in Pbilosopbiches Aahr+
buch ?< 5-.>27 pp( <<43?7(
-/( -dmtlicbe &er$e, p( 2"/6 cf( p( 2"> ff( where 0chiller defines the tas% of the
uni$er
sal historian as a method with which one can at first suspend the teleolo&ical principle
that is the &oal of findin& out and sol$in& the problem of world order in the course of world
history :@because a world history of the final order is only to be e8pected in the latest
of times(@ The method itself describes historio&raphy as a %ind of @history of influence@6
the uni$ersal historian @turns from the latest world situation upward toward the ori&in of
thin&s@ as he draws out from amon&st the $arious &i$ens those that ha$e had an essential
influence on the form of the world today6 then he turns around alon& the path that has
been thus found and can report on the relationship of the past to the present constitution
of the world as ==world history@ @alon& the &uidin& thread of these indicated facts(@
-.( The conseHuence of the principle that the
historian ou&ht first to empty his head of
e$erythin& that he %nows of the later course of hi
period 5)ustel de +oulan&es7 is the irrationalism o
not %now how to &i$e any accountin& for the prede
torical standpoint( 'alter BenBamin=s critiHue of
point of historical materialism leads unnoticed
conception of history6 see his @Geschichtsphilosophische Thesen@ *o( !II in -chriften I
5)ran%furt a( M( -.227 p( 3.?6 An&( @Theses on the Philosophy of History@ *o( !II in
(lluminations, ed( Hannah Arendt trans( Harry `ohn _*ew Mor% -.>/7 p( "2>( "1( 'ilhelm
$on Humboldt &er$e, p( 2/>(
Bry when he wishes to represent a past
an @empathy@ 71infuhlun8 that does
9erminations and preBud&ments of its
his49his position deli$ered from the
stand4ryond the obBecti$ism of the
materialist
*DTA0 TD PP( /4-- E -.<
"- (bid,, P4 2.19 @The historian who would be worthy of this name must represent
each &i$en as part of a whole or what is the same thin& the form of history itself in each
""( +haracteristic of this di$ision of literary history and literary criticism is the
defini
tion of the concept of philolo&y in Gusta$ Grober=s Grundriss der romaniscben Pbiloloie
7<utline of Romance Philoloy8, Bd( I "nd ed( 50trasbour& -.1>7 p( -.39 @The appearance
of the human spirit in lan&ua&e that can only be understood throu&h mediation and its
achie$ement in the artistically used discourse of the past constitute the uniHue obBect of
philolo&y(@
"<( Dn this see 'erner Irauss -.21 p( -. ff( and 'alter BenBamin -.<- p(
32<9 @in
this swamp the hydra of scholarly aesthetics finds itself at home with its se$en heads9 crea
ti$ity empathy timelessness re4creation shared e8perience illusion and aesthetic pleasure(@
"3( Dn this cf( Rene 'elle% -.><( p( "?-(
"2( 'erner Irauss -.21 p( 2? ff( shows with the e8ample of Amst Robert
+urtius
how &reatly this scholarly ideal is bound up with the thou&ht of the Geor&e circle( OThe
German poet 0tefan Geor&e 5-/>/4-.<<7 throu&h his considerable personal and literary
influence &athered around him many of @the best and the bri&htest@ of Germany=s youn&
writers critics and historians between the late -/.1s and the -."1s includin& )riedrich
Gundolf Arnst Bertram Ma8 Iommerell *orbert $on Hellin&rath Arnst IantorowicF and
briefly Hu&o $on Hofmannsthal( The *aFis later tried to appropriate Geor&e=s comple8 his4
torico4mythopoetics somethin& he steadfastly refused( 5Tr(7B
">( 1urop>aiscbe Literatur und lateinisches Mittelalter 5Bern -.3/7 p( 3136 An&(
1uro
pean Literature and the Latin Middle *es, trans( 'illard R( Tras% 5*ew Mor%( -.2<7
p( 311(
"?( @'or%4immanent@ N&er$immanente8 interpretation perhaps best
represented in
'olf&an& Iayser=s 5as spracbliche Iunstwer$ 76he =erbal &or$ of *rt8 5Bern -.3/7 was
the rou&h analo&ue in postwar German literary criticism to American *ew +riticism( 5Tr(7
"/( Mar8 and An&els 5ie deutscbe (deoloie 5-/3243>7 in Iarl Mar8 and
)riedrich
An&els &er$e 5Berlin -.2.7 Bd( < pp( ">4"?6 An&( 6he German (deoloy, in Collected
&or$s, trans( +lemens Kutt '( Lou&h and +( P( Ma&ili 5*ew Mor% -.?>7 $ol( 2 pp( <>4<?(
".( 'erner Irauss @ Literatur&eschichte als &eschichtlicher Auftra&@ 5-.217 in
-tudien
und *ufsiit#e 5Berlin -.2.7 pp( ">4>>(
<1( Iarel Iosf%( 5ie 5iale$ti$ des Ion$reten 5)ran%furt a(M( -.>?7 %6beorie
2', pp(
"-4""(
<-( Mar&aret Har%ness=s !ran# von -ic$inen, a political prosocialist drama
aroused
discussion amon& the Mar8ists( The portion of An&el=s famous letter of April -///toHar%4
ness 5referred to in note </ below7 concernin& the play can be found in Mar/ism and *rt,
cd( Berel Lan& and )orrest 'illiams 5*ew Mor% -.?"7 pp( 2-423( 5Tr(7
<"( The documents rele$ant to this debate4the watershed in 'estern Mar8ist
literary
theory both before and since the war4are now a$ailable in An&lish in Arnst Bloch Geor&
Lulcacs( Bertolt Brecht 'alter BenBamin and Theodor Adorno *esthetics and Politics, ed(
Ronald Taylor 5London -.??7( 5Tr(7
<<( Hans Blumenber& @*achahmun& der *atur9 `ur !or&eschichte der Idee des
schop4
ferischen Mensdien@ in -tudium enerate -1 5-.2?7 pp( ">? "?1(
<3( (bid,, p( "?>(
<2( +f( Blumenber& ibid,, p( "?19 @The aminaturalism of the nineteenth
century is
borne by this feelin& of the narrowin& of man%ind=s authentic producti$ity throu&h a tire
some horiFon of conditions( The new pathos of labor directed itself a&ainst nature9 +omce
coined the e8pression =antinature@ and Mar8 and An&els spea% of =antiphysis (
-.3 K*DTA0 TD PP( H4-3
<>( Gyor&ii Ple%hano$ 5-/2>4-.-/7 acti$ist theorist and re$olutionary e8ile was
one of the founders of Russian Mar8ism and a collea&ue of Lenin and the Bolshe$i%s
until he bro%e with themshortly before the re$olution( He authored "> $olumes of Mar8ist
theory includin& *rt and -ociety 5-.-"7( 5Tr(7
<?( Iosi% 5ie 5iale$ti$, p( -->(
</( The leadin& e8ample for this is An&te=s interpretation of BalFac in his
letter to
Mar&aret Har%ness 5April -///7 which concludes with the ar&ument @that BalFac thus was
forced to be a&ainst his own class4sympathies and political preBudices that he saw the neces
sity of the decline of his belo$ed nobles and depicted themas men that did not deser$e any
better fate6 and that he saw the real men of the future there when alone at that time they
were to be found :I consider that as one of realism=s &reatest triumphs(@ 5Iarl Mar8 and
)riedrich An&els 0ber Iunst und Literatur, ed( M( Iliem 5Berlin -.>?- Bd( I p( -2.(7(
The mystification that BalFac was @forced@ into obBecti$e representation a&ainst his in
terests by social reality endows hypostasiFed reality:similar to He&el=s @cunnin& of rea
son@:with the power itself indirectly to produce literature OKichtun&7( In this @triumph
of realism@ Mar8ist literary theory found a carte blanche for appropriatin& conser$ati$e
authors such as for e8ample Goethe or 'alter 0cott into the process of emancipation(
<.( @Ainleitun& Fur Iriti% der polischen D%onomie@ in &er$e, Bd( -< p( >316
An&(
@Introduction to the +ritiHue of Political Aconomy@ in -elected &ritins, ed( Ka$id
McLellan 5D8ford -.??7 p( <2.(
31( @Ainfiihrun& in die asthetischen 0chriften $on Mar8 und An&els@ 5-.327
@Literatur
und Iunst als #berbau@ 5-.2-7 in .eitrae #ur Geschicbte der *stbeti$ 5Berlin -.237(
3-( (bid,, p( 3"3(
3"( &er$e, Bd( -< p( >3-6 An&( -elected &ritins, p( <>1(
3<( @The =classical character= thus follows not fromthe obser$ance of formal
=rules=
but rather precisely fromthe fact that the wor% of art is in a position to &i$e the ma8imum
e8pression of symboliFation and indi$idualiFation to the most essential and all4typical human
relationships@ %.eitrae, p( 3"27( Dn this see Peter KemetF @`wischen Ilassi% und Bol4
schewismus( Geor& Lu%acs als Theoreti%er der Kichtun&@ in Mer$ur -" 5-.2/7 pp( 21-4-2
and KemetF Mar/, 1nels and the Poets, trans( Jeffrey 0immons 5+hica&o -.>?7(
33( Brecht ironically criticiFed this canoniFation of the @form of a few
bour&eois
no$els of the last century@ as the @formalist character of the theory of realism@6 cf( his
statements in the Brecht4Lu%acs debate in Mar/ismus und Literatur, ed( )( J( RaddatF
5Hambur& -.>.7 Bd( " pp( /?4./( V0ee note <"( 5Tr(7I
32( An&( in Mar/ism and Linuistics 5*ewMor% -.2-7( CTr(7
3>( .eitrae #ur Gescbicbte der *stheti$, p( 3-.(
3?( +ited in Lu%acs .eitrae, pp( -.34.>(
3/( Dn this see the Introduction 5@Le tout et les parties@7 to Le dieu cache"
ttude
#ur la vision tr?i?ue dans les Pense>es de Pascal et dans le theatre de Racine 5Paris -.2.76
An&( 6he Hidden God, * -tudy of 6raic =ision in the Pensees ofPascaland the 6raedies
of Racine, trans( Philip Thody 5*ew Mor% -.>376 and Pour une socioloie du toman
5Paris -.>37 pp( 33 ff(6 An&( 6oward a -ocioloy of the Novel, trans( Alan 0heridan
5London -.?27 pp( -1 ff((
3.( Dn this see '( MittenFwei=s critiHue @Kie Brecht4Lu%acs4Kebattc@ in 5as
*ru
ment -1 5-.>/7( p( <- which reproaches Lu%acs=s o$eremphasis on this unity as a lac% of
dialectics9 @But Mar8ist dialectics be&ins with the contradictory character of the unity
of essence and appearance(@
21( Thus in Lu%acs=s theory of reflection the concept of intensi$e totality has
its
una$oidable correlati$e in the @immediacy of reception@9 the obBecti$e reality is said to be
correctly %nown in the wor% of art precisely when the @recei$er@ 5reader hearer $iewer7
*DTA0 TD PP( -34-/ K -.2
reco&niFes himself in it 5cf( Problems des Realismus, Berlin -.22 p( -< ff(74 Accordin& to
this the influence of the wor% of art already presupposes the correct collecti$e e8perience
in its public from which e8perience it can only &radually differ as e$er truer and more
complete reflection(
2-( Iosi=% 5ie 5iale$ti$, p( -"<(
2"( -tudien #ur deutscben und fran#dsiscben *uf$larun 5Berlin -.><7( p( >
and
@Literatur&eschichte als&eschichtlicher Auftra&@ p( >>(
2<( @0tatt eines *achwortes Fu @K=un Realisme sans ri$a&es= @ in Mar/ismus
und
Literatur, p( ""?(
23( 5ie 5iale$ti$, pp( -</ -<.6 here one can remember Mar8 @Ainleitun& Fur
Iriti%
der Politischen D%onomie@ p( >"36 @The art obBect4li%e e$ery other product4creates
a public of artistic taste and capable of enBoyin& beauty( The production thus produces
not only an obBect for the subBect but also a subBect for the obBect(@
22( Iosi% 5ie 5iale$ti$, p( -31(
2>( (bid,, p( -3/(
2?( - refer to Mar8=s well4%nown statement @The formation of the fi$e senses
is a
labor of the whole precedin& world4history@6 cf( <$onomiscb+pbilosophische Manus$ripte
5-/337 in Mar8 and An&els =ber Iunst und Literatur, p( --.6 An&( 6he 1conomic
and Philosophic Manuscripts of 49OO, ed( Kir% J( 0trui% trans( Martin Milli&an 5*ew
Mor% -.>37(
2/( Aditions in German translation are9 Boris Aichenbaum *ufsat#e #ur
6heorie
und Gescbichte der Literatur 5)ran%furt a(M4 -.>276 JuriB TynBano$ 5ie literariscben
Iunstmittel und die 1volution in der Literatur 5)ran%furt a(M( -.>?76 !i%tor 0%lo$s%iB
6heorie der Prosa 5)ran%furt -.>>76 in )rench translation9 6heorie de la litterature, 6e/tes
des formalities russes, ed( and trans( TF$etan Todoro$ Paris -.>2( _In An&lish translation
the leadin& antholo&ies are Readins in Russian Poetics" !ormalist and -tructuralist =iews,
and Russian !ormalist Criticism" !our 1ssays, ed( and trans( Lee T( Lemon and Marian J(
Reis 5Lincoln *eb( -.>27( 5Tr(7l The most rele$ant critical e$aluation of the )ormalist
school is JuriB 0triedter=s @Introduction@ to the 6e/te der russischen !ormalisten I 5Munich
-.>.7 to whom ( owe a &reat deal for his ad$ice and su&&estion with the writin& of sec
tions 3 and -1(
2.( This famous formula coined by !i%tor 0h%lo$s%y in -."- was shortly
thereafter
impro$ed upon with the concept of an aesthetic @system@ in which each artistic de$ice
had a definite function to fulfill6 cf( !ictor Ahriich Russian !ormalism 5The Ha&ue
-.227 p( .1(
>1( @Ker `usammenhan& der Mittel des 0uBetbaus mit den all&emeinen
0tilmitteln@
%Poeti$, -.-.7 cited in Boris Aichenbaum *ufsat#e, p( "?( Amon& the other early si&ns
of the @e$olution of &enres@ )erdinand Bruneriere already held the @influence of wor%s
on wor%@ to be the most important relation in literary history6 cf( 'elle% -.>< p( 33(
>-( Aichenbaum *ufsat#e, p( 3?(
>"( (bid,, p( 3>6 TynBano$ @Kas l%erarische )a%tum@ and @#ber literarische
A$olu
tion(@ 5An&( of the latter in Readins in Russian Poetics, 5Tr(7;
><( TynBano$ and Ja%obson @Probleme der Literatur4 und 0prachforschun&@ in
Iun+
buch 2 5-.>>7 p( ?26 An&( @Problems in the 0tudy of Literature and Lan&ua&e@ in Read
ins in Russian Poetics,
>3( TynBano$ 5ie literariscben Iunstmittel, p( 31 opposes the @succession of
systems@
S the main concept of literary e$olution to @tradition@ as the fundamental concept of
the old literary history(
>2( In lin&uistics this principle is represented abo$e all by A( +oseriu cf( -incroma,
dtacronia e b$toria 5Monte$ideo -.2/7(
-.> K *DTA0 TD PP( -.4"3
>>( @Beden%en ernes Philolo&en@ -tudium enerate ? 5-.237 <"-4"<( The new
ap
proach to literary tradition that R( Guiette has sou&ht in a series of pioneerin& essays
5partly in @uestions de litterature OGhent( -.>1-7 usin& his own method of combinin&
aesthetic criticism with historical %nowled&e corresponds almost literally to his 5unpub
lished7 a8iom @The &reatest error of philolo&ists is to belie$e that literature has been
made for philolo&ists(@ 0ee also his @Alo&e de la lecture@ Revue enerate beie 5January
-.>>7( pp( <4-3(
>?( This thesis is one of the main points of the (ntroduction a une estbeti?ue
de la
litterature by G( Picon 5Paris -.2<76 see esp( pp( .1 ff(
>/( +orrespondin&ly 'alter BenBamin 5-.<-7 formulated9 @)or it is not a
Huestion of
representin& the written wor%s in relation to their time but of brin&in& to representation
the time that %nows them :that is our time :in the time when they ori&inated( Thus lit
erature becomes an or&anon of history and the tas% of literary history is to ma%e it this :
and not to ma%e written wor%s the material of history@ E*nelus Novus O)ran%furt a(M(
-.>>7( p( 32>7(
>.( 6be (dea of History 5*ew Mor% and D8ford -.2>7 p( ""/(
?1( Here I am followin& A( *isin in his criticism of the latent Platonism of
philolo&ical
methods that is of their belief in the timeless substance of a literary wor% and in a time
less point of $iew of the reader9 @)or the wor% of art if it cannot incarnate the essence
of art is also not an obBect which we can re&ard accordin& to the +artesian rule =without
puttin& anythin& of ousel$es into it but what can apply indiscriminately to all obBects(=@6
La Litterature et le lecteur 5Paris -.2.7 p( 2? 5see also my re$iew in *rcbiv fur das
-tudium der neueren -pracben -.? 5-.>1- ""<4<27(
?-( Picon (ntroduction, p( <3( This $iew of the dialo&ical mode of bein& of a
literary
wor% of art is found in Malrau8 %Les voi/ du silence' as well as in Picon *isin and
Guiette :a tradition of literary aesthetics which is still ali$e in )rance and to which I am
especially indebted6 it finally &oes bac% to a famous sentence in !alery=s poetics( @It is
the e8ecution of the poem which is the poem(@
?"( Peter 0Fondi @#ber philolo&iscbe Ar%enntnis@ (lolderlin+-tudien 5)ran%furt
a(M( -.>?7 ri&htly sees in this the decisi$e difference between literary and historical studies
p( --9 @*o commentary no stylistic e8amination of a poem should aim to &i$e a descrip
tion of the poem that could be ta%en by itself( A$en the least critical reader will want to
confront it with the poem and will not understand it until he has traced the claim bac%
to the acts of %nowled&e whence they ori&inated(@ Guiette says somethin& $ery similar in
@Alo&e de la lecture@ 5sec note >>7(
?<( *ote also J( 0torost 5-.>17 who simply eHuates the historical e$ent with the lit
erary e$ent 5@A wor% of art is first of all an artistic act and hence historical li%e the Battle
of Isos@7(
?3( Rene 'elle% 5-.<>7 p( -?.(
?2( In -lovo a slovenost, I p( -." cited by 'elle% 5-.<>7 pp( -?. ff(
?>( G( Buc% Lemen und 1rfabrun 50tutt&art -.>?7 p( 2> who refers here to
Husserl
%1rfahrun und 0rteil, esp( X /7 but who more broadly &oes beyond Husserl in a determina
tion of the ne&ati$ity in the process of e8perience that is of si&nificance for the hormonal
structure of aesthetic e8perience 5cf( note --3 below7(
??( 'olf Kieter 0tempel @Pour une description des &enres litteraires@ in *ctes
du
Jlle covres international de linuisti?ue Romane 5Bucharest -.>/7 also in .eitrae
#ur 6e/tlinuisti$, ed( '( K( 0tempel 5Munich -.?17(
?/( Here I can refer to my study @Theory of Genres and MedBe$al Literature@ +hap
ter < in this $olume(
?.( Accordin& to the interpretation of H( B( *euschafer 5er -inn der Parod,e
im
5on @uiHote, 0tudia Romanica 2 5Heidelber& -.><7(
*DTA0TDPP( "34"? K-.?
