“No Symbols Where None Intended”

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theories and methodologies

WHAT DOES THE AVERAGE MIDDLE SCHOOLER KNOW ABOUT CLOSE READING? joshua gang Launched in 2010 and adopted by forty- three states and the Dis- trict of Columbia,1 the Common Core State Standards read like a Well Wrought Urn for kids—a New Critical primer for a new gen- eration. From kindergarten through grade 12, close reading is the backbone of literary curricula. With each passing year, students per- form close readings of increasing complexity—and with what feels like increasing adherence to New Critical doctrine. According to the Common Core reading standards, ffh graders must be able to “determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including fgurative language such as metaphors and similes.” Tey must also be able to explain “how a series of chapters, scenes, or stanzas fts together to provide the overall structure of a particular story, drama, or poem” (12). By eighth grade, students must be able to “provide an objective summary of the text” and “compare and con- trast the structure of two or more texts and analyze how the difering structure of each text contributes to its meaning and style” (36). And by eleventh or twelfh grade, they must “cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text, including determining where the text leaves matters uncertain” (38). Students meeting these standards, we are told, can “readily undertake the close, attentive reading that is at the heart of understanding and enjoying complex literature” (3). In their textbook Understanding Poetry (1938), which popularized close reading across North American universities, Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren announced a similar goal: “to present to the student, in proper context and afer proper preparation, some of the JOSHUA GANG, an assistant professor of basic critical problems—with the aim, not of making technical crit- En glish at the University of California, Berkeley, is working on his manuscript ics, but merely of making competent readers of poetry” (xiv). “Word and Mind: Behaviorism and Liter- But the Common Core standards aren’t entirely faithful to the ary Modernity, 1913 to the Present.” His New Critics—particularly when it comes to authorial intention. In work has appeared in journals such as Principles of Literary Criticism (1924), I. A. Richards warned that ELH and Novel: A Forum on Fiction.

“whatever psycho-analysts may aver, the men- discussions of surface reading, readers have tal processes of the poet are not a very proft- been asked to think about the texts in front of able feld for investigation. . . . Te difculty them instead of the minds behind those texts. is that nearly all speculations as to what went “Tough we would not endorse Paul de Man’s on in the artist’s mind are unverifable” (24). insistence on the ‘void that separates’ poetic This argument became infamous through intent from reality,” Stephen Best and Sharon W. K. Wimsatt and Monroe Beardsley’s “Te Marcus write in “Surface Reading: An Intro- Intentional Fallacy” (1946), which argued that duction” (2009), “we remain intrigued by his authorial mental states couldn’t be inferred observation that poetry is the ‘foreknowledge’ from literary texts—and didn’t need to be: of criticism, and that the interpreter therefore “Tere is a gross body of life, of sensory and ‘discloses poetry for what it is’ and articulates

theories and methodologies mental experience, which lies behind and in ‘what was already there in full light’” (12).2 some sense causes every poem, but can never In “Close Reading and Thin Description” be and need not be known in the verbal and (2013), Heather Love makes a parallel claim: hence intellectual composition which is the literary studies, she explains, “might forge an poem” (12). But in the Common Core stan- expanded defense of reading by considering dards it is precisely this “gross body of life, of practices of exhaustive, thin description . . . sensory and mental experience” that students forms of analysis that describe patterns of be- must learn to incorporate into their analy- havior and visible activity but do not trafc ses. By tenth grade, students are expected to in speculation about interiority, meaning, or “analyze how an author’s choices concerning depth” (404). At the same time, recent discus- how to structure a text, order events within sions of afect have asked the degree to which it (e.g., parallel plots), and