Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site eosp1.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!princeton!eosp1!robison From: robison@eosp1.UUCP (Tobias D. Robison) Newsgroups: net.ai,net.nlang Subject: Re: The Soapy-Woof theory of talk. Message-ID: <1248@eosp1.UUCP> Date: Fri, 9-Nov-84 12:58:14 EST Article-I.D.: eosp1.1248 Posted: Fri Nov 9 12:58:14 1984 Date-Received: Sat, 10-Nov-84 09:32:02 EST References: <4162@decwrl.UUCP> Reply-To: robison@eosp1.UUCP (Tobias D. Robison) Organization: Exxon Office Systems, Princeton Lines: 87 Xref: princeton net.ai:341 net.nlang:230 Summary: I disagree strongly wth the C.S. Lewis quote below (from ken Arndt). All arts that appeal primarily to one sense suffer to a degree from the fault Lewis describes, that one item of information is processed at a time, and the artwork is perceived serially in a sense. Almost all great artists in all media have wonderful ways of addressing this problem, so that it is not a limitation, but merely a challenge. In the specific example, the words of poems particularly tend to have multiple meanings, and to give additional meanings to other parts of the poem. Even if one focuses on the INITIAL reading of a poem (which is ridiculous), the words already read will continually change in perception as additional words are read. This is a heavy parallel activity! Other examples one might give: In writing, many authors contrive to describe a complicated sudden change obscurely, so that the reader knows he does not understand the words fully in his serial reading, but the entire complex moment may be understood suddenly when, after many pages, the whole situation falls into place. I'm sure we can all think of books where this occurs. For spectacular, but easy examples of this I would recommend the beginning (say, the first 15 pages) of either of these novels by Henry Green: - Living - Party Going In each case, he starts by partially describing the current situation in such an uncommunicative manner that the reader is all at sea. Conversation, observation, and environment just accumulate in the readers mind, awaiting elucidation. Then orientation occurs, the meaning of the opening pages hits the reader in a rush, and he is emotionally deep in the fabric of the book, having been struck by a torrent of words suddenly, in a way C.S. Lewis would have thought impossible... Painters and similar artists know that the eye perceives a picture serially. Most types of art attract the eye (not 100%, but materially) to a part of the picture, and then lead it from place to place. Many pictures are arranged so that the actual motion of the eye will be soothing or otherwise. Some pictures are arranged so that a surprise awaits the eye after part of the picture is perceived. [In Western Art, landscapes that slope down from left to right tend to be more soothing than the reverse, since Western eyes tend to read from left to right. Some pictures just lead the eye round and round through an unsettling maze, as Picasso's Guernica.] Musical compositions are heard serially. Again, if we focus on the initial hearing, musical ideas are being presented serially, with a minimum of parallelism possible. But as a composition goes on, the listener learns more about, and re-interprets, what he has heard. An obvious example would be a theme and variations, in which some of the variations emphasize constructional characteristics of the theme, and some recall the theme so the listener can rethink its impression on the basis of better understanding of its parts. These variations will be communicating in parallel (what happened before, plus the new variation itself). Three-dimensional sculptures must also be perceived over time, since they are not fully visible from one place. Mnay sculpors are aware of this and arrange that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. The quote: >"Another grave limitation of language is that it cannot, like music or >gesture, do more thatn one thing at once. However the words in a great poet's >phrase interinanimate one another and strike the mind as a quasi-instantaneous >chord, yet, strickly speaking, each word must be read or heard before the next. >That way, language is unilinear as time. Hence, in narrative, the great >difficulty of presenting a very complicated change which happens suddenly. >If we do justice to the complexity, the time the reader must take over the >passage will destroy the feeling of suddenness. If we get in the suddenness >we shall not be able to get in the complexity. I am not saying thta genius >will not find its own ways of palliating this defect in the instrument; only >that the instrument is in this way defective." > >From: C.S. Lewis, STUDIES IN WORDS, Cambridge University Press, 1960. > Chapter 9 "At The Fringe Of Language, p.214-5. > >Comments??????????????????? > >Regards, > >Ken Arndt