/1( Accordin& to the interpretation of Rainer 'arnin& (llusion und &ir$ticb$ett
in
6ristam -handy und Aac?ues ie !ataliste, Theorie und Geschichte der Literatur und der
schbnen Iiinste 3 5Munich -.>27 esp( pp( /1 ff(
/-( Accordin& to the interpretation of Iarl HeinF 0tierle 5un$elbeit und !orm in
Ger
ard de Nervats X>CbimeresF, Theorie und Geschichte der Literatur und der schbnen Iiinste 2
5Munich -.>?7 esp( pp( 22 and .-(
/"( Dn this Husserlian concept see Buc% Lernen und 1rfabrun, pp( >3 ff(
/<( Here O amincorporatin& results of the discussion of @%itsch@ as a borderline phe
nomenon of the aesthetic which too% place durin& the third colloHuium of the research
&roup @Poeti% und Hermeneuti%@ 5now in the $olume 5ie nicbt mebr scbonen Iiinste X
Gren#pbdnomene des *stbetischen, ed( H( R( Jauss OMunich -.>/-7( )or the @culinary@
approach which presupposes mere entertainment art the same thin& holds as for %itsch
namely that here the @demands of the consumers are a priori satisfied@ 5P( Beylin7 that
@the fulfilled e8pectation becomes the norm of the product@ 5'olf&an& Iser7 or that @its
wor% without ha$in& or sol$in& a problem presents the appearance of a solution to a
problem@ 5M( Imdahl7 pp( >2-4>?(
/3( As also the epi&onal6 on this see Boris Tomashe$s%y in 6be>orie de la
litterature,
6e/tes des formalistes russes, ed( T( Todoro$ 5Paris -.>27 p( <1> n( 2<9 @The appearance
of a &enius always eHuals a literary re$olution which dethrones the dominant canon and
&i$es power to processes subordinated until then( ( ( ( The epi&ones repeat a worn4out
combination of processes and as ori&inal and re$olutionary as it was this combination
becomes stereotypical and traditional( Thus the epi&ones %ill sometimes for a lon& time
the aptitude of their contemporaries to sense the aesthetic force of the e8amples they
imitate9 they discredit their masters(@
/2( R( Ascarpit 5as .uch und der Leser" 1ntwurf einer Literaturso#ioloie
5+olo&ne
and Dpladen -.>-6 first e8panded German edition of -ocioloie de la litterature OParis
-.2/;7 p( -->(
/>( I( H( Bender Iiini und =asalh =ntersucbunen #ur Chanson de Geste des
J((,
Aabrbunderts, 0tudia Romanica -< 5Heidelber& -.>?7 shows what step is necessary to &et
beyond this one4sided determination( In this history of the early )rench epic the apparent
con&ruence of feudal society and epic ideality is represented as a process that is maintained
throu&h a continually chan&in& discrepancy between @reality@ and @ideolo&y@ that is be
tween the historical constellations of feudal conflicts and the poetic responses of the epics(
/?( The incomparably more promisin& literary sociolo&y of Arich Auerbach
brou&ht
these aspects to li&ht in the $ariety of epoch4ma%in& brea%s in the relationship between
author an=t reader6 for this see the e$aluation of )ritF 0chal% in his edition of Auerbach=s
Cesammelic *ufsat#e #ur ratnaniscben Pbiloloie 5Bern and Munich -.>?7 pp( -- ff(
//( 0ec Harald 'einrich @)ur eine Literatur&eschichte des Lesers@ Mer$ur "-
5*o
$ember -.>?7 an attempt arisin& fromthe same intent as mine which analo&ously to the
way that the lin&uistics of the spea%er customary earlier has been replaced by the lin&uis
tics of the listener ar&ues for a methodolo&ical consideration of the perspecti$e of the read
er in literary history and thereby most happily supports my aims( 'einrich shows abo$e all
howthe empirical methods of literary sociolo&y can be supplemented by the lin&uistic and
literary interpretation of the role of the reader implicit in the wor%(
/.( In FMadame .ovary par Gusta$e )laubert@ Baudelaire( <euvres completes,
Pleiade
ed( 5Paris -.2-7( p( ../6 @The last years of Louise4Philippe witnessed the last e8plosions of
a spirit still e8citable by the play of the ima&ination6 but the new no$elist found himself
faced with a completely worn4out society4worse than worn4out4stupified and &luttonous
with a horror only of fiction and lo$e only for possession(@
.1( +f( ibid,, p( ... as well as the accusation speech for the defense and $erdict of
the
Hovary trial in )laubert <euvres, Pleiade ed( 5Paris -.2-7( I pp( >3.4?-? esp( p( ?-?6 also
-./ J *DTA0 TD PP( "?4<-
about !anny, A( Monte&ut @Le roman intime de la literature realiste@ Revue des deu/
mondes -/ 5-/2/7 pp( -.>4"-< esp( pp( "1- and "1. ff(
.-( As Baudelaire declares <euvres completes, p( ..>9 @for since the
disappearance of
BalFac ( ( ( all curiosity relati$e to the no$el has been pacified and put to rest @
."( )or these and other contemporary $erdicts see H( R( Jauss @Kie beiden
)assun&en
$on )lauberts 1ducation sentimentale F Heidelberer Aahrbucber " 5-.2/7 pp .>4--> esp
p( .?(
.<( Dn this see the e8cellent analysis by the contemporary critic A( Monte&ut 5see note
.1 abo$e7 who e8plains in detail why the dream4world and the fi&ures in )eydeau=s no$el
are typical for the audience in the nei&hborhoods @between the Bourse and the boule$ard
Montmart8e@ 5p( "1.7 that needs an @alcool poetiHue@ enBoys @seein& their $ul&ar ad$en
tures of yesterday and their $ul&ar proBects of tomorrow poeticiFed@ 5p( "-17 and sub
scribes to an @idolatry of the material@ by which Monte&ut understands the in&redients of
the @dream factory@ of -/2/:@a sort of sanctimonius admiration almost de$out for fur
niture wallpaper dress escapes li%e a perfume of patchouli from each of its pa&es@ 5p( "1-7(
.3( A8amples of this method which not only follow the success fame and
Influence
of a writer throu&h history but also e8amine the historical conditions and chan&es in under
standin& him are rare( The followin& should be mentioned9 G( )( )ord 5ic$ens and His
Readers 5Princeton -.2276 A( *isin Les <euvres et les si>ecles 5Paris -.>17 which discusses
@!ir&ile Kante et nous@ Ronsard +orneille Racine6 A( Lammert @`ur 'ir%un&s&eschichte
Aichendorffs in Keutschland@ !estschrift fur Richard *lewyn, ed( H( 0in&er and B( $on
'iese 5+olo&ne and GraF -.>?7( The methodolo&ical problem of the step from the influ
ence to the reception of a wor% was indicated most sharply by )( !odic%a already in -.3-
in his study @Kie Problemati% der ReFeption $on *erudas 'er%@ 5now in -tru$tur vyvoHe
Pra&ue -.>.7 with the Huestion of the chan&es in the wor% that are realiFed in its successi$e
aesthetic perceptions(
.2( 0ee H( R( Jauss 0ntersuchunen #ur mittelalterlicben 6ierdicbtun
5Tiibin&en
-.2.7 esp( chap( I! A and K(
.>( A !ina$er @A la recherche d=une poetiHue medie$ale@ Cahiers de
civilisation me
dievale 2 %4C;C', -4->(
.?( Gadamer &ahrheit und Methods, pp( "/3 "/26 An&( p( ">/(
./( (bid,, p, "/<6 An&( p( ">?(
..( (bid,, p, <2"6 An&( p( <<<(
-11( (bid,, p, "/.6 An&( p( "?<(
-1-( (bid,, p( <2>6 An&( p( <<?(
-1"( 'elle% -.<> p( lMAbid,, -.>< pp( -?4"1(
-1<( (bid,, p, -?(
43O, (bid,,
43;, (bid,, >
-1>( &abrbeit und Methode, p( "?36 An&( p( "2?(
43Q, (bid,,
439, (bid,,
-1.( (bid, p( ".16 An&( p( "?<(
--1( This re$ersal becomes ob$ious in the chapter @Kie Lo&i% $on )ra&e und
Antwort@
%ibid,, pp( <2-4>16 An&( pp( <<<43-76see my @History of Art and Pra&matic History@ X !II
included in this $olume(
---( (bid,, p( "/16 An&( p( ">3(
--"( (bid,, p( -1.6 An&( p( -1"(
--<( -ee ibid,, p( --16 An&( p( -1<(
--3( This also follows from )ormalist aesthetics and especially from !i%tt
r
sh%low%y=s
theory of @deautom
alism, = QR, @
ary Ru
cf( !ictor Arlich=s
*DTA0 TDPP( <-4<? K -..
the =twisted deliberately impeded form= interposes artificial obstacles between the percei$ 4
in& subBect and the obBect percei$ed the chain of habitual association and of automatic re 4
sponses is bro%en9 thus we become able to see thin&s instead of merely reconi#in them(@
--2( &ahrbeit und Methode, p( "?26 An&( p( "2/(
-->( ibid,, p, "/16 An&( p( ">3(
--?( In the -."? article @#ber literarische A$olution@ by JuriB TynBano$ 5in 5ie
literati+
scben Iunstmittel und die 1volution in der Literatur, pp( <?4>17 this pro&ram is most pre&
nantly presented( It was only partially fulfilled4as JuriB 0triedter informed me4in the treat
ment of problems of structural chan&e in the history of literary &enres as for e8ample in the
$olume iiuss$aHa pro#a, !oprosy poeti%i / 5Lenin&rad -.">7 or J( TynBano$ @Kie Dde als
rhetorische Gattun&@ 5-.""7 now in 6e/te der russiscben !ormalisten, II ed( J( 0triedter
5Munich -.?17(
--/( J( TynBano$ @Dber literarische A$olution@ p( 2.(
--.( @A wor% of art will appear as a positi$e $alue when it re&roups the structure
of the
precedin& period it will appear as a ne&ati$e $alue if it ta%es o$er the structure without
chan&in& it(@ 5Jan Mu%aMo$s%y cited by R( 'elle% -.>< pp( 3/3.(7
-"1( 0ee( !( Arlich Russian !ormalism, pp( "2342? R( 'elle% -.>< pp( 3/ ff(
and J(
0triedter 6e/te der russiscben !ormalisten, I Introduction X W(
-"-( Hans Blumenber& in Poeti$ und Hermeneuti$ < 5see note /<7 p( >."(
-""( Accordin& to !( Arlich Russian !ormalism, p( "2" this concept meant three
thin&s
to the )ormalists9 @on the le$el of the representation of reality 5ifferen#?ualitat stood for
the =di$er&ence= fromthe actual i(e( for creati$e deformation( Dn the le$el of lan&ua&e it
meant a departure from current lin&uistic usa&e( )inally on the place of literary dynamics
a ( ( ( modification of the pre$ailin& artistic norm(@
-"<( )or the first possibility the 5antiromantic7 re$aluation of BoHeau and of the
classi
cal contrainte poetics by Gide and !alery can be introduced6 for the second the belated dis
co$ery of llblderlin=s hymns or *o$alis=s concept of future poetry 5on the latter see H( R(
Jauss in Romaniscbe !orscbunen ?? O-.>2- pp( -?34/<7(
-"3( Thus since the reception of the @minor romantic@ *er$al whose Chimeres
only
attracted attention under the influence of Maliarme the canoniFed @maBor romantics@
Lamartine !i&ny Musset and a lar&e part of the @rhetorical@ lyrics of !ictor Hu&o ha$e
been increasin&ly forced into the bac%&round(
-"2( Poeti$ und Hermeneuti$ 2 %(mmanente *stheti$+*stbetische Refle/ion',
ed( '(
lser 5Munich -.>>7 esp( pp( <.243-/(
-">( In Zsunisse+6heodor &, *dorno #umR3, Geburtsta 5)ran%furt a(M(
-.><7
Pp( 214>3 and also in @General History and the Aesthetic Approach@ Poeti$ und Hermen
euti$ <( 0ee also History" 6he Last 6hins .efore the Last 5*ew Mor% -.>.7 esp( chap( >[
@Ahas$erus or the Riddle of lime@ pp( -<.4><(
-"?( @)irst in identifyin& history as a process in chronolo&ical time we tacitly
assume
that our %nowled&e of the moment at which an e$ent emer&es from the flow of time will
help us to account for its appearance( The date of the e$ent is a $alue4laden fact( Accord4
m
&=y all e$ents in the history of a people a nation or a ci$iliFation that ta%e place at a
&i$en moment are supposed to occur then and there for reasons bound up somehow with
that moment@ 5Iracauer History, p( -3-7(
-"/( This concept &oes bac% to H( )occillon 6be Life of !orms in *rt 5*ew Mor%(
.3/7 and G( Iubler 6he -hape of 6ime" Remar$s on tbe History of 6hins 5*ew Ha$en
19"2/(
-".( Iracauer(Gte(ory p( 2<(
d ff
-<
R
Poet
G
und

ller
>Fetieuti$ < p( 2>.( The formula of @the contemporaneity of the lN76N^
-
=@
'
=
th
@
ll
==
+h

f
=Z
0en
e=T @Auf&aben der hcud&en Literatur&eschichtsschreibun&@
yM
( PP( "3? ff(
refers to the same phenomenon fails to &rasp one dimension of the prob4
"11 J *DTA0 TD PP( <?43-
tern which becomes e$ident in his belief that this difficulty of literary history can be sol$ed
be simply combinin& comparati$e methods and modern interpretation 5@that is carryin&
out comparati$e interpretation on a broader basis@ p( "3.7(
-<-( In -.>1 Roman Ja%obson also made this claim in a lecture that now
constitutes
chap( -- @Lin&uistiHue et poetiHue@ of his boo% 1ssais de linuisti?ue enerate 5Paris
-.><7( +f( p( "-"9 @0ynchronic description en$isa&es not only the literary production of
a &i$en period but also that part of the literary tradition which has remained ali$e or been
resuscitated in the period in Huestion( ( ( ( Historical poetics e8actly li%e the history of
lan&ua&e if it wants to be truly comprehensi$e ou&ht to be concei$ed as a superstructure
built upon a series of successi$e synchronic descriptions(@
-<"( JuriB TynBano$ and Roman Ja%obson @Problcme der Literatur4 und
0prachfor4
schun&@ 5-."/7 now in Iursbuch 2 5)ran%furt a(M( -.>>7 p( ?29 @The history of the sys
tem itself represents another system( Pure synchrony now pro$es to be illusory9 each syn
chronic system has its past and its future as inseparable structural elements of this system(@
-<<( )irst in @Apochenschwelle und ReFeption@ Pbiiosopbiscbe Rundschau >
5-.2/7
pp( -1- ff( most recently in 5ie Leitimatat der Neu#eit 5)ran%furt a(M( -.>>76 see esp(
pp( 3- ff(
-<3( *(B( This was composed in -.>?( 5Tr(7
-<2( Le$i40trauss himself testifies to this in$oluntarily but e8tremely impressi$ely
in his
attempt to @interpret@ with the help of his structural method a lin&uistic description of Bau
delaire=s poem @Les chats@ pro$ided by Roman Ja%obson( 0ee L>Homme " 5-.>"7 pp( 24"-6
An&( in -tructuralism, ed( JacHues Ahrmann 5Garden +ity *(M( -.?-7 a reprint of Sale
!rench -tudies nos( <>4<? 5-.>>7(
-<>( *ow in Gesellschaft+ Literatur+ &issenschaft, Gesammelte -cbriften 4C:9+
4CRR,
eds( H( R( Jaussand+( Miiller4Kaehn 5Munich -.>?7 pp( -4-< esp( pp( " and 3(
-<?( )irst in 0ntersuchunen #ur mittelalterlicben 6ierdichtun, see pp( -2< -/1
""2
"?-6 further in *rcbiv fiir das -tudiunt derneueren -pracben -.? 5-.>-7 pp( ""<4"2(
-</( Iarl Mannheim Mensch und Gesellscbaft in Zeitalter des 0mbaus
5Karmstadt
-.2/7 pp( "-" ff(
-<.( In 6heorie und Realitdt, ed( H( Albert 5Tubin&en -.>37 pp( /?4-1"(
-31( (bid,, p( .-(
-3-( (bid,, p, -1"(
-3"( Popper=s e8ample of the blind man does not distin&uish between the two
possibili
ties of a merely reacti$e beha$ior and an e8perimentin& mode of action under specific hypo
theses 5f the second possibility characteriFes reflected scientific beha$ior in distinction to
the unreflected beha$ior in li$ed pra8is the researcher would be @creati$e@ on his part and
thus to be placed abo$e the @blind man@ and more appropriately compared with the writer
as a creator of new e8pectations(
-3<( G( Buc% Lemen und 1rfabrun, pp( ?1 ff( @O*e&ati$e e8periencel has its
instruc
ti$e effect not only by causin& us to re$ise the conte8t of our subseHuent e8perience so that
the new fits into the corrected unity of an obBecti$e meanin&( ( ( ( *ot only is the obBect
of the e8perience differently represented but the e8periencin& consciousness itself re$erses
itself( The wor% of ne&ati$e e8perience is one of becomin& conscious of oneself( 'hat one
becomes conscious of are the motifs which ha$e been &uidin& e8perience and which ha$e
remained unHuestioned in this &uidin& function( *e&ati$e e8perience thus has primarily the
character of self4e8perience which frees one for a Hualitati$ely new %ind of e8perience(@
)rom these premises Buc% de$eloped the concept of a hermeneutics which as a @relation
ship of li$ed pra8is that is &uided by the hi&hest interest of li$ed pra8is:the a&ent=s self4
information@ le&itimiFes the specific e8perience of the so4called humanities 7Geisteswis+
senscbaften8 in contrast to the empiricism of the natural sciences( 0ee his @Bildun& durch
*DTA0 TDPP( 3-43/ J "D-
'issenschaft@ in &issenscbaft, .ildun und pddaoiscbe &ir$licb$eit _Heidenheim( -.>.7
p( "3(
-33 JuriB 0triedter has pointed out 5hat in the diaries and e8amples from the prose of
Leo Tolstoy to which 0h%lo$s%y referred in his first e8planation of the procedure of @alien 4
ation @ the purely aesthetic aspect was still bound up with an epistemolo&ical and ethical
cedure
-
and not in the Huestion of its ethical presuppositions and effects(@ EPoeti$ und
Hermeneuti$ 2 Osee note -"27 PP( "// ff(7
-32( )laubert <euvres, (, p, >2?9 @thus as early as this first mista%e as early as
this
first fall she &lorified adultery its poetry its $oluptuousness( !oila &entlemen what for
me is much more dan&erous much more immoral than the fall itself=@
-3>( Arich Auerbach Mimesis" 5arestellte &ir$licb$eit in der abendlandischen
Litera+
tur 5Bern -.3>7 p( 3<16 An&( Mimesis" 6he Representation of Reality in &estern Litera
ture, trans( 'illard I( Tras% 5Princeton -.2<7( p( 3/2(
-3?( )laubert( <euvres, -( p( >? <(
-3/( (bid,, p( >?1(
-3.( (bid,, p, >>>(
-21( +f( ibid,, pp( >>>4>?(
-2-( (bid,, p( ?-?(
-2"( @Kie 0chaubiihne als eine moralise he Anstalt betrachtet@ in -cbillers
-dmtlicbe
&er$e, 0a%ularaus&abe WI( p( ..( 0ee also R( Iosellec% Iriti$ und Irise 5)reibur& and
Munich -.2.7 pp( /" ff(
-2<( @`ur 0ystemati% der %iinstlerischen Probleme@ Aahrbuch fur *sthetih
5-."27( p(
3316 for the application of this principle to wor%s of art of the present see M( Imdahl
Poeti$ und Hermeneuti$ < pp( 3.<4212 >><4>3(
+hapter "( History of Art and Pra&matic History
-( @Letter to Andre Lebey@ 0ept( -.1> <euvres (( 5Paris -.>17 p( -23<6
also 0(
Iracauer in 5ie mebt mebr schonen Iunste, ed( H( R( Jauss 5Munich -.>/7 Poeti$ und
Hermeneuti$, III p( -"<(
"( +oncernin& the chan&e of paradi&m in the history of science see Th( 0(
Iuhn 6he
-tructure of -cientific Revolutions, 5+hica&o( -.>"7 and H( R( Jauss @Paradi&mawechsel
in der Literaturwissenschaft@ in Linuistische .ericbte, I 5-.>.7 pp( 33432(
<( P( Broc%meier 5arstellunen der fran#osiscben Literaturescbicbte von
Claude
Paucbet bir Laharpe 5Berlin -.><7(
3( 0ee H( R( Jauss Literalureschicbte als Provo$ation 5)ran%furt -.?17 pp(
<2 ff(
2( 0ee --( R( Jauss *sthetiscbe Normen und escbichtlicbe Refle/ion in der
@uerelle
des *nciens etdes Modernes 5Munich( -.>37( pp( "<4<<(
>( R( Iosellec%( @Historia ma&istra $itae@ in Natur und Ceschicbte, Iarl
Lowitb #um
?1( Geburtsta 50tutt&art -.>/7 pp( -.>4"-.(
?( 0ee thesis Huoted in note 2(
/( 0ee Nacbahmun und (llusion, ed --( R( Jauss 5Munich( -.>37( Poeti$ und
Hermen+
e t
G t i $ , I p ( I . i
.( Geschichte der Iunst des *ltertums ENQR4' ed( '( 0enff 5'eimar -.>37 p(
?(
-1( lbid,r p, "-(
--( <bcr das -tudium der riecbiscben Poesie, ed( P( Han%amer 5Godesber&
-.3?7(
P -2<(
-"( .riefe #ur .eforderunderHumanitdt, ?th and /th collections in &er$e, ed(
0uphan
5Berlin -//<7 W!HI p( 2?(
"1" J *DTA0 TD PP( 3/42>
-<( 0ee H(4K( 'eber !r, -cbleels F6rans#endentalpoesieF und das =erbal
tnis von
Iriti$ und 5icbtun im 49, Aaforbundert 5Munich -.?<7 pp( //4-1-(
-3( This is the basic principle behind the history of modem poetry with which
Herder
in letters /-4-1? alon& with 0chiller and )( 0chle&el 5-?.>4-?.?7 a&ain ta%es up the Hues
tions of the @uerelle des *nciens et des Modernes 6 see wor% Huoted in note 3 pp( ?"4?3(
-2( !oltaire Le siecle de Louis J(=, lntr(
->( The fra&ment datin& from -?23 is Huoted fromG( &inc$etmanns sdmtlicbe
&er$e,
ed( J( Aiselein 5Konaueschin&en7 WII pp( iii4 8$6 see also )ontius &tnc$elmann und die
fran#osiscbe *uf$larun 5Berlin -.>/7 -it#,+.er, d, dt, *$ad, d, &scb, #u .erlin, +at( for
lan&ua&e literature and art -.>/ I to whom I am obli&ed for the reference(
11. P. 7.
-/( &er$e, W!III p( -<?(
-.( In his presentat ion of modern poetry -?.> Herder still holds fast to
a@telos@ of
history insofar as he as%s at the outset9 @'hat is the law of this chan&eL Koes it chan&e for
the better or for the worseL@ 5p( >7 and at the end concludes from a comparison of periods9
Ftendimus in *rcadiam, tendimusY To t he land of simplicit y truth and morals &oes our
path@ 5p( -317( As re&ards the esthete 5WWWII p( ><7 or poetic philoloist 5WWWII p( /<7
that one must be in order to ris% oneself on the ocean of historical obser$ations see 'eber
5note -<7 p( --1(
"1( 'eber !r, -cbleels F6rans#endentalpoesie,F p( -"<(
"-( (bid,, p( --.(
""( &er$e, I pp( 33-433(
"<( &er$e, II p( --"(
"3( Histori$" =orlesun uber 1n#y$lopadie und Metbodoloie der Geschicbte,
ed( R(
Hubner 5Munich
i
I.>?P p( <2(
"2( (bid,, p( <3(
">( Kroysen himself was cau&ht up in the idea that in the history of art or
literature
@the sou&ht4for obBecti$e facts lie direcdy in front of us@ %ibid,, p( .>7(
"?( 0ee the critiHue of literary history by R( Barthes in -ur Racine 5Paris I.>176
An&(
<n Racine, trans( Richard Howard 5*ew Mor% -.>37(
"/( Jauss @Literary History as a +hallen&e to Literary Theory@ 5+hapter - of this $ol
ume7(
".( Histori$, pp, -<< ->?(
<1( (bid,, p( .-(
<-( Kroysen Histori$, X -> 5henceforth Huoted only with pa&e number or X7(
<"( !ariant in manuscript print of -/2/(
<<( A( Thierry -ur les trots randes metbodes histori?ues en usae depuis le
sei#ieme
siecle 5-/"176 Ke Barante Preface de (>Histoire des 5ues de .ourone 5-/"37 and the
anonymous article @Ke la nou$elle ecole historiHue@ 5-/"/76 Huoted from I( Massmann
5ie Re#eption des bhtoriscben Romans von -ir &alter -cott in !ran$reicb von 494R bis
49:2, Kiss( IonstanF -.>. esp( p( --/(
<3( That there was here a @parallelism of intention ( ( ( which Bustifies the
assertion
that the historical no$el of the 0cott type ( ( ( was capable of fulfillin& the pro&ramme of
the ei&hteenth4century 0cottish school of history more completely than it could itself is
also shown by A( 'olff @`wei !ersionen des historischen Romans9 0cotts ='a$erley= und
Thac%erays =Henry Asmond= @ in Lebende *nti$e, -ymposium fur R, -ubnet, ed( H( Meller
and H( 4J( `immermann 5Berlin( -.>?7 pp( <3/4>. 5esp( <2?7(
<2( Ad( 1( !ossler 50tutt&art( -.237 pp( ?/4.2 5henceforth Huoted only with pa&e
<>( The be&innin&s of a new style are accordin& to I( Badt 5see note /?7 @often not
tentati$e or imperfect but4 li%e Athene out of the head of `eus4 the new style stands com4
*DTA0 TD PP(2>4>? K "1<
Gertheless fully and chai
plete before us
perhaps 9 oped@ 5p( -<.7(
<?( 0ee Kroysen p( "/2 and also A4 +( Kanto *nalytical Philosophy of History 5+am
brid&e -.>27 who o$erloo%s the fact that die difference between the @whole@ of a wor% of
art and the ne$er completed @whole of history@ only e8ists so lon& as one does not i
the wor% of art in the historical dimension of its reception(
</( This preconception which Kanto see%s to e8plain as a @social inheritance@
5pp( ""3
"3"7 li%e his &eneral attempt to establish a relati$e le&itimacy for the historical would be
easier to &rasp throu&h Kroysen=s idea of analo&ies of historical e8perience( 0ee Histori$
-2.9 @'hate$er is &i$en in the nature of the thin& we ha$e learnt from our e8perience and
%nowled&e elsewhere of analo&ous situat ions4as the sculptor restorin& an old torso has
this basic analo&y in the constant form of the human body(@
<.( The metric scheme alone is not enou&h to determine the &eneric form of a
sonnet
as Kanto p( "2> ob$iously assumes(
31( 0ee H( R( Jauss @Litterature medie$ale et theorie des &enres@ in Poeti?ue,
revue
de theorie et d>analyse litte>raires 5-.?17 pp( ?.4-1- 5esp( p( ."7(
3-( M( Heide&&er @Ker #rsprun& des Iunstwer%s@ in llol#wee, )ran%furt -.21 p
-/ 5An&( @The Dri&in of the 'or% of Art@ in Poetry, Lanuae, 6houht, trans( Albert
Hofstadter O*ew Mor% -.?--76 also the correspondin& definition of classical in H(4G(
Gadamer &ahrbeit und Metbode 5Tubin&en -.>17 p( "?" 5An&( 6ruth and Method, no
trans( V*ew Mor% -.?2779 @a consciousness of permanence of the unlosable meanin& inde
pendent of all temporal circumstances ( ( ( a %ind of timeless present which means con
temporaneous for e$ery present@6 or A( R( +urtius 1uropatsche Literatur und lateiniscbes
Mittelalter 5Bern -.3/7 p( "< 5An&( 1uropean Literature and the Latin Middle *es,
V *ew Mor% -.2<;79 @The =t imeless present@ which is an essent ial element of lit erature
means that the literature of the past can always remain effecti$e in any present(@
3"( H(4G( Gadamer pp( ">- ff(9 5ie Rebabilitierun von *utoritdt und
6radition,
3<( '( Irauss Literaturescbicbte als escbicbtlicber *uftra, in -inn und
!orm 2
5-.217 p( #<(
33( P( -</(
32( In Le Peintre de la vie modeme, in <euvres completes 5Paris -.2-7
pp( /?<4?>(
3>( @Thesen iiber Tradition@ in (nsel *lmanacb auf das Aahr 4CRR, pp( "-4<<(
3?( 0ee Adorno p( ".9 @5Here7 one meet s wit h
t he true t heme of t he recollei
tradit ion which brin&s to&ether all that has remained by the
wayside the ne&lected the
defeat ed under the name of t he out4of4date( There the li$in&
element of tradit ion see%s
refu&e and not in the store of
wor%s that are to defy time@6 and
see especially 04 Irs
whose philosophy of history in History" 6he Last 6hins .efore the Last 5*eC
$indicates in many respects the demand @to undo the inBurious
3/( Gadamer p( ">-(
3.( +oncernin& the term FIon$retisationF
5materialiFat ion7 N
from p( !odic%a see below(
21( &ahrheit und Metbode, pp( <2-422(
2-( @Adward )uchs der 0ai
P

<D
2
3
"( 0ee the der(ilQN critiHue by G( Hartman @Toward Literary History(@ in 5aedalG
50prin& -.?17 pp( <224/<6 also +( 0e&re( ( Zpn t la critica 5Turin (.>.7( who also subBects
the claims of semiolo&ical literary theory to well4ar&ued criticism(
2<( *orthrop )rye *natomy of Cnticism 5*ew Mor%( -.>?7 pp( -> seH(
i little coars
4ally de$el4
sider
i of
v Mor% -.>.7
ir% of tradition@ 5p( ?7(
ich I ha$e ta%en o$er
nler und Histori%er(@ in *nelus Novus _)ran%furt( -.>>7(
"13 K *DTA0 TD PP( >?4?-
ciaJ attention should be paid to this fundamental critiHue which de$elops hermencutic ap 4
proaches to the problemof o$ercomin& structural do&matism(
2?( -ur Racine, see esp( p( -?9 @Les trois espaces e8terieurs9 mort fuitc
e$enement@
and p( 239 @La faute 5La theolo&ie racinienne cst une redemption in$ersee9 c=est I=homme
Hui rachete Kieu7@ p( 22(
2/( (bid,, p, -2>(
;C, (bid,
>1( 0ee statements of R( Pi card and +( Le$i40trauss Huoted by G( 0chiwy 5er
fran+
/osiscbe -tru$turalismus 5Hambur& -.>.7 p( >? and p( ?- respecti$ely(
>-( -ur Racine, p( --9 @In literature which is an order of connotation there
is no
pure Huestion6 a Huestion is always nothin& but its own scattered answer which is split up
in fra&ments between which the meanin& sprin&s up and at the same time escapes(@ This
new accentuation of the problem in itself implies what Barthes did not see:the answerin&
character of the te8t which is the prime connectin&4point for its reception(
>"( Hence the &reater resistance of art to time4 that @parado8ical nature@ of the
wor%
une8plained by R( Barthes9 @it is a si&n for history and at the same time resistance a&ainst
it@ 5p( -<7(
><( 5ie *ppellstru$tur der 6e/te" =nbestimmtbeit ah &ir$unsbedinun
literarischer
Prosa _IonstanF -.?17 Ionstan#er 0niversitatsreden, ed( G( Hess( $ol( WW!III(
>3( This interaction has been described by H(4G( Gadamer as a @fusion of
horiFons@9
%Hori#ontverscbmel#un', pp( "/. seH( <2>( In my opinion this description with which O
concur does not necessarily &i$e rise to the re$ersal of the relationship between Huestion
and answer which Gadamer 5pp( <2-42>7 brin&s about in order to ensure die precedence
of the @e$ent of tradition@ o$er understandin& as @a producti$e procedure@ 5p( "/17(
>2( Iriti$ und &abrbeit 5)ran%furt -.>?7 p( >/(
>>( (bid,, [, >/(
>?( (bid,, p( ?1(
>/( (bid,, pp( //4.-( In -ur Racine, the pro&rammatic @literary history without
indi
$iduals@ is understood as a history of the literary institution6 the mediation between pro
duction communication and reception remains Huite open and in the end R( Barthes has
to confess that the result of this reduction is @simply history@ and so no lon&er specific
to the historicity of art 5pp( ""4"<7(
>.( +hapter - of this $olume(
?1( )or my account of this I amindebted to JuriB 0triedter and the Research
Group
for the 0tructural 0tudy of Lan&ua&e and Literature at the #ni$ersity of +onstance who
ha$e prepared a detailed presentation and a German edition of the most important te8ts of
Pra&ue 0tructuralism for the series 6heorie und Gescbichte der Literatur und der -cbonen
Iunste, published by '( P( )in% Munich and ha$e allowed me to Huote fromtheir trans
lation of )( !odic%a=s boo% -tru$tura vyvoHe 5since published9 5ie -tructure der hterari
scben 1inbildun, intro( by J( 0triedter Munich -.?>7( The semiotic structuralism of 0o
$iet literary study does not yet appear to be concerned with the problem of a structural
history of literature so much as with structural analysis of literary &enres( 0ee I( Aimer4
macher @Antwic%lun& +hara%ter und Probleme des sowBetischen 0tru%turalismus in der
Literaturwissenschaft(@ in -pracbe im teebniscben Zeitalter, <1 5-.>.7 pp( -">42?( Df
prime importance are the writin&s of J uriB Lotman9 Le$cii po stru$tum= noH poeti$e 5Tartu
-.>37 repr( Pro$idence Rhode Island -.>/(
?-( In the collection of essays !iures 5Paris -.>>7 PP4 -324?1
?"( @0tructure et hermeneutiHueL in 1sprit <- 5-.><7 pp( 224>4>"?6 cont(nued
$wrh9
@La structure le mot -=e$enement@ in 1sprit <2 5-.>?7 pp( /1-4"-(
?<( P( ->-(
?3( (bid,, pp( ->"4>3(
*DTA0 TDPP( ?-4?? K"12
=olu4
tion &lobale en=pratiHuant des coupes synchroniHues a di$erses etapes et en comparant les
Tableau8 entre eu8( ( ( ( +=est dans le chan&ement conrinuel de fonction Hue se manifeste
la $raie $ie des elements de I=oeu$re litteraire(@
?>( In @uatre conferences sur la F->ouvelle Criti?ueF 5Turin 0ocieta editrice interna4
Fionale -.>/7 p( </(
QQ, (bid, p, <.(
?/( (bid,, p( <.9 @Les &randes oeu$res rebellessont ainsi trahies ellessont4par le
com4
mentaire er la&lose4e8orcisees rendues acceptables et $ersees au patrimoine commun( ( ( (
Mais la comprehension critiHue ne $ise pas a I=assimilation du dissemblable( Alle ne serait pas
comprehension si elle ne comprenait pas la difference en tant Hue difference(@
?.( The most important writin&s of J( Mu%a!o$s%y are to be found in @+hapters
from
+Fech poetry@ Iapitoly # ces$e poeti$y 5Pra&ue -.3/7 < $ols( and -tudie F esteti$y
50tudies fromAesthetics7 5Pra&ue -.>>7(
/1( The boo% -tru$tura vyvoHe 50tructure of Ke$elopment7 puhlished in
Pra&ue in
-.>. la%es up two older wor%s9 Ion$reti#ace literarnibo dila 5MaterialiFation of the Liter
ary 'or% -.3-7 and Literami historie, HeHt problemy a u$oly 5Literary History Its Prob
lems and Tas%s -.3"76 see note ?1(
/-( -tru$tura vyvoHe, p( <2(
/"( P( -..(
/<( P( 3-(
/3( P( -.>(
/2( P( "1>(
/>( This obBection is raised by M( 'ehrli in his address9 Literatur und
Gescbicbte,
Aabresbericbt der 0niversitat Zurich 5-.>.4-.?17 p( >(
/?( I( Badt &issenscbaftstebre der Iunsteschicbte 5p( ->17( This was an
unpublished
wor% which the author has %indly allowed me to Huote from6 it also proceeds from a con
sideration of Kroysen=s Histori$, in order to establish a new methodolo&ical basis for the
history of the fine arts 5since published +olo&ne -.?-7(
//( (bid,, p( -.1(
/.( Here I am followin& I( Iosi% 5ie 5iale$ti$ des Ion$reten 5)ran%furt
-.>?7
csp( the chapter9 @Historismus und Historic mus@ pp( 1::-;<.
.1( (bid,, p( -3<(
.-( (bid,, p( -3/(
C2, (bid,
C3a9t6r :. ,36ory of /6nr64 an7 M67i6'al Lit6ratur6
1. This was re$i$ed by the @Third International +on&ress of Modern Literary
History@ Lyon in May -.<. 5@Tra$au8 du <e +on&res international d=Histoire
litteraire mo4 Helicott 2 --.31; 7 that was de$oted to the &enre problem that
had been declared X +roce and that thereby pro$o%ed his scornful protest( +f( G(
`acharias @B( +roce literarischen Gattun&en(@ dissertation #ni$ersity of
Hambur& -.2-( )or further on cf( J( Pommier @L=ldec de &enre@ Publications
de (>1cole Normale -uperieure, des Lettres II 5Paris -.327 pp( 3?4/-6 Rene
'elle% and Austin 'arren 6heory of 5*ew Mor% -.3"7 ch( -?9 @Literary
Genres@6 and '( Rutt%ows%i 5ie Hterari+ unen 5Bern -.>/7 useful for its
biblio&raphy(
H( Iuhn @Gattun&sprobleme der mittelhochdeutschen Literatur@ in 5icbtun und
Mittelalter, "nd ed( 50tutt&art -.>.7 p( 32( +f( Iuhn @Gattun&sprobleme= p(
?9 @But what does one do with the unsun&
& p = p( ?9 rse the fable
with all the types that play
held ii
=lerne(
dead by
und die
discussii
0ection
l,ii,
scben c
"
&elt h
<(
t boundaries across
rhymed disi
"1> J *DTA0 TD PP( ??4/-
the didactic the no$elistic the alle&orical from the smallest forms up to the &reat formsL
0hould the passion play function as tra&edy the !asnacbtspiel as comedyL +an the didactic
and the reli&ious literature of all forms constitute their own &enres since as =epic= =lyric=
or =dramatic= they are only pseudotypes( And once a&ain prose of all %inds literary and
pra&matic reli&ious and scholarly and practical with the most $aried transitions into poetry4
rhymed prefaces to Lucidarius and -achsenspieel, rhymed and prose chronicles world4his4
torical as well as locally historical the ritual literatureL@
3( +roce=s aesthetics were mediated in the #nited 0tates throu&h J( A(
0pin&arn who
counts amon& the &round4brea%ers of *ew +riticism6 cf( 0pin&arn @The *ew +riticism@
5-.-17 in 6he *chievement of *merican Criticism, ed( +( A( Brown( 5*ew Mor% -.237
pp( 2"243> and J( Hermand @Probleme der heuti&en Gattun&s&eschichte@ in Aabrbucb
fur (nternationale Germanisti$ " 5-.?17 pp( /24.3(
2( Dn the foundin& of an historical aesthetics cf( Peter 0Fondi
@Ainleitun&@ to
6beorie des modernen 5ramas 5)ran%furt a(M( -.2>7 and his @La Theorie des &enres
poetiHues cheF )riedrich 0chle&el@ Criti?ue 5March -.>/7 pp( ">34."(
>( Benedetto +roce 1stetica, "nd ed( CBari -.1"7 p( 31(
?( (bid,, pp, 31 ?2(
/( The two names 1rtebnisastbeti$ and Geniedstbeti$, refer respecti$ely to
criticism
represented by Kilthey=s 5as 1rlebnis und die 5icbtun 5-.1?7 and the late ei&hteenth4
century theories of Hamann Herder and @0turm und Kran&(@ 5Tr(7
.( 'olf4Kieter 0tempel @Pour une description des &enres litteraires@ in
*ctes du
Jlle Conres international de linuisti?ue Romane 5Bucharest -.>/7 p( 2>2 on the funda
mental condition of any theory of discourse9 @A$ery act of lin&uistic communication is
reducible to a &eneric and con$entional norm composed on the le$el of the spo%en lan
&ua&e of the social inde8 and the situation6QN inde8 as a unity of beha$ior(@
-1( )( 0en&le 5ie literarische !ormenlebre 50tutt&art -.>>7 p( -.(
--( Accordin& to A( +oseriu @Thesen Fum Thema =0prache und Kichtun&
-
@ in
.ei+
trae +L0J 6e/tlinuisti$, ed( 'olf4Kieter 0tempeN 5Munich -.?-7 pp( -/<4// esp( section
II "6 cf( 0tempel9 @Thus the &enre as it were is at once of the system and of the utterance
7parole8 a status correspondin& to that which +oseriu calls =norm(= @
-"( 'hat +roce 1stetica, p( ?/ called @the family atmosphere@ 5to indicate the
simi
larity of e8pressions7 and played a&ainst the concept of &enre thus recei$es a positi$e meanin&(
-<( Iant Iriti$ der asthetiscben 0rteils$raft, sec( -/( Here I am followin& the
inter
pretation of Gerhard Buc% @Iants Lehre $om A8empel@ *rcbiv fur .eriffsescbichte --
5-.>?7 p( -/" to which - owe this su&&ested solution of the &enre problem(
-3( 'ith this formulation J( G( Kroysen in his Histori$, ed( R( Hiibner 5Munich
-.>?7
pp( . ff( paraphrases the Aristotelian determination of man%ind %epidosis eis auto' as op
posed to the merely &eneric animals or plants E5e anima II 3(27( Kroysen=s formulation
which &roundshis ima&e of the continuity of pro&ressi$e historical labor, is directed a&ainst
the or&anic concept of de$elopment and thus is also appropriate for the historiciFed con
cept of the literary &enre(
-2( +f( 0tempel @Pour une description des &enres litteraires(@
->( Ta%in& off from the theory of &enre de$eloped here H( #( Gumbrecht(
!un$tions+
wandel und Reception, -tudien #um byperbolischen *usdrucfc in literanscben 6e/ten des
romanischen Mittelalters 5Munich -.?"7 has in$esti&ated the limits of probability and the
@literary tones@ of $arious &enres on the basis of a statistical study of hyperbolic e8pressions
in twelfth4 and thirteenth4century te8ts(
-?( Juri TynBano$( @Kas litenmehc )a%tum@ C-a"37( i@ ^SS CQa@aSaS\
!orm0is+
S(( !ol( - 5Theorie und Geschich(e der LiterSur und der Pch>nea Iun(te !I7 ed( Buri
0triedter 5Munich -.>.7 pp( <."43<-6cf( 0medter p( l8ii(
-/( Dn the ap, cf( J( u( )echner( @`urr( Gap in der al(pro$enFal(schen Lyn%
Ctmar,,
*DTA0 TD PP( /-4/< J "1?
hche+romanische Monatsschrift, -3 5new scries6 -.>37 pp( - 24<36 on the &rotesHue cf( 5ie
nicht mebr schonen Iunste 5Poeti% und Hermeneuti% III7 ed( H( R( Jauss _Munich -.>/7(
under das Grotes$e,
-.( <n 0haftesbury=s 6he Audment of Hercules, cf( Iari !ietor @Problem der
literari4
schen Gattun&s&eschichte@ 5eutsche =iertelHabrschrift fur Literaturwissenscbaft und Geis+
teseschtcbte . 5-.<-7 ".>4<11(
"1( Andre Jolles 1infacbe !ortnen" Leende, -ae, Mylhe, Ratsel, -piel, Iasus,
Mora+
bile, Marchen, &it# 5-.<17 "nd ed( 5Halle -.2>7 p( -.>(
"-( Cf, Chanson de este und bbftscher Roman 50tudia romanica I!7
5Heidelber&
-.><7 pp( ?1 ff((
""( (bid,, pp( >.4?1(
"<( References for the synchronic system correspond to the para&raphs of the outline9
-(-9 +f( *orthrop )rye *natomy of Criticism 5Princeton *( J( -.2?7 pp( "3/ "3.
where he distin&uishes a spea%in& poet and a listenin& audience 5epic7 a writin& author and
an unseen audience 5Iprosel fiction7 the concealment of the author from his audience
5drama7 and the concealment of the poet=s audience from the poet 5lyric7(
-("9 Dn the @si&nes du narrateur@ cf( Roland Barthes @Introduction a I=analyse
structural des rec%s@ Communications / 5-.>>7 p( -.(
-(<9 The opposition between @how4suspense@ and @if4at4all4suspense@ is de$eloped by
+( Lu&ows%i 5ie !orm der (ndividualist im Roman 5Berlin -.<"7 pp( 3- ff(6 on epic dis4
tance and theopposition between @passe du sa$oir@ and @passe du recit@ 5future in the past7
cf H( R( Bauss Zeit und 1rinnerun im Marcel Prousts F* la recherche du temps perduF,
"nd ed( 5Heidelber& -.?17 pp( -/ ff(
"(-9 Dn the etymolo&y of roman# and novela, see Iarl !ossler 5ie 5ichtunsformen
der Romanen 50tutt&art -.2-7 pp( <12 <1>(
"(<9 Accordin& to Arich Auerbach Mimesis+, 5arestellte &ir$Hch$eit in der abend+
landischen 0teratur, "nd ed( 5Bern -.2.7 chs( $ $i6 Boccaccio 5ecameron, +onclusione <
5concernin& the accusation that he had @troppa licenFia usata@ and said to the women
@cose non assai con$enienti@79 @La Hual cosa io ne&o per cio chen niuna si disonesta n=e
che con onesti $ocaboli dicendola si disdica ad alcuno@
<(-9 Dn the opposition between action and happenin& which &oes bac% to He&el=s
aesthetics see Jauss Chanson de este und hofischer Roman, p( ?"6 on Goethe=s formula4
tion 5con$ersation with Ac%ermann on "2 January -/"?7 and its formerly une8hausted si&4
nificance for the casuistry specific to the no$ella see H(4J( *euschafer .occaccio und der
.einv der Novetlisti$ 5Theorie und Geschichte der Literatur und der 0chonen Iunste !III7
5Munich -.>.7 pp( ?> ff(
<("9 The &radation of the prota&onists in epic romance and no$ella corresponds to
the three middle &rades in *orthrop )rye=s classification accordin& to the heroes= possibili4
ties of action cf( *natomy of Criticism, pp( << <36 the scale can be differentiated accord4
in& to the structural status of the types of action as for e8ample with TF$eun Todoro$=s
basic predicates 5lo$e communication help7 or A( J( Greimas=s octants _subBectGobBect
&i$erGrecei$er helperGopponent7 cf( Barthes @Introduction@ pp( -2 ff(
<(<9 Dn the structure of courtly ad$entures and their opposite world see Arich Ioh4=er
(deal und &ir$Hch$eit in der bofiscben 1pi$ 5Tubin&en -.2>7 chs( iiiGi$6 Boccaccio >on,
+oncl( -/9 @+on$iene nella moltitudine delle cose di$erse Hualita di cose tro4
5ecc
3(-6 Dn the de&rees of reality see below on Johannes de Garlartdia=s PoetriaK on the
$arious substrata of the sa&a 5for the epic7 and the fairy tale 5for the romance7 and their
definition by Ja%ob Grimm see J auss Chanson de este und bofischer Roman, pp( >3 ff(6
on the social character of the no$ella see Arich Auerbach Zur 6echni$ der !ruhrenah+
sancenovetle in (talien und !ran$reich 5Heidelber& -."-7 p( -(
"1/ a *DTA0 TD PP( /<4.-
3("9 The opposition between the ethics of action and the ethics of the e$ent is de4
$eloped by Jolies 1infacb !ortnen, p( "1-(
3(<6 Dn the relationship between epic and memoire collective, see M( Bloch La soci+
ete feodale, !ol( I 5Paris -.3.7 pp( -3?4><6 on the social function of the romance see I
)rappier 1tude sur Svain , ( 5Paris -.>.7 pp( - /2 ff(9 the Huote on the no$ella is ta%en
from Auerbach Zur 6echni$ der !rubrenaissancenovelle p( <(
"3( My definition of the romance relies in many points on Paul `umthor @Le
roman
courtois9 Assai de definition@ in 1tudes literaires 3 5-.?-7 pp( ?24.1(
"2( Juri TynBano$ and Roman Ja%obson @Problemeder Literatur4 und
0prachforschun&@
5-."/7 in Iursbucb 25-.>>7 pp( ?34?>6 cf( Jauss( +hapter - of this $olume(
">( +f( note -36 Andre Jolles 1infache !ortnen, p( ? intends the same principle
when
he spea%s of @lan&ua&e as labor@9 @to establish the path which leads from lan&ua&e to litera
ture ( ( ( as we comparati$ely obser$e how one and the same phenomenon repeats itself
in an enriched manner on another le$el how a force &o$erns the system as a whole formin&
a structure and limitin& the form and ele$atin& itself with each step(@
"?( )ormulated lin&uistically as the e8pansion of a semiotic system that fulfills
itself
between the unfoldin& and correction of the system6 cf( 0tempel @Pour une description( @
"/( )rom Kroysen Histori$, p( -./ referrin& to national peoples as @indi$idual
struc
tures(@
".( '( Iellermann @Dber die altfranFosischen Gedichte des
unein&eschran%ten #n4
sinns@ in *rchiv fur das -tudium der neureren -pracben "12 5-.>/7 pp( -4"" who there
summariFes the pertinent studies by A( M 0chmidt Paul `umthor L( +( Porter and their re
$iewers(
<1( '( Hempel in a boo% re$iew in Romanische !orscbunen ?< 5-.>-7 p(
321 has
called attention to this(
<-( Iellermann @Dber die altfranFosischen Gedichte@ p( -3(
<"( The character of the fatras as @&loss@ stems from P( Le Gentil cf(
Iellermann ibid,,
P( 3(
<<( '( Iellermann @Ain 0chachspiel des franFosischen Mittelalters9 die
Res$eries@
Melanes R( LeBeune -.>. pp( -<<-43>(
<3( (bid,, pp( -<<24<>(
<2( B( Goth 0ntersucbunen #ur Gattunseschicbte der -ottie 5Bochumer
Arbeiten
Fur 0prach4 und Literaturwissenschaft I7 5Munich -.>?7 pp( <? ff((
<>( Kroysen Histori$, p( "1.(
<?( Dn this see 'erner Irauss -tudien #ur deutscben und fran#osischen
*uf$tarun
5Berlin -.><7 pp( ?< ?39 @The attempt to e8plain the whole course of a literary period
throu&h the constant influence of basic economic relationships would not only call into
Huestion the meanin& of literary history but indeed destroy the e8istence of literature as an
immanentiy coherent sphere of creati$ity( Literature would remain only an unor&anic series
of mere refle8es( The $ul&ar4materialist dissolution of literature into sociolo&y misses the
real essence of literary phenomena as much as the idealist e8planation of the so$erei&nty of
mental creati$ity docs(@
</( Irauss @Kie literarischcn Gattun&en@ in 1ssays i\r frm#osiscben Liunuur
5Berlin
and 'eimar -.>/7 p( -<(
<.( Arich Iohler 1sprit und ar$aditcbe !reibeit, *ufsat#e aus der &elt der
Romanu,
5)ran%furt a(M( and Bonn -.>>7 p( />(
31( Irauss @Kie lircrarisehcn Gattun&en@ p( C,
=#, w=T`nlei @Kie Brecht4Lu%te4Keb(tte(@ Da *rumem 5March-.>/7( pp( -"4
3<6 also I(rl Iosi%( KS 5i,le$,i$ des Ion$reten 5)ran%furt a(M(( -.>?76 cf( 6e/,e derruss+
scben !ormalisten, ed( 0triedter I p( I88$iii(
*DTA0 TDPP( .-4.. K"1.
3<( Iohler @Kie Pastourcllen des Trobadors Ga$audan@ in 1sprit und ar$adhcbe
!rei+
beit, pp( >?4/"(
33( Iohler @0ir$entes4IanFoner =&enre batard= oder le&itime Gattun&L@ in
Melanes R,
LeHeune, p( -?"9 @'hile the can#one honors the ideal of indi$idual fulfillment in Hoi d>amor,
celebratin& or also complainin& of the happiness and pain of lo$e and the sirvemes on the
other hand denounces e$erythin& which opposes this ideal it is the structural principle of
the sirventes+can#one to maintain that ideal throu&h the representation of possible fulfill
ments and actual hindrances(@
32( *euschiifer .occaccio und der .eintt der Novellisti$,
3>( (bid,, p( /(
3?( As does '( Pabst Novellentheorie und Novellendicbtun, "nd ed(
5Heidelber&
-.>?7(
3/( !ietor @Probleme der literarischen Gattun&s&eschichte@ p( <13(
3.( +f( H( Iuhn @Gattun&sprobleme der mittelhochdeutschen Literatur@ pp(
3> 2>
(, R4,
21( Dn this last aspect I can refer to my studies of the Ren art4epi&ones9 cf(
0nter+
sucbuuen ]ur mittelaherlicben 6ierdicbtun, 5Beihefte Fur `eitschrift fiir romanische Philo4
lo&ie +7 5Tubin&en -.2.7 ch( !6 also Cultura neolatina "- 5-.>-7 pp( "-34-. and Melanes
5elbouMe, -.>3 !ol( II pp( ".-4<-"(
2-( BenBamin @Iiduard )uchs der 0ammler und Histori%er@ in *nelas Novus
5)ran%
furt a(M( -.>>7 p( <1<(
2"( I( Behrens 5ie Lehre von der 1mteilun der 5icbt$unst 5Beihefte Fur
`eitschrift
fur romanischen Philolo&ie W+II7 5Halle -.3176 A( )aral Les arts poeti?ues du Jlle et du
Jllte siecles 5Paris -."376 A( de Bruyne 1tudes d>estheti?ue medie>vale, < $ols( 5Bru&&e
-.3>7 esp( II 3"(
2<( Accordin& to )aral Les arts poeti?ues, p( /"9 @That which was a matter
of style
for the first critics became a matter of social di&nity for the school of the twelfth and thir
teenth centuries( It is the Huality of the characters and not that of the elocution that fur
nishes the principle of classification@6 and de Bruyne 1tudes, II 3- ff((
23( Irauss @Kie literarischen Gattun&en@ p( -2(
22( A( R( +urtius 1uropdiscbe Literatur und lateiniscbes Mittelalter, <rd ed(
5Bern
-.>-7 @A8%urs !9 0patanti%e Literaturwissenschaft@6 An&( 1uropean Literature and tbe
Latin Middle *es, trans( 'illard R( Tras% 5*ew Mor% -.2<7(
2>( Ke Bruyne( 1tudes, II -/ ff((
2?( +urtius 1uropean Literature, ch( -? sec( 29 @Kie Commedia und die
literarischen
Gattun&en(@
2/( )or this essay the results of the Grundriss der Romaniscben Literaturen des
Mitt eh
alters mono&raphs on &enres 5to appear after !olume -7 could not yet be e$aluated( The
si&nificance of the Honleur repertories that ha$e been handed down 5e(&( that of Guiraut
de +abreira6 cf( R( #Beune @La forme de Tensehamen au Bon&leur= du troubadour Guiraut
de +abreira@ in Melanes L, N, d><lwer 5Barcelona -.>>7 II pp( -?-4/"7 and of the &en
eric &roupin&s in the collected manuscripts for a historical systematics of literary &enres
deser$es a comprehensi$e in$esti&ation(
2.( +f( Jauss 0ntersucbunen #ur mittelalierlicben 6ierdichtun, ch( I!A(
>1( )or the interpretation of this prolo&ue cf( R( Guiette Romania ?/
5-.>?7 pp(
-4-"(
>-( Hu&o )riedrich 1pochen der italieniscben Lyri$ 5)ran%furt a(M(( -.>37( p(
.1(
>"( A( Jeanroy @Les &enres lyriHues sccondaires dans la poesie pro$encale du
Wl!e
siecle@ in Melanes Pope, -.<. pp( "1.4-36 new definitions of the escondt 5son& of Busti
fication7 and the contHat 5son& of farewell7 arc pro$ided by +hristian )ey .tid und !un$+
tion der donipna in der Lyri$ der 6robadors 5Heidelber& Ph(K( dissertation -.?-7(
"-1 K *DTA0 TD PP( ..4-13
><( Poirion( Le poett et le prince,+ L>evolution du lytisme courtois de Guillaume
de
Macbaut a Charles d><Heans 5Paris -.>27 pp( <-<4<->(
>3( )or a critiHue of these premises for A( R( +urtius=s research into tradition 5e(&(
his
1uropean Literature, ch( -7 cf( '( Bulst @Beden%en eincs Phiiolo&en(@ in Medium *evum
=wunt, H( R( Jauss and '( 0challer eds( Heidelber& I.>1 pp( ?4-1 and Jauss +hapter !
of this $olume(
>2( J( Rychner La chanson de este" 1ssai sur E>art epi?ue des Honleurs
50ociete de
publications romanes et francaises LWWW7 5Gene$a -.2276 cf( @La techniHue iitteraire des
+hansons de &este@ *ctes du Collo?ue de Liee, 0eptember -.2? 5BibliotheHue de la )acul4
te de philolo&ie et de lettres de -=#ni$ersite de Lie&e +L7 ed( M( Kelbouille 5Paris -.2.76
also the report of the +on&res de Poitiers 5July -.2.7 of the 0ociete Rences$als in .ulletin
bibliorapbi?ue de la -ociete Rencesvals " 5-.>17 pp( 2.4-""(
>>( Rychner La chanson de este, p( 3/(
>?( Rudolf Bultmann 5ie Gescbichte der synoptischen 6radition, >th ed(
5Gottin&en
-.>37 p( 3(
>/(+f(btCJ(p($ii(
>.( A( Robert and A( )euillet (ntroduction a la .ible 5Tournai -.2.7 p( -21(
?1( (bid,, p( -21(
?-( Robert and )euillet6 Los eneros literarios de la -arada 1scritura
5+on&reso de
ciencias eclesiasticas 0alamanca -.237 5Barcelona -.2?76 also A( Lods Histoire de la li
terature hebrai?ue et Huive 5Paris -.2176 A( BeniFen (ntroduction to the <ld 6estament,
"nd ed( 5Iopenha&en -.2"76 H( +( Kodd 6he apostolic preachin and its developments,
?th ed( 5-.2?76 I( Ioch 'as ist !ormenescbicbte) Neue &ee der .ibele/eese, "nd ed(
5*eu%irchen4!luyn -.>?7(
?"( Robert and )euillet Los eneros, p( -"<(
?<( +( Iuhl and G( Bom%amm @)ormen und Gattun&en@ in Reliion in
Geschicbte
und Geenwart" Handworterbucb fur 6beoloie und Reliionswissenschaft, <rd ed( 5Tubin&
en -.2/7 H columns ..>4-112(
?3( Bultmann 5ie Geschicbte, p( 31(
?2( (bid,, pp( 31 3-(
?>( Auerbach Literaturspracbe und Publi$um in der lateinischen -patanti$e
und im
Mittelalter 5Bern -.2/7 p( <"6 cf( An&( Literary Lanuae and (ts Public m Late Latin
*nti?uity and in the Middle *es, trans( Ralph Manheim 5Princeton *( J( -.>27 p( <?(
??( +f( Bultmann 5ie Geschicbte, p, 39 @Just as the locus in life is not a uniHue
his
torical e$ent but rather a typical situation or mode of beha$ior in the life of a community
the literary &enre4or respecti$ely the form throu&h which a particular piece is coordinated
with a &enre4is similarly a sociolo&ical concept and not an aesthetic one howe$er much
such forms may be used in a later de$elopment as aesthetic means for an indi$idualiFin&
literature(@
?/( M( 'altF @`um Problem der Gattun&s&eschichte im Mittelalter@ in
Zeitscbrift fur
romaniscbe Philoloie /> 5-.?17 pp( <" and << note -? on the autonomy of courtly
poetry which sets in rather early9 @The courtly forms also prefi&ure in other ways the stable
&enres of the later period9 they li$e in a symbolic world 5which they essentially carry with
them7 that is separated from the official reli&ious one arid its socio4cultural function is less
immediately comprehensible(@
?.( (bid,, p( <2(
/1( 0ee the Grundrissder Romanischen LiteratureG, des Mittelalters, !ol( !I +( PP(
->1
"<< 5forthcomin&7(
/-( Ro&er Kra&onetti Revue beie de philoloie et d>histoire 3< 5-.>27 P( --/6
cf(
GRLM*, !I + p( -2-(
*DTA0 TD PP( -134--3 J "--
/"( Rainer 'arnin& @Ritus Mythos and &eistliches 0piel(@ in Poetica < 5-.?17
pp(
/<4--3(
/<( (bid,, p( -1"(
/3( 0ummariFed by 0triedter ed( 6e/te der russiscben !ormalisten, - pp( I84l88(
/2( (bid,, p( I8$i(
/>( (bid, p( i8$(
/?( Juri TynBano$ pro$ided the model of such an analysis of the history of a
&enre for
the ode in @Kie Dde als oratorisches Genre@ 5-.""7 in 6e/te der russiscben !ormalisten, O-
ed( '(4K( 0tempel 5Munich -.?"7 pp( "?<4<<?6 Boris Tomache$s%y pro$ides e8amples
for the @penetration of the procedures of the $ul&ar &enre into the hi&her &enre@ in @The4
matiHue@ 5-."27 in 6beorie de la litterature" 6e/tes des formalistes russes, ed( TF$etan
Todoro$ 5Paris -.>27 pp( "><4<1?(
//( +f( Iohler @`ur Antstehun& des altfranFosischen Prosaromans@ in
6robadorlyri$
und bdfiscber Roman 5Berlin -.>"7 pp( "-<4"<(
/.( TynBano$ @Kie Dde als oratorisches Genre(@
.1( Jolles 1infache !ormen,
.-( Jan Mu%arQo$s%y Iapitel aus der Poett$ 5)ran%furt a(M( -.>?7 and
Iapitel aus
der *stbeti$ 5)ran%furt a(M( -.?176 on these see 0triedter ed( 6e/te der russiscben !or
malisten, I pp( I8i I88i86 Jauss +hapter - of this $olume(
."( +oncernin& the @answerin& character@ of the wor% of art as well as the
hermen4
eutic lo&ic and tradition4formin& function of the procedure of Huestion and answer - refer
the reader to +hapter J of this $olume(
+hapter 3( Goethe=s and !alery=s )aust9 Dn the
Hermeneutics of Euestion and Answer
-( +yrus Hamlin @Literary History and Tradition6 The Importance of Goethe=s
&elt+
literatur for +omparati$e Literature@ 5paper deli$ered at the +on&ress of the International
+omparati$e Literature Association Dttawa -.?<76+lausTra&er @'elt&eschichte4*ation4
aliteratur4'eltliteratur@ in &eimarer .eitrae, Heft ? _-.?37 p( "16 Manfred Gstei&er
@PourHuoi la litterature compareeL@ in 1tudes de lettres, III ? 5-.?37 p( -3(
"( Accordin& to Roland Barthes6 see my critiHue in +hapter - of this
$olume( )or
the followin& definition of myth - refer to Andre Jolles 1infacbe !ormen, "nd ed(
5Tubin&en -.2/7 p( .? and 6error und -piel" Probleme der Mytbenre#eption 5Poeti% und
Hermeneuti% I!7 ed( Manfred )uhrmann 5Munich -.?-7 p( "1-(
<( That all structural description in the field of communication acts cannot
mana&e
without the hermeneutic circle is also demonstrated by #mberto Aco @Rhetoric and Ideolo&y
in 0ue=s Les Mysteres de Paris,F in (nternational -ocial -cience Aournal -. 5-.>?7 p( 22-(
3( +f( @Au lecteur@ in <euvres 5Pleiade7 ed( Jean Hytier 5Paris -.2?4>17 II
p( "?2
5in the followin& this edition is cited with the act and scene numbers only76 on this see Les
Cabiers, edited in facsimile by the +entre *ationale de Recherche 0cientifiHue 5Paris(
-.2?4 7 WI 5-."24">7 p( /-3 and WWIII 5-.317( p( ?<>(
2( Accordin& to the testimony of his dau&hter A&athe Rouard4!alery in an
inter$iew
with the newspaper Les -pectacles, "> *o$ember -.?19 @My father was $ery=chau$inistic(=
and he so to spea% a$en&ed the e$ents by throwin& himself into an obstinate labor in order
to use and channel the $iolence that was howlin& within him(@
>( Harold Bloom 6he *n/iety of (nfluence, * 6heory of Poetry 5*ew Mor%
-.?<7
Pp( -/433(
?( Dn this see 0ander L( Gilman @!ery Little )aust ( ( ( Parodies of German
Krama
on the Mid4*ineteenth +entury British 0ta&e@ *rcadia / 5-.?<7 pp( -/433(
"-" J*DTA0 TDPP( --24-"?
tre temps et =alery, ed( Jeai
/( @)aust et % +ycle@ 5-.>27 now in Les
Criti?u
Beltemin4*oel 5Paris -.?-7 pp( .24-1?(
.( Lucicn Goldmann @Rationatismus und Kiale%ti%4 Bemer%un&en Fu !alerys
)aust@
in !estschrift #um 93, Geburtstae von Geor Lu$dcs, -.>2 pp( 33<42"(
-1( Dri&inally in 5ie Leitimist der Neu#eit 5)ran%furt a(M( -.>>7 pp( </- 3"-6
then
in the re$ised new edition 5er Pro#ess der tbeoretischeti Neuierde 5)ran%furt a(M( -.?<7
csp( pp( -/. and "3-(
44, (bid,, pp, -/. -.1(
-"( +f( ibid,, p( "-3(
-<( +f( ibid,, p( "2"9 @Iant now shows that absolutely no alternati$e presents
itself
but rather that the dri$e of cra$in& for %nowled&e itself consistently pursued ultimately in
ta%in& hold of the totality of the conditions of obBecti$ity ma%es self4%nowled&e into a nec
essary theme(@
-3( Thus in @0chema Fu =)aust= @ cited from the commentary of Arich
TrunF in
Goetbes !aust, <rd ed( 5Hambur& -.2376 in the followin& this edition is cited(
-2( Dn this see my Ileine *poloie der asthetischen 1rfabrun 5IonstanF
-.?"7 p( /(
->( +f( w( <"/ @A &ood man in his dar% dri$e@6 ->?> @'ould a human mind
in its
hi&h stri$in&@6 -?3" @The stri$in& of all my power@6 --.<> @'hoe$er always stri$in&
ma%es the effort(@
-?( Ddo MarHuard (dealismus und 6heodi#ee 5-.>27 now in -cbwieri$eiten
mil der
Geschicbtspbilosopbie 5)ran%furt a(M( -.?<7 pp( 2"4>2(
-/( Bastet @)aust ef le +ycle@ p( .?6 this interpretation may also be
supported by a
passa&e in the Cabiers 5-.<.4317 WWII p( 2/. entitled @A&o@9 @- was born at twenty e8
asperated by repetition4 that is to say a&ainst life( Awa%enin& dressin& eatin& defecatin&
sleepin&4and always those seasons those stars( And history4%nown by heart4to the point
of madness ( ( ( this table repeats itself before my eyes for <. years now( ( ( ( All this
passes for bein& =poetic= But for me poetic is that which is opposed to this sad industry(@
)urther on one also finds a phrase that is re$ealin& for the reprise of the affaire Maruerite+,
@as soon as it was reco&niFed lo$e appeared to me to be a repetition9 all that =certified sen
timent= throu&hout the a&es(@
-.( In Cabiers WW!HI ."- !alery calls his )aust a @0isyphus of life(@
"1( II "6 correspondin& by III "6 @it is so easy to &et rid of his soul and to
repurchase
it at a lower price at the liHuidation of the body(@
"-( Goldmann @ Rationalismus@ p( 33.(
""( @Kespite the fact that the name of sensibility is currently applied only to
phenom
ena of the senses I belie$ed it possible to anne8 other areas to this restricted sense6 whence
the term of &eneraliFed sensibility si&nifies that it concerns not only e$ents produced by
our senses but all which presents itself under certain conditions of sponteneity and of re
sponse to a need a lac% an e8citement( In the customary usa&e the sensibility scarcely
means anythin& but sensorial phenomena6 - added phenomena of the intellectual order to
it@4 from the Cours de Poeti?ue au Collee de !rance, cited by Iarl A( Bluher -trateie des
Geistes+Paul =alerys !aust 5)ran%furt a(M( I.>17 p( <?(
"<( Bluher -trateie des Geistes, p( <>(
"3( Accordin& to the formulation with which !alery concluded the e8planation
cited in
note ""9 @Dn the other hand I insisted on the producti$e properties which seemed of such
an importance that recepti$ity could be considered as a particular case of the &eneral notion
of the sensibility=s production(@
"2( Dn this Ari%a LorenF @Ker *ame Lust in Paul !alerys erstem )aust
)ra&ment@ in
Romanisttcbes Aabrbucb "" 5-.?-7 pp( -?/4.1( There are pre$ious attempts at interpreta
tion9 @D unconscious LustF from Ril%e=s poem @Ima&inarer LebensJauf@ 5A( von Richthof4
en7 6 @yet all Lust wants eternity@ from *ietFsche=s Zaratbustra 5)( '( Mtiller76 @He is to
J
*DTA0 TD PP( -"?4-<3 K" - <
fill stars from hea$en and from earth e$ery hi&hest LustF from Goethe=s Prolo im Himmel
5Ari%a LorenF7( But they pay too little attention to the subtle play between )aust and Lust,
and abo$e all to the answerin& relationship in which !alery=s Man (>aust stands to Goethe
to render Lust>s connotations more precise(
">( -chriften ]um 6heater 5)ran%furt a(M( -.><7( !I pp( <"/4<<1(
"?( Thus TrunF Goetbes h>aust, p( 3./( Here as in the whole essay I could not
by far
as a non4Germanist wor% throu&h the endless secondary literature so that I presumably4
or hopefully4 o$erlap with the results of Dthers= research(
"/( TrunF p( 2-3(
".( Iarl Mar8 <$onomisch+pbilosophische Manus$ripte 5-/337 cited from 5ie
t>rub+
schriften, ed( 0( Landshut 50tutt&art -.?-7 p( "<3(
<1( Here my interpretation touches on that of 'ilfried Malch 5ie 1inheii der
!aust+
5icbtun Goetbes in der -pieelun ibrer 6eile ( ( ( pp( -<<42/ esp( p( -<> for whom
only Helen would be the @re$ealin& mirrorin&@ of that @which could naturally be possible
for such lo$e(@ It seems to me that with this Malch in the ser$ice of his thesis concernin&
Goethe= s turn toward poetry of hist ory dis&uises t he problem of &uilt wit h Gretchen as
well as with Philemon and Baucis and thereby also dis&uises the problem of theodicy(
<-4 Here I can refer to my study @Racines und Goethes Iphi&enie@ 5-.?<7 now in
Re#eptionsdstbeti$ als literaturwissenschaftliche Pramati$, ed( Rainer 'arnin& 5Munich
-.?27(
<"( @Goethe und Paul !alerys !aust,F in Melanes de litterature comparee et de
pbilo+
loie, offerts a Miec#yslaiu .rabmer 5'arsaw -.>?7 p( 2>/(
<<( Iarl Lbwith Paul =alery+ Grund#ue seines 5en$ens 5G0ttin&en -.?-7(
<3( )aust= s utterance precedin& the monolo&ue4@)or me perfumes are
promises( Pure
promises nothin& more( )or nothin& surpasses the promise in deiiciousness( ( ( ( Abo$e
all not hin& more@ 5II 274at first st ill appears to be similar lo Goethe= s @!or&efuhl @ but
it obtains anot her meanin& t hrou&h t he @pure @ which refers to no @afterwards@ and t he
later surpassin& of Ohe @nothin& more@ throu&h the @full and pure %nowled&e(=
-
<2( In Lust>s words9 @Mou yourself seem to be one of those moments
mar$elously full
of all the powers that are opposed to death(@
<>( @'hat then are those e8ceptional $isions which ascetics desire compared
to this
prodi&ious thin& which is to see whate$er there isL The soul is a po$erty(@
<?( Thus already in @Leonard et les philosophes@ <euvres, I -">- and in
Cabiers !lf
?>.9 @A$ery philosophic syst em in which the human body does not play a fundamental
role is inept inapt(@
</( Milton Paradise Lost !III w( 3>.4?< in 6be Poetical &or$s of Aohn
Milton, ed(
Helen Karbishire 5D8ford -.2"7 5I p( -??9
The Rib he formd and fashiond with his hands6
#nder his formin& hands a +reature &rew Manli%e
but different se8 so lo$ly fair That what seems fair
in all the 'orld seemd now Mean or in her summd
up in her containd(
Dn this cf( +hretien deTroyes =vaiti, ed( '( )oerster 5Halle -.1>7 w( -3."4..(
DnHues mes si desmesurer An
biaute nc se pot *ature6
Du ele espoir nQi o$ra onHucsL
+omant poist a$enir dontBuesL
Kon fust so &ranG biauteF $enueL
"-3 K *DTA0 TD PP( -<34-31
Ja la fist Keus de sa main nue(
PDT *ature feire muser(
5*e$er a&ain before or after did *ature so surpass herself in beauty for with this she
stepped beyond all measure( Dr perhaps she had nothin& to do with itL How then could it
happenL How did such &reat beauty ariseL God himself created her with his mere hand in
order lo astonish *ature(7 The history of the topos, which here intersects with the compe4
tition between *ature and God still needs in$esti&ation( - !ZtG romN^,@fD iUi UJtJil ! p( lo(
31( <euvres, II p( -3-3(
3-( 'ais @Goethe und Paul !alerys !aust,F p( 22/(
3"( 'ais p( 2?/( )ormulations such as @the ne$er4satisfied )austBan stri$in&
toward the
potential@ 5p( 2?37 or @ne$er lin&erin& continually see%in& the contradiction meanwhile
obtains a sharper definition throu&h !alery@ 5p( 2?-7 betray the harmoniFation in itself that
Iurt 'ais presupposes 5for !alery the potential is not a &oal to be sou&ht for Goethe the
ne$er4lin&erin& is in no way the same thin& as @see%in& the contradiction@7(
3<( )or e8ample p( 2>"9 @The concept of plenitude wor%s as a doubled
metaphor in
the creati$e womb of !alcry=s ima&ination in the ima&e of masculine cpistemolo&ical power
and feminine beauty or mental clarity and warmth of soul( This has roots not merely in
!alery=s antithetical mode of thou&ht but also in his life4history(@
33( Dn this sec the indispensable critiHue of Bloom=s boo% by Geoffrey
Hartman in
5iacritics < 50prin& -.?<7 pp( ">4<" now in his 6he !ate of Readin 5+hica&o -.?27(
32( A( $on Richthofen p( -<1 calls attention to the fact that !alery=s drafts
of the
final acts ha$e this seHuence in the manuscript(
3>( @In summation the enchantment bro%en4here a scene of well4bein&4at least
plac
in& it after some error of Lust=s: a minimal error but one which shatters the crystalline edi
fice4all harmonious@ %Cabiers WWI! ->7(
3?( Bastet @)aust et le +ycle@ p( -1-(
3/( Bastet p( -1- on Cabiers WWIII p( /.3(
3.( Bastet p( -1<9 @ >Le -olitaire,> it says in the unedited notes >is -uicide,> @
21( +orrespondin&ly a fra&ment from the drafts of -olitaire ((( reads9
@0olitaire 5to
Mephisto79 = 'hen I thin% of the ridiculous temptations which you dared to propose to
that Man4GodN All your feeblemindedness displayed itself that day@ E<euvres, II -3-"7(
2-( Dn the +ali&ula motif see *ed Bastet p( -13(
2"( +f( +ahiers WWI! <?34?29 @*ote what I e8pect of myself O e8pect of
you4 and I
%now that I cannot e8pect anythin& of myself which mi&ht be already somethin of me,
ready to be ima&ined foreseen therefore of a finite me4that is to say of an =other(
-
)or
=other= is an obBect which one can concei$e only as finite(@
+hapt er 2( The Poet ic Te8t 'it hin t he +han&e of
Hor iFons of Readin&
-( &abrheit und Methode 5Tubin&en -.>17 pp( ".1 ff( A$ailable in An&lish as
6ruth
Nnd Method, translation edited by Garrett Barden and John +ummin& 5*ew Mor% -.?27(
"( (bid,, p, ".3(
<( 1infubrun in die literarische Hermeneuti$ 5)ran%furt -.?27 p( -<(
3 R Posner drew this conclusion from the debate9 @Db$iously neither the prosody
Z = n of the written
*DTA0 TDPP( -314->2 K"-2
in der +edichtsinterp relation@ -pracbe im tecbniscben Zeitalter ". 5-.>.7 pp( "?42/ esp(
p( 3?(
2( *owin 1nais de stylisti?ue structurale _Paris -.?-7 pp( <1? ff( 6 cf( his @The
Read
er=s Perception of *arrati$e@ in interpretation of Narrative 5Toronto -.?/7(
>( ibid,, p4 ".9 @Instead of only loo%in& for rules re&ulatin& narrati$e
structures I
propose that we loo% for rules re&ulatin& actualiFation of such structures in the te8t that is
re&ulatin& the $ery performance of literature as communication(@ Dn his @reader4reception
modes@ see -emiotics of Poetry 5Bloomin&ton Indiana -.?/7 pp( --2 ff(
?( On a still unpublished lecture on literary hermeneutics Kubro$ni% -.?/(
/( Dn this see my *sthetiscbe 1rfabrun und literariscbe Hermeneuti$
5Munich
-.?.7 p( >" and chapter A>( This boo% is forthcomin& in the An&lish translation of Michael
0hawfromthe #ni$ersity of Minnesota Press(
.( The Kubro$ni% lecture 5see note ?7( &abrbeit und Metbode, p( ".- touches
on my
Hualification that in aesthetic perception understandin& certainly implies interpretation but
does not at die same time ha$e to articulate it as a theme( @Interpretation is not an act that
occasionally and retrospecti$ely attaches to understandin&6 rather understandin& is always
interpretation and interpretation therefore the e8plicit form of understandin&(@
-1( 5as Problem der Relevan# 5)ran%furt -.?-7(
--( 1ssais de stylisti?ue structural, p( <31(
-"( 5er*$t des Lesens 5Munich -.?>7(
-<( @Analyse te8tuelle d=un conte d=Id&ar Poe@ in -etnwti?ue narrative et
te/tuelle,
ed( +laude +habrol 5Paris -.?<7 pp( ".423(
-3( (bid,, p( <1(
-2( (bid,, p( <"(
->( (bid,, p( 2-(
-?( ibid,, pp( <1 and 2"(
-/( (bid,, p, <1(
-.( (mmanente *stbeti$ + *sthetiscbe Refle/ion" Poeti$ und Hermeneuti$ 44, ed(
'olf
&an& Iser 5Munich -.>>7 pp( 3>-4/3 esp( pp( 3?< and 3/1 9 @)or a concrete interpretation
and for a Bud&ment of the Huality of the poem it is not enou&h to pro$ide its structural
principle and to describe Apollinaire=s poetic techniHue( A series of ambi&uities is not yet a
compellin& whole( If this whole pro$o%es an e$er newer interpretation on the basis of the
techniHue in which it is unfolded then this interpretation is neither accidental in its details
nor free froma fundamental orientation that is compellin&ly pro$ided throu&h the construc
tion of the te8t( The first readin& pro$ides this compulsion throu&h the su&&estion of the
rhythm( The interpretation must &i$e itself o$er to this medium in which the poemmo$es@
5Kieter nenrich7( This interpretation is translated as @Group Interpretation of Apollinaire=s
=Arbre(= @ in New Perspectives in German Literary Criticism, ed( Richard A( Amacher and
!icior L(an&e 5Princeton -.?.7 pp( -/"4"1?(
"1( Dn this see my *lteritat und Modernitat der mittelalterl$ben Literatur
5Munich
-.??7 esp( pp( io ff(
"-( In the followin& alliteration or phonetic recurrence is indicated throu&h a
raised
hyphen(
""( Accordin& to the famous definition &i$en in the ProHets de Preface of
-/2.G>1 in
<euvres, cd( de #Pl ciat Ve 5Pari0i -.2-7 p #><
"<( !usees W!l in <euvres, p( --/?(
"3( ProHets de Preface, p( - <><(
"2( 'ith @world4an8iety@ N&eltanst', - refer to '( 0chultF in *spe$te der *nst,
n
S ed( ed( H( $on Kitfurth 5Munich( -.??7 pp( -3 ff( By it - understand that manifes4
ation of an8iety that distin&uishes itself from obBect4related fear which probably be&an
= n the +hristian reli&ion and which perhaps is to be related io the e8pectation of the
"-> J *DTA0 TD PP( ->24-?3
Last Jud&ment in that it is the sin&ulariFation of real an8ieties into an indeterminate world4
an8iety(
">( Mon coeurmisa nu, LWWW!II in <euvres, p, -""2(
"?( M( Milncr @PoetiHue dc la chute@ in Reards sur .audelaire 5+olloHue de
London
-.?17( ed( '( Bush 5Paris -.?37 pp( />4-1?(
"/( Here I rely upon +( Pawel%a who wor%ed out this disco$ery in reference to its
liter4
ariFation in his +onstance dissertation !ormen der 1ntwir$licbun bei !ran# Iaf$a 5-.?/7(
".( I than% Iarl Bertau for the reference that this fi&ure of alle&orical
personification is
nonetheless already to be found in the older German tradition with Heinrich )rauenlob as
for e8ample in his Marienleicb N cf( 5eutsche =iertelHahrsscbrift 31 5-.>>7 p( <"3(
<1( Gaston Bachelard La terre et les reveries de la volonte, cited by R( Galand
.aude
laireK Poeti?ue et poe>sie 5Paris -.>.7 p( <<2(
<-( Accordin& to G( Kurand Les structures anthropoloi?ues de (>imainaire,
cited in
R( Galand .audelaire, p( <<2(
<"( To my %nowled&e the history of Baudelaire=s reception has not yet been wor%ed
on sufficiently( )or ad$ice I ha$e drawn upon9 +( !er&niol @+inHuante ans apres Baude
laire@ in La Revue de Paris 5-.-?7 pp( >?<4?1.6 Henri Peyre @La )ortune et t=influence de
Baudelaire@ in Connaissance de .audelaire 5Paris -.2-7 pp( -224?/ and .audelaire devant
ses contemporains, ed( '( T( Bandy and +( Pichois 5Paris -.2?7( Df the 5none too numer
ous7 interpretations of our @0pleen@ poem the followin& were rele$ant to my in$esti&ation9
'alter BenBamin @`entralpar%@ 5-.</G<.L7 in Gesammelte -cbriften 5)ran%furt -.?37
!ol( I " pp >224.16 R(B(+heri8 Commentaire des !leurs du mat 5Gene$a -.3.7 pp( ">.4
?"6 B( K( Hubert L>estbeti?ue des !leurs du mat 5Gene$a -.2<7 pp( -<34<>6 Gerhard Hess
5ie Landschaft in .audelaires >!leurs du ma= 5Heidelber& -.2<7 pp( /14/"6 0ebastian *eu4
meister in Poetica < 5-.?17 pp( 3<.4236 I( A( Bliiher in -prachen der Lyri$+)estschrift
for Hu&o )ricdrich ed( Arich Iohler 5)ran%furt -.?27 pp( ""4326 and Laurent Jenny in
Poeti?ue "/ 5-.?>7 pp( 3314-.(
<<( +ited in Bandy and Pichois .audelaire devant ses contamporains, p( -<(
<3( +ited in the second edition 5Paris -/>.7 p( -39 @He points not to this side
but to
the far side of romanticism : une8plored territory a sort of pric%ly and fierce Iamtchat%a(@
i;, (bid,, p( "19 @*o one has professed &reater dis&ust for the turpitudes of the spirit
and the u&liness of matter( He hates e$il as a de$iation from mathematics and from the norm
and in his Huality of bein& a perfect &entleman he scorns it as incon$enient ridiculous
bour&eois and :abo$e all :improper(@
<>( )rom the Notes et documents pour mon avocat, cited in !er&niol
@+inHuante ans
apres Baudelaire@ p( >/3(
<?( 'alter BenBamin @`entralpar%@ in -cbriften ( 5)ran%furt -.227 p(3//6D(
0ahl4
ber& .audelaire 49O9" Gedicbte der Revolution 5Berlin -.??7 p( ">6 'olf&an& )iet%au
-cbwanenesan auf 49O9 5Hambur& -.?/74e8cellent for its precise unco$erin& of the his
torical conte8t of 6he 49tb .ntmaire of Louis .onaparte, @*apoleon le Petit@ and Proud4
hon=s writin&s6 and K( Dehler Pariser .ilder ( %49:3O9' 5)ran%furt -.?.7 p( -/3(
</( Gautier @*otice@ p( "-( Joined to this Heine is also Huoted9 @and it is not he
who
li%e Heinrich Heine=s philistines is flabber&asted by the romantic efflorescence of new fo
lia&e and swoons at the son& of sparrows(@
<.( (bid,, pp( 2> and ">9 @A$erythin& that distances man and abo$e all woman
from
the state of nature appears to him as a happy in$ention(@
31( (bid,,, p( -?9 @the obscure fantasies that astonish the day and e$erythin& that
the
soul at the bottom of its deepest and last ca$ern recei$es from the shadowy the deformed
and the $a&uely horrible(@
*DTA0 TD PP( -?24-?. J "-?
3-( <euvres, p( 32/(
3" @Baudelaires Ruc%&riff auf die Alle&oric@ in !ormen und !un$tionen der *lleoric
50ymposion 'olfenbiittel -.?/7 cd( '( llau& 50tutt&art -.?.7 pp( >/>4?11(
3<( Dn this see )( *ies in (mao Linuae+)estschrift for )ritF Paepc%e
5Munich
-.??7(
33( 0ee note 3"(
32( )rom the e$idence in P( Robert 5ictionnaire alphabeti#e el analoi?ue de la
lanue
francaise 5Paris -.>37 0( !( spleen" @Dur women were formerly ill with &out( ( ( ( The
An&lish ha$e le splin, or la splin, and die of humour@ 5!oltaire7i @since this mornin& I ha$e
had le spleen, and such a spleen that e$erythin& I see when left alone dis&usts me deeply( I
hate the sun and hold the rain in horror@ 5!i&ny -telloK here hatred toward nature appears
as a symptom of the illness7(
3>( 5ictionnaire universel du JlJeme siecle" @Human societies li%e indi$iduals
ha$e
their periods of belief and disbelief ( ( ( peoples become ci$iliFed police themsel$es then
become refined and enner$ated ( ( ( the characteristic symptom of the decline of society
is that immense ennui shared by all classes and indi$iduals( -pleen is the new name but the
phenomenon is not new(@
3?( Gautier @*otice@ p( <1(
3/( 1ssais de psycholoie contemporaine .th ed( 5Paris -/.27 p( -2(
3.( (bid,, pp(-/ ff(
21( @*ot to for&et the main thin& G 'e ha$e seen e$erywhere and without
ha$in&
searched for it G )rom the top to the bottom of the fatal scale G The ennuyeu/ spectacle of
immortal sin(@
2-( 0ee my @Baudelaires Ruc%&riff@ pp( >.1 ff(
2"( Accordin& to Hans Blumenber& -a$utaristerun und -elbubebauptun
5)ran%furt
-.?37 p( -"19 @As a willful style seculariFation consciously see%s Jhe relationship with the
sacred as a pro$ocation( It needs a lar&e measure of the continued $alidity of the reli&ious
sphere of the ori&inal in order to achie$e an effect Bust as =blac% theolo&y= can unfold its
blasphemous horror only there where the sacred world still e8ists(@
2<( !alery himself testifies to this process of reception in @0ituation dc
Baudelaire@
5-."37 <euvres 5Pleiade7 5Paris -.2?7 I p( >-"(
23( @)ar from them see the dead years lean G Dn the balconies of Hea$en in outmoded
dress G 0milin& Re&ret risin& from the depths of the waters(@
22( (bid,, p( >--(
2>( 'alter BenBamin @#ber eini&e Moti$e bei Baudelaire@ in -chriften
5)ran%furt
-.227 - p( 32/6 in the followin& - rely primarily on @`entralpar%@ in Gesammelt -chriften
5)ran%furt -.?37 !ol( -G" pp( >2?4.1(
il,Gesammelte -chriften, -G< p( --2-(
T 2/( H( 0teinha&en @`u 'alter BenBamins Bc&riff der Alle&orie@ cited in my @Baude4
aircs Ruc%&riff@ p( >?o( tnt(r5 KcBan6(6 rehabilitation of alle&ory in his whole wor% is
e8tensi$ely e$aluated(
[XGesammeHe -chriften, Ml p >2.
>1( Ifcirf( p( >>1(
R4,(bid,
>"( (bid,, p( >/-9 @The emblems return as commodities(@
><( (bid,, r), iQi and >?>(
>3( (bid,, p( >/"(
>2( In a footnote to @Ker )laneur@ in Charles .audelaire" 1in Lyri$erim Zeitaher
des
Hoch$apilalismus 5)ran%furt -.>.7 p( 2.(
"-/ D *DTA0 TD PP( -/14-/2
>>( Gesammelte -cbriften, -G" p( >>.9 @If it is fantasy that brin&s the
correspondences
to memory then it is thou&ht that dedicates the alle&ories to it( Memory brin&s the two to
&ether(@ Dn this sec my *stbetiscbe 1rfabrun, p( -">(
>?( Gerhard Hess pp( >/ >.(
>/( (bid,, pp( >. and ?"(
RC, (bi d, p, -(,
?1( J( K( Hubert pp( -<3 ff(
?-( (bid,, p( -<>9 @Thus it seems that the first part of the poem represents an
alle&ory
of the pri$ate life of the poet tormented by the irritations of money and the pains of lo$e
and that the second part symboliFes his situation within the century(@
?"( (bid,, pp( -12 f(
?<( Iarl Bluher p( "<(
QO, (bid,, p, OO,
?2( (bid,, p( "?(
?>( 0ebastian *eumeister p( 33-( The %ey to his interpretation is !usees WWII
where
Baudelaire clarifies the idee poe>ti?ue in playin& upon the mo$ements of a ship 5@which
ta%es part in ( ( ( the re&ularity and symmetry that are one of the primordial needs of the
human mind as much as complication and harmony are@7(
??( Thus for e8ample the contradictory mo$ement seen in lines -24"3 that on the
one
hand the disinterest &rows to the le$el of the temporal conditions while on the other hand
the interest in the @I@ declines to the le$el of the four perfect participles(
?/( Laurent Jenny p( 332 where the play of the &rammatical person of the lyric
sub
Bect is summariFed as follows9 @-(- am not MM0AL)( "(- am distinct from 6H1M in refer
ence to death and the secret 5they + des% pyramid $ault7( <( - am (6 and (6 is a place of
death 5I [ cemetery old boudoir7( 3( (6 is (6K I am no lon&er of this world 5it [ ennui', 2(
I see S<0 become (6 and this S<0 isMS-1L! 5you [ li$in& matter &ranite7( >( Be&innin&
with my doublin& this (6 sin&s 5it [ sphin87(@
?.( (bid,, p( 33?(
/1(GQM( p( 333(
/-( Dne should also still refer to H( Mehnert Melancbolie und (nspiration" .eriffs+und
wissenscbaftseschichtlicbe 0ntersucbunen #ur poetiscben Psycholoies .audelaireG,
!lauberts und Mallarmes 5Heidelber& -.?/7( It concerns an in$esti&ation as rich in materials
as it is in thou&hts into the icono&raphy and the latent theory of inspiration in Baudelaire
to brin& to li&ht their deri$ation from older psycholo&y humoral patholo&y and doctrines
of temperaments( Mehnert=s perspecti$e also confirms that Baudelaire=s spleen and ennui
are no symptoms9 F-pleen is thus perpetuated ennui, and si&nifies the loss of the irritabilite
that is potentially stored in ennuiF 5p( -?27( Dn our @0pleen@ poem Mehnert remar%s9
@The representation of the ossified cellula memorativa, the missin& =irritation= clothed in the
ambi$alent wrap of =lycanthropia= the encrusted heart and the whole space of inspiration
5the connection between hearth and brain bein& bro%en7T these representations can be read
out of the te8t as the =psycholo&ical= substratum of the first fourteen Imes 5p( -?? #nfor 4
tunately the aesthetic transformation of this substratum dd not (Merest Mehnert 5hnes -.4"3
are brac%eted alto&etherN7 so that no consistent interpret(((^ anses that allows (tself to be
entered into the history of the reception of our @0pleen poem(
Inde8
Inde8
A rebours, -??
@Aune Madonne@ -??
*ct of Readin, 6he, -32
Adler A( /- .?
Adomo Theodor '( 8$( 88$iii ><
*eneid, .>
*esthetic 1/perience and Literary HerG
Aesthetic perception 3- -336 achie$e 4
ment of form in ->-6 in contrast to
e$eryday perception -3"6 e8pectation
of lyric consistency in -2"6 in first
readin& of @0pleen@ -3.4>-6 as phase
of first readin&( -3-43"6 priority of
within hermeneutics -3/( -ee also
Perceptual understandin&
Aesthetics9 brea%s lin% between poetics
and history 88iii6 Brcchtian .-6 cate 4
&ory of 8$iii48i86 cate&ory of and his 4
tory <26 importance of to IonstanF
school $iii6 of e8perience in +roce
?.6 Platonic ..6 and pleasure prin 4
ciple 8i86 of representation -/4-.
31( -ee also Aesthetics of reception
*esthetics, -ee Lectures on *esthetics
Aesthetics of reception 8$ </6 as basis
for literary history <"6 and literary
wor%=s social function 3143"6 as medi 4
ator of passi$e reception and acti$e
understB
6 as mediator of
hermeneutics -1/6
as mode of e$aluation "26 as on&oin&
totaliFation of the past "16 opens
historical dimension <36 opposed to
classicism and positi$ism "16 as syn 4
thesis of hermeneutics and poetics
86 theory of <"6 as translation of Re#ep+
tionsastbeti$, $iii( -ee also Aesthetic
perception6 HoriFon of e8pectations6
Reception
*ffaire Maruerite, --2 -"3 -"? -".6 as
con cremation of Goethe=s !aust, --3
Allc&oresis9 as lin% between superstructure
and infrastructure -?"4?<6 in !alery=s
!aust, -"2( -ee also Alle&ory
Alle&ory9 as alternati$e to mimesis 88ii6
@anor&anic@ Huality of 88iii -?.6
Baudelaire=s rehabilitation of -?26 and
commodity4producin& society -?/4?.6
as counter to romanticism -/"6 in med 4
ie$al poetry -1<436 as mode of rep 4
resentin& destruction of self ->/4>.6
as moment di$idin& aesthetics and
poetics 88iii6 phenomenalism of in
Jauss 88ii6 as poetic medium -/16
rhetorical process of 88ii 88$
An&iolieri +ecco /-
Anstlm of +anterbury 0aint -13
An8iety9 meanin& of in @0pleen@ ->>4>?
*n/iety of (nfluence, 6he, --3
Apollinaire -3/
dlI-
A( -.
Application -3?( -ee also Historical
understandin& Archetypal criticism9 and
reflection theory
<.4316 theory of >>
Aristotelian poetics $ii6 definition of fic4
tion in 236 heuristic $alue of /<6 as
theoretical norm .<( -ee also
Aristotle Aristotle i8 8 >" ><6 story4
definition
of >-
Arnold Matthew >> Art function of9
dialectical as opposed
to mimetic -> *rt de trovar, ./ Artistic
perception9 formalist concept of
->
*estbeti$er, 21 *tala, 44 *thendum, //
*ucassin et Nicolette" as chame+fable,
//
Auerbach Arich $ii 88$iii -1-4"
Au&ustine 0aint -1" --/ Aure$illy
Barbey dc "? Author and public9
interaction of -2( -ee also Reception6
Euestion4and4answer process
AutomatiFation9 as canoniFation of literary
form -?6 theory of <<4<3
Bachelard Gaston ->.
Bacon )rancis --. -"1
Badt Iurt ?3
BalFac Honore de 8i -- -< "?
Barante Baron de 22
Barthes Roland -3<6 and literary history
>?4?16 Poc story analysis of -3?6
Racine interpretation of >?4>/ Bastet
*ed --2 -"" -<> Baudelaire +harles
88488$ passim, "?
>< -3/4/" passim, concept of poetic
lan&ua&e of -2?6 definition of beauty
of ->-6 definition of poetry of ->"6
as poet of modernity -?34?2 Bede
!enerable .> Bedier Joseph ". .ein and
6ime, 88$iii BenBamin 'alter 8$iii 88i
88$iii .2
-?<6 on alle&ory in Baudelaire -?/4/16
as critic of essendalism 8$48$i6 as
critic of historicism( >26 notion of
translation of 8$48$i6 reine -pracbe
of distinct from !alery=s poesie pure
8$i6 on @Re$e Parisien(@ -?"6 and
treatment of alle&ory 88ii488iii
Ber&son Henri( -/1
Bible the9 importance of literary history
&enres
of -114-1"6 literary forms aruY >((((((((((((((
of -1"6 and notion of communir
-11 Bloom Harold 8i --3 -""6
cate&ories
of -<2 Bliiher( Iarl A( -"26 on
@0pleen@ -/-4
/<
Blumenber& Hans </ --? n&
Boccaccio9 and de$elopment of no$ella
92093
Bodel Jean ./ Boileau *icolas ".
Boniface !III Pope 2> Boucher
)rancois 88 -2? Bourdin Gusta$e -?-
Bour&et Paul9 on Baudelaire -?>4??
Brecht Bertold -1 33 -"? Brunetiere
)erdinand ?? Bruno Giordano --/
.ucolica, .> Bulst 'alther -.
Bultmann Rudolf -11 -1-
Cabiers, of !alery --3 -<1 -<- -<>4
</ passim
+anon literary( -ee +lassicism6 Tradi4
tionalism
+ardenal Peire /-
+AM4formula %corps+esprit+monde', -->
-<1 -<26 brea%in& of solipsism of
-<"6 dialectic of -<?6 and particular
$ersus whole -<-
+er$antes Mi&uel de "3
+hampfleury -1
Chanson de este, 2C, /.6 as medie$al
epic /<4/?6 reorientation of scholar4
ship of ..6 $ersus courtly romance
/1( -ee also Genres medie$al
Chanson de Roland, .3
Chanso+sirventes" and new &enre forma4
tion ."
+hateaubriand "?
Cbimeres, "3
I*KAW K "" <
Ci1i)
+lassical concept of the9 as Gadamenan
prototype of mediation <16 historical
transcendence of -<6 as second hori4
FonsN chan&e "2 <14<-( -ee also
+lassicism
+lassicism9 definition of the beautiful in
3-6 and doctrine of essence Gappearance
-36 )rench 3?6 &eneric e8pectations
of .36 mimesis of 88ii <-( -ee also
+lassical concept of the6 Tradition6
Traditionalism
+ollin&wood Robin Geor&e 88$iii ".6
and critiHue of historical obBecti$ity "-
+ommunity notion of9 importance of
to Romance philolo&y -11 -1-
+omparati$e studies9 methodolo&y of --14
-36substantialist illusions of --"4-3
+oncretiFation9 as aesthetic 8$iii6 of aes4
thetic obBect ?"6 defined ?<6 and his4
torical pro&ression -3?43/6 of lin&uistic
structure 8$ii
Consistorio del ay saver, ./
@+orrespondances@ -?< +ou$in 'atriHuet
de /. +roce Benedetto . -116
aesthetics of
??4?.
+uriosity 5curiositas7 -". -<36 end of
-"<6 and eudaemonia -</6 and )aust
myth --?4"-6 theoretical le&itimation
of --.6 toward %nowled&e of nature
--/6 turn of toward %nowled&e of
history -"<
+urtius Arnst Robert $ii 8$ 88$iii6 clas4
sicism of 8i .
Kante Ali&hieri ?? // .? ./( -".
Kanto( Arthur +(9 philosophy of history
of >14>-
5e doctrina cbristiana, -1"
Ke 0anctis )rancesco <
5e vulari elo?uentia, ./
5ecameron, /<6 &enres included in ."
TfamiliariFation ->
Kescartes Rene -<-6 dream of( -<<
Keschamps Austache ?? ./
Kiachrony9 as determination of literary
&enres /?4//6 and synchrony 8i$
<>4<.( -ee also History literary6 His4
toricity of literature6 Reception
Kialo&ue( -ee Euestion4and4answer process
Pibelius Martin -DD
5ictionnaire universeY du JiJ>eme siecle, -?>
Kiderot Kenis "3
Kiomedes6 and forms of deli$ery .>
5iscours en =bonneur de Goethe, -<1
<il des traverces, .1
5ivina Commedia, .3 .?
<ivino afflante spiritu 5encyclical7 -11
5ominant, &eneric /"6 concept of /-6
and literary e$olution -124>
5on @ui/ote, "3
Konatus Aelius .>
5reita manera de trobar, ./
Kroysen Johann Gusta$ >- >" ><6 as
critic of obBecti$ism 2-4226 on his4
torical $ersus artistic narrati$e 2.4>1
Kuranty Louis Amile Admond -1
Ac%ermann Johann Peter -"2
1ducation sentimentale, -1.
Aidetic reduction9 of aesthetic perception
-3"
1infache !ormen, -1?
Aliot T( 0(8i ?2
Aluard Paul -/-
An&els )riedrich -3 >2 ---
1rinnerun+, as art of history 88$6 and
history as recollection 88iii( -ee also
Memory6 -ouvenir
Arlich !ictor 88i8
Ascarpit Robert ">
Assence9 and appearance -36 canonical
wor% as incarnation of 8i6 dismissal
of classical concept of ?.6 and influence
of art wor% -2( -ee also +lassicism
Assential ism 0ubstantialism
Assential ism 8$6 as conception of litera4
ture 8( -ee also Assence
Astran&ement( -ee KefamiliariFation
1lats du monde, /-
Atiemble Rene --1
A$ent E1reinis'" and audience=s e8pecta4
tions .16 historical fact as >16 of
history compared to wor% of art >"6
and history of influence <.6 of lit4
erature contrasted with history "-4""
2-42<6 and reception <3( -ee also
Literary e$olution
""3 J I*KAW
A$ent of bein& %-einsescbeben', <"
A8emplary cate&ory of the9 mediation of
/1 A8pressionism debate of -.<34</
-1
!abliau/, 2C, /.
!annys compared with Madame .ovary,
"?4"/
!atras" impossible $ersus possible, /.4.1
!atrasie" &enetically defined /.
!atrasie aF*rras, /.
!aust, of Goethe --"4-? passim, -</6
concretiFation --36 function of lo$e
in -"/4".6 as renewal of %nowled&e4
happiness Huestion -"-4""
!aust, of Lessin& --?
!aust, of !alery --"4-3 passim, -".
-</6 alle&oresis in -"26 anti4+artesian
turn of -<<6 as critiHue of idea of uni4
$erse -<-6 as @final )aust@ -""4"36
&arden scene of -->4-? -".4<"6 ironi4
Fation of moi pur in -<"6 order of
fra&ments of -<>6 process of curiosity
in -<36 scenes of --26 subBect4obBect
relationship in -">6 $ersus Goethe=s
-<2
)aust myth9 Huestion4and4answer conte8t
of --?4""
)enelon )rancois de la Mothe 3/
)eydeau Arnest Aime "?4"/
!ierabras, /<
)iet%au 'olf&an& -?"
!iaro, -?-
)ish 0tanley $iii
)laubert Gusta$e 8i -- "? 3"433 >-
!leurs du mat, -1.6 reception5s7 of -?14
-/< passim
)orm9 achie$ed in aesthetic perception
->-6 historiFation of concept of .14.-
.3 -12
)orm and content( -ee Assence
)ormalist literary theory . 316 aporia
of -1 -/6 conception of &enre in
-124>6 conception of literary fact in
-/4-.6 contributions of <"4<36 dis4
re&ard for history in -1?6 form and con4
tent distinction in 3-6 method of
->4-/6 and Pra&ue structuralism ?"6
relationship of function and form in
<<6 role of reader in -/4-.
)orm4historical school9 Biblical criticism
of -114-1-6 implications of method
of -1"4<
)ran%furt 0chool $ii
!ran#dsiscbe Gescbicbte, 2>
)reud( 0i&mund -?2
)rye *orthrop <. >>
)uchs Aduard >>
!undamentals of tbe 6heory of Histori+
oraphy, R
Gadamcr Hans4Geor& 8i 8$ 88ii 88$iii
? >2 -3"6 and hermeneutic process
-<.4316 in 6ruth and Method, ".4<"
Galilei Galileo 3. -"1
Gap" as &eneric structure /-
Garaudy Ro&er -2
Garlandia Johannes de ./6 &enre system
of .>4.?
Gamier Theophile -?1 -?3 -?>6 @*o4
tice@ of to !leurs du mat, -?-4?"6
interpretation of spleen, -?<
Ga$audan 5troubador7 .-
Gedan$en vom mundlichen =ortra der
neuern allemeinen Geschichte, OC
Geistes&eschichte > -/16 as re$olt a&ainst
positi$ism /4.( -ee also Idealism
Genette Gerard ?-
Genres literary9 continuity formati$e of
// .<4.36 diachronic determinability
of /14/" /?4.1 -1>6 historical system4
atics of .26 historicity of /.4.16 and
literary e$olution -124>6 substantialist
notion of //6 synchronic determin4
ability of /"4/? -1>4?
Genres medie$al9 and four modalities of
epic romance no$ella /<4/?
Geor&e 0tefan -21
Georica, CR
German (deoloy, 6he, -1
Ger$inus Geor& Gottfried < 3 2<6 and
nationalist @idea@ >4?
Geschichte der Iunst des *ltertums, 3/
3.
Gespra>cbe mit Goethe, -"2
Goethe Johann 'olf&an& $on 8i8 ---4<-
passimK )aust myth renewed by -<?4</6
role of for !alery -<2( -ee also !aust,
of Goethe
Goldmann Lucien( H>6 and concept of
I*KAW J ""2
homolo&y -36 on Goethe=s and !alery=s
!aust, -"2
Gon&ora y Ar&oce Luis de <2
@Gouffre(@ ->>
Gounod +harles )rancois --3 --2
Grimm Jacob ". Grund#ue der
Histori$, 2 < Gruncwald ?3 Gun%el
Hermann -11
Hamann Johann Geor& 88iii
He&el Dor& 'ilhelm )riedrBch 8i ?
<-6 on the aesthetic 8i86 on alle&ory
88iii6 and concept of obBecti$e spirit
<>6 on the si&n 88$
Heide&&er Martin 8ii 8$ 8$i 88iii 88$iii
<" >?
Herder Johann Gottfried 88iii 3. 216
as critic of 'inc%elmann 3/
Herenc Baudet /.
Hermeneutics9 defined i86 of e8perience
8$ii6 and formation of aesthetic canon
-3?43/6 and horiFon of contemporary
interests -<?6 and method of com4
parison --"6 nonteleolo&icai perception
in .<4.36 of readin& 8$ii6 relation of
to structuralism -1/6 science of history
of 216 triadic unity of process of
-<.431 -3<6 two interpreti$e acts of
-3-( -ee also Euestion 4 and4 answer
Hess Gerhard 31 -/1
Hiuoria, --?
Historical understandin&9 of @0pleen@ -?14
/26 as third readin& -3>
Hisioricism9 and art history=s loss of pres4
ti&e( 2-6 based on nationalism >4?
/6 concept of pro&ress in ?4/6 de$elop4
ment of (>4/6 of the Anli&htenment
3?43/6 mo$e of toward periodiFation
?4/ in positi$istic phase 3?6 and pri$4
ile&in& of history o$er aesthetics -3>6
and sacrifice of teleolo&ical conception
/6 !alery=s polemic a&ainst -""4<
Historicity of literature9 opposed to positi$4?
and
@iditiondism( 2-6 at syn4chromc4
diachromc intersections <?6 threefold
characteriFation of <"6 $ersus pra&matic
history 2"
H
=SRriQ9 $iew of history in >"
Historio&raphy of art9 paradi&ms of 3>43/
History art9 conception of( >"4><6 e8en$
ptarity of totaliFation in ?26 as med4
ium of human spirit 216 as new form of
history 3.6 as paradi&m >"6 as produc4
tion and reception ?36 relation of to
&eneral history 3/6 relation of to
pra&matic history 3?43. passim, 2"42<
?26 uni$ersality of 216 'inc%elmann=s
proBect of 3.
History &eneral -/ <.6 $ersus special
history <>4<? 3.
History literary9 as aesthetic reception
"-6 based on aesthetics of reception
"16 characteriFed as positi$istic /
<" 2"6 claims of to obBecti$ity 26
dependence of on canon 3426 as e$ent4
ful history <"6 )ormalist proBect of
<<6 founded on production and recep4
tion -24->6 as lin% between history
and literature 326 lin%s of to Idealism
24>6 as literary e$olution <36 literary
theory=s critiHue of 3426 mediation of
aesthetic and historical aspects of
-.4"16 principle of representation of
</4<.6 Huestion4and4answer process of
-.6 relation of to pra&matic history
-/6 romantic definition of ---6 as
special history <.6 synchrony c4dia4
chronic relationship in -?4-/ <>6
theses of "14326 tied to nationalism
<( -ee also Euestion4and4answer process6
Reception
History of the Poetic National Literature
of the Germans, R
History pra&matic -/( -ee also History
art(
History special <>6 relation of to &eneral
history <. 3.( -ee also History art6
History literary
History uni$ersal9 as dilemma for histor4
ical research ?6 ille&itimacy of <?6
methodolo&y of /
Hbldcrlin )riedrich 8$i 88iii
Homer i8 -<
H>pital 3.
HoriFon9 model of 8iii6 ne&ati$ity of
8$ii6 of past $ersus present -3>43?
HoriFon alteration of9 and &enre forma4
tion "< //4/.6 and si&nificance of
22" ! INDE-
masterwor%( .3( -ee also HoriFon
chan&e of
HoriFon chan&e of9 between first and see
ond readin&s -326 as criterion for aes4
thetic $alue "24"?6 diachronic and syn4
chronic understandin& of </4<.6 as
familiar e8pectation "24">6 -ee also,
HoriFon alteration of
HoriFon of e8pectations 8$6 as classical
model 88ii6 confronted by literary
wor% 336 deri$ed from Husserlian
phenomenolo&y 8ii6 epistemolo&ical im4
plications of 8ii6 e$o%ed by new te8t //4
/.6 of !leurs du trtal, -?-4?"6 mediation
of 8iii6 as mediator of literary e$ent
""6 modification of "<4<36 as orientin&
reception ?.6 of perceptual readin& -3-4
3"6 possible limitation of concept of
8$ii6 reconstruction of "/6 relation of
to li$ed e8perience 5pra8is7 "3 <. 3- B
in social sciences 3143-6 two horiFons of
8ie6 as unifier </ HoriFon of e8perience9
as continuity of reception -.( -ee also
HoriFon of e8pectations HoriFons fusion
of ". Houdenc Raoul de -1> Hubert
Judd9 on @0pleen@ -/14/- Hu&o !ictor
-?/ @Humanitats4Briefen@ 21 Humboldt
'ilhelm $on9 @historical idea@
of >
Hume Ka$id 22 Husserl Admund 8ii 8$ii
88$iii6 ne&ati$ity
of phenomenal model of 88ii
Huy&ens 3. Huysmans Joris Iarl
-??
Idealism9 @idea=(= if in ser$ice of nation4
alism >4?6 ideolo&ical model of >(
0ee also Gcistes&eschichte
Identity9 and alle&ory ->/4>.6 in Jenny=s
interpretation of @0pleen@ -/34/26 of
@I@ as obBect of alle&orical space -/1(
-ee also 0ubBect lyric
@Ima&e of 0ociety in )rench Literature
The@ 31
Indeterminacy9 and process of understand4
in& >.6 Iser=s cate&ory of -32
Infrastructure9 relation of to superstruc4
ture -"( -ee also Reflection theory
In&arden Roman 8 ?<
Interpretation9 three sta&es of -<.
Interpretation reflecti$e -336 distinct from
perceptual understandin& -3"43<6 as
phase of second readin& -3-( -ee also
Interpreti$e understandin&
Interpreti$e understandin&9 act of as
hypostasiFation -326 and second readin&
of \=0pleen@ ->-4?1( -ee also Inter4
pretation reflecti$e
iphienie, -".
Iser 'olf&an& $iii 88$ii RC, -3<6 and
cate&ories of aesthetic effect -33432
Isidore of 0e$ille 0aint .>
Aac?ues le !ataliste, "3
Ja%obson Roman -/ "" -31 -/-
Jauss Hans Robert $ii488i8 passimK
and critiHue of literary canon 8iii6
eHuates aesthetic with pleasure prin4
ciple 8i86 as hermeneut 86 histor4
ical model of 8i$6 lin&uistic consid4
erations of 8$ii6 theoretical resources
of 88$iii
Jenny Laurent9 on @0pleen@ -/<4/2
Jolles Andre -1?
Iant Immanuel 88ii 88iii 88$iii6 and
aesthetic Bud&ment /16 and sublation
of Au&ustinian disBunction --.
Iellerman 'ilhelm /. .1
Iier%e&aard 01ren 8i8 88iii
Inowled&e %1r$enntnis'" distinct from
&issen _%nowled&e7 -"16 found in
enBoyment -"16 and Goethe=s !aust,
-"16 and Iantian sublation --.6 of
nature as human happiness --/4-.6
from perspecti$e of curiositas, -"14"-6
as re%nowled&e -"<
Iohler Arich ."6 on history of pastourelle
&enre .-
IonstanF school $ii 88$ii6 methodolo&y
of $iii6 orientation of i848i
IosG% Iarel -1 ?26 as critic of @economic
factor@ ideolo&y -"6 on mediation of
art -2
Iracauer 0ie&fried <>
Irauss 'erner -16 on literature=s formati$e
function -2
La .ible Guiot, /- #
)ayette Mme( de .<
Lan&ua&e9 composed of si&ns 8$ii6 lanue
and parole distinction in ""6 opposed
to phenomenal world 8$ii6 play of the
si&nifier in 8i84886 poetic and prac4
tical distinction in -> "" "3
Lanson Gusta$e <
@L=arbre@ -3/
=an de dictier el de fere cbancons, ./
@LeMai@ -/-
Le -olitaire ou les Maledictions de (>0mvers,
--3 #0 -<>( -ee also !aust, of !aiery
@Le !oya&e(@ -?>
Lectures on *esthetics, 88iii 88$
@Les BiBou8@ -?"
@Les Litanies de 0atan@ -??
Lessin& Gotthold Aphraim --?4"- passim
Le$i40trauss +laude 31 ?- -31 -/-6
and theory of decline >>4>?
Leys d>amor, C4
Leys d>amors, of G( Molinier9 &enres classi4
fied in ./4..
Life4world 5Lebenswelt79 three horiFons of
-3<( -ee also +ommunity notion of6
@Locus in life@
Literariness9 as process of &enre literariFa4
tion -1<6 diachronic and synchronic
conditionin& of -?
Literary e$olution9 based on aesthetics of
reception <34<>6 as dialectical concep4
tion -?6 formalist wea%ness of concept
of( << -1?6 and &eneral process of
history -1?4/6 as historical chan&e of
systems( -/6 horiFonal chan&e in process
of </ <.6 of literary &enres -124>6
opposed to classical concept of tradi4
tion -?6 principles of <"4<>6 as reno4
$ation of literary history <<4<3
Literary wor%9 as aesthetic obBect ?<6
conditioned by understandin& conscious4
ness ?.( -ee also 'or% of art
Literature9 historical representation of(
<.6 modern &enre distinction of ??6
opposed to mere literature /4.6 Ren4
aissance autonomy of -1< Lives, 3>
@Locus in life@9 as functional determination
of literature -1"4<6 as life mode of
community -1-6 of literary
&enres -1?
Lords Guillaume de .3 -1<43 -1>
Lowith Iarl -<1 -<- Lucretius +ams
Titus -<" -<< Lu%acs Geor&( $iii 8$( -1
-36 classicism
of 8i -< Lust+La 5emoiselle de
Criual, --34->
passim, -<>( -ee aho !aust, of !aiery
Machaut Guillaume de CC
Madame .ovary" as e8ample of horiFonal
chan&e "?4"/6 new literary form of(
3"433
@Madri&al triste@ -?>
Mallarme 0tephane <2 -??
Malrau8 Andre ?2
Mannheim Iarl 31
Marcabru 5troubador7 .-
Mar&uard Ddo -"-
Marlowe +hristopher --?
Mar8 Iarl 88iii -< ---
Mar8ist literary theory 8i . -> 31
?2 .- B aporia of -1 -/6 and art as
formati$e of reality --6 conception of
literary fact in -/6 denial of literature=s
autonomy in -16 dependence of on
classical aesthetics --6 reflection theory
in -14-36 role of reader in -/4-.
Mediation9 in literary series <3( -ee also
History literary6 HoriFon of e8pecta4
tions
Mehrin& )ranF >2
Memory9 decay of into remembrance
-236 destruction of ->36 e8pectation
of as unifier -><4>36 relation of to
lyrical @I@ -2>42/( -ee also 1rinnerun,
-ouvenir
Mery Huon de -1>
Meun Jean de /-
Michelan&elo -<3
Milton John( -<3
Mimesis 88ii6 of phenomenal e8perience
88ii6 as Platonic reco&nition -3 <-(
-ee also +lassicism
@Moesta et errabunda@ -?"
Moi pur, of !aiery -<> -</6 distinct
from Goethe=s @fullness of e8istence@
-<26 as e8perience of selfs bein& -<-6
and necessity of @other@ -<"
Moliere ">
""/ K I*KAW
Molinier Guifhelm ./ Molliens Reel us
de -1< Man coeur mis a nu, ->>
Mu%afo$s%y Jan 8$iii "" ?" ?< -1?
*arration historical9 and historical no$el
2242>6 illusions of 2<4236 as percep4
tion and presentation >16 $ersus arris4
tic 2.
*arration impersonal %impassibilite'" in4
no$ation of "?
@*atural Laws and Theoretical 0ystems@
31
*er$al Gerard de "3
*eumeister 0ebastian9 on @0pleen@ -/<
*euschafer Hans4Jor& ."
*ew +riticism $ii 88$iii
*ewton 0ir Isaac 3. -"1
*ietFsche )riedrich 'ilhelm 88i 88iii
--2 -<>6 on the aesthetic 8i8
Nouveau roman, 33
Nouvelle Criti?ue" and literature=s dis4
continuity ?-4?"
*o$ella9 in contrast to fairy tale /"6 as new
&enre ."4.<( -ee also Genres medie$al
DbBecti$ism9 in comparati$e studies --14
--6 Kroysen=s critiHue of 2-4226 un4
ac%nowled&ed preconceptions of ".
DbBecti$ity9 in historicism ?6 of histor4
io&raphy 2( -ee also DbBecti$ism
Dehler Kolf -?<
@Dn Mar8ism and Lin&uistics@9 Lu%acs=
commentary on -<4-3
@Dn the Dri&in of the 'or% of Art@ 8$i
<n the 6as$ of the Historian, R
<poya#, -ee )ormalist literary theory
<straneniye, -ee KefamiliariFation
Paradis artificicls, -? 2
@Parallels@9 literary form of 3>43?
Paranomasis 88i
Pascal Blaise -/1
Passion play9 de$elopment of -13
Pastourelle, .-
Perceptual understandin&9 as constitutin&
aesthetic e8perience -3"6 role of con4
sensus in -3/( -ee also Aesthetic per4
ception
Perceval, "-
Phenomenal e8perience4 as mimetic 88ii
Phenomenolo&ical aesthetics9 historiciFed
by Pra&ue school ? <
Phenomenolo&y9 as ancestor of IonstanF
school 86 Husseriian of perception
8ii
@Philosophy of history@9 of )rench An4
li&htenment 3? 3.
Pinard Arnest 3"
Pius WII Pope -11
Plechano$ Gyor&ii9 and art as reproduced
reality --
Plutarch 3>
Poe Ad&ar Allan -?-
Poetic te8t9 temporal alterity of -3>43?(
-ee also Literary wor%
Poetics9 defined i86 distinct from the aes4
thetic 88i488ii
Poetics immanent9 $ersus &eneric norm
.<4.3
Poeti$ und Hermeneuti$ &roup i8 -3/
Poetria" as sum ma of literary &enres .>4.?
Poirion Kaniel ..
Popper Iarl R( 3143-
Positi$ism C, <.6 effects of on literary
history 2-42< passimK @obBecti$e@ his4
tory of "-6 as series of @facts@ <"(
-ee also DbBecti$ity
Pra&ue structuralism 8 88$iii 88i8 ?-6
art wor%=s dialectical conception in
-1?4/6 literary history of ?"4?36 notion
of literary lan&ua&e in 8$ii48$iii
Problem and solution process( -ee Euestion4
and4answer process
ProHet d>un traite sur (>histoire, 3/
Proust Marcel $iii
Psycboloie contemporaine, -?>
Psychomachia, -1<
@uerelle des anciens et des modernes,
3? ><6 historical4philosophical prob4
lem of 21
Euestion4and4answer process9 between in4
terpreter Goethe and !alery --<6 as
constituti$e of tradition <1 >2 ?16
and )aust fi&ure --?6(as fusion of hori4
Fons ".4<16 historical mediation of
>/4>. ?36 le&itimacy of -/26 as Jimit
Zeti$e arbitrariness >.6 of
to interprc
reception 8iii
6constructi$e 190202 .
INDE- G 229
readin& -3>6 relation of past to pre4
sent in <"6 renewal of 26 re$ersal
of( 33
Racine Jean Baptiste( >?4>/
Raimmondin /.
Ran%e Leopold $on ? 236 historio&raph4
ical narration of 2242.
Raios de trobar, ./
Realism9 as literary cate&ory <.
Realist art theory9 reflection theory of
ID4#
Reception9 analysis of as basis for struc4
tural description -3143-6 as articula4
tion of diachrony and synchrony 8i$6
e8emplified by Huestion and answer
8iii6 as historical concretiFation 8$ii4
8$iii6 lin% of to semiotics 8$iiii as
mediator of formal structure and social
chan&e 8i$6 method of "/6 modes of
in medie$al &enres />4/?6 ne&lected
by essentialism 86 and passa&e to critical
understandin& -.6 presupposes e8per4
ience of aesthetic perception "<6 psy4
chic process of "<6 relation of to pro4
duction -2-> ?26 role of in mar8ist
and formalist theory -/6 selecti$eness
of --24-->6 !odic%a=s theory of ?<6
within system of e8pectations "" "<6
wor%=s history of as mediator "/
@Recueillement@ -??
Reflection theory9 as classical schematiFa4
tion 316 problem of in mar8ist theory
--6 problematiFation of in mar8ist
theory .-6 in realist art theory -16
solution of( throu&h self4cancellation
-"4-<
Reine$e !ucbs, 4C
Remede de !ortune, ..
Rcmi Phillipe de /. .1
Rereadin& e8perience of9 horiFonal struc4
ture of -3<( see also Interpretation
reflecti$e
Iesverie, /.6 &enre transformation of
.1
@Re$eParisien(@ -?"
Revue de Paris 3"
Ineptionsaubeti$" problems of translation
Rhetoric ancient9 in Middle A&es .24..
Richards I( A( 88$iii ""
Ricoeur Paul >? ?-
Riffaterre Michael $iii -31 -326 on recep4
tion -3- -3<433
Rimbaud Arthur -??
R3456)738+ Wi99i.1+ 55
Roman de miserere, -1<
Roman de Renart, "/4". .3 .? -1?6
horiFonal chan&e of ".
Roman de la Hose, /- -1<43
Romance9 as fusion of &enres /"( -ee
also Genres medie$al
Romans )olHuet de ."
Russian )ormalism 88$iii 88i8( -ee also
)ormalist literary theory
Rutebeuf /1 /-
Rychner Jean9 on chanson de &este ..
0ahlbcr& 1( -?"
-aisnes, ./
0cheilin& )riedrich 'ilhelm Joseph $on
88iii
-chema Fw !aust, -"1
0cherer 'ilhelm <
0chiller Johann +hristoph )riedrich $on
2 > / 33
0chle&el )riedrich 88 88iii 3/
0chiitF( Alfred 88$iii -3<
0cott 'alter 2<6 narrati$e form of 2242>
-einseschehen, <"
-einsveressenheit, RQ
0emiotics9 substantial ism of --3
-emiotics of Poetry, -3-
0enard Antoine 3<
0er$ius .>
0haftesbury Anthony Ashley +ooper Aarl
of /"
0h%lo$s%y !i%tor -? 3-
-ic$inen debate of -/2. -1
-iecle de Louis J(=, 3.
0i&n9 indeterminacy of 8$ii48$iu6 mar%s
passa&e from recollection to thou&ht
88$6 as pertainin& to lan&ua&e 88$(
-ee also Lan&ua&e
@0ociety for the 0tudy of Poetic Lan4
&ua&e(@ -ee )ormalist literary theory
0ociolo&y literary .-6 dependence of on
masterpieces -"6 dilemma of ">6 disasso4
ciation of from positi$ism and idealism
.6 literature4society connection in <.
"<1 K I*KAW
-ottie des menus propos, .1
-ouvenirK and history as recollection
88iii( -ee also 1rinnerunK Memory
0phin8 ima&e of9 as alle&ory of beauty
-?.6 as emblem of for&ettin& 88$6
as reification of lyric subBect ->?6
si&nificance of in @0pleen@ ->.4?1
0pies Johann --?
0pitFer Leo $ii 88$iii -31
@0pleen 5II7@ 88iii -??4/< passimK as
counter to @lyrics of e8perience@
-?36 first readin& of -3.4>-6 historical
readin& of -?14/26 re$i$al of alle&ory
in ->/6 second readin& of ->-4?16
si&nificance of title of -2142- ->34>2(
0ee also -pleen 5term7
-pleen 5term79 distinct from ennui, -?>6
Gautier=s e8planation of -?<6 as %ey
word in Baudelaire=s aesthetics -?-6
as reification of an8iety -?24?>6 as
state of mind becomin& obBect 88iii4
0pohr Louis --3
0talin Joseph -<
0tarobins%i Jean ?-
0tempel 'olf4Kieter "<
0tendahl --
0triedter JuriB $iii
0tructuralism9 as critiHue of classical idea
of art >>6 &enre theory of ?>6 reflec4
tion theory in <.4316 relation of to
hermcncutics -1/6 substantial ism of
--3
-tructuralism et criti?ue litteraire, ?-
-tru$tura vyvoHe, ?"
-turm und 5ran" )aust fi&ure of --.
0tyle history of9 compared with Ran%e=s
historical presentation 2?42.6 as &i$en
form by 'ihc%elmann 2>
-tyle indirect libre+, in Madame .ovary, 3"4
3<
0ubBect lyric9 and attempt at self4iden4
tity -2242>6 destruction of as autono4
-><4>36 place of held by sphin8 ->?6
self4alienation of ->?4>/6 si&nificance
of spleen of ->2
0ubstantialism -324 as economic essence
-36 and illusions of in comparati$e
method --"4-36 in mar8ist literary
theory --6 misconception of >-6
notion of &enre of // -126 and notion
of literary tradition </6 opposed by
functional idea of history ?3( -ee also
0uperstructure9 and relation to infrastruc4
ture -"( -ee also Reflection theory
0ynchrony9 as determination of literary
&enres /"4/?6 relation of to diachrony
8i$ </( -ee also Kiachrony6 Historicity
of literature6 History literary6 Reception
0Fondi Peter 88$iii -31
@Tas% of the Translator The@ 8$
Tempo Antonio da ??
6essera, -""6 as !alery4Goethe relationship
-<24<>6 definition of --3 Theory9 and
association with eudaemonia
--/4-.6 and practice 8i$48$
Thierry Au&ustin 22 @Time
and History@ <> Tolstoy Leo
-<
6ournoiement de (>*ntechrist, -1>
6ractatus coisilianus, CR Tradition9 as
atemporal continuity .6
as @creati$e misinterpretation@ -<26
and illusion of @obBecti$e@ meanin&
>36 nonsubstantialist conception of
>34>26 Huestion4and4answer dialectic of
>26 self4acti$atin& illusion of ><4>3(
-ee also +lassicism6 Traditionalism
Traditionalism <.6 classical &enre theory
of ?>6 role of masterpieces in ><(
-ee also Tradition
Tra&er +laus ---
Translation9 emphasis of on lan&ua&e 8$i
6ristan, 2C
Troyes +hretien de "- /" .3 -1> TrunF
Arich -"/ 6ruth and Method, 88$iii6
classicism of
".4<" TynBano$
JuriB -? -/
<bermenscb" as )aust concretiFation --2
#nderstandin&( -ee Historical understand4
in&6 Interpreti$e understandin&6 Perceptual
understandin&
ti8( 3> 442+4R passim,
on Baudelaire -??4?/6 !alery Paul 8$i
-"?4<3
passim
I!D=> K ?:1
+artesianism of -<16 and curiositas
-""4"36 and lin% between thin&s and
thin%in& -<<6 ne&ates idealist notion of
e8perience -<14<-6 plenitude concept
of -<16 poesie pure of 8$i6 and re4
Bection of symbolism -"26 role of
Goethe for -<2 -</6 si&nificance of
@Lust@ for -">4"?( -ee also !aust, of
!alery
!erlaine Paul -??
!idal Raimon ./
!ietor Iarl .3 !illena
AnriHue de ./ !illon
)rancois .. !ir&il .>
=ita Nuova, @@ !i$iani
3.
!odic%a )eli8 !( 8$ii 8$iii ?" ?<
=ol$sbuch, --? --/
!oltaire )rancois Marie Arouet 3? 3.
-->
!ossler Iarl $ii
'ais Iurt -".
'altF Matthias 1A:
'arbur& school9 emphasis of on tradition .
'arnin& Rainer 8$ -13
'eber H( 4K( 21
'elle% Rene 88i8 <16 and critiHue of I( A(
Richards=s theory ""
@'hat is and Toward 'hat And Koes
Dne 0tudy #ni$ersal HistoryL@ 24>
'imsatt '( I( 88$iii
'inc%elmann Johann Joachim 3/ 3. 21
'ind Ad&ar 33
'or% of art9 in dialectical structuralism
-1/6 epistemolo&ical si&nificance of
<-4<"6 historical essence of -26 as self4
mediatin& e$ent <-4<"( -ee also Literary
wor%
'orld literature %&ehliteratur'" canon of
as formation of tradition ---4-"
Hans Robert Jauss is professor of literary criticism
and romance philolo&y at the #ni$ersity of IonstanF
'est Germany and is founder and co4editor of Poeti$
and Hermeneutic, He has tau&ht at +olumbia Male
and the 0orbonne( His writin&s include studies of
medie$al and modern )rench literature as well as
theoretical wor%s(
Timothy Bahti is assistant professor of comparati$e
literature at +ornell #ni$ersity an essayist and a
member of the editorial board of 5iacritics,
Paul de Man 0terlin& Professor of +omparati$e Lit4
erature at Male #ni$ersity is the author of .lindness
and (nsiht and *lleories of Readin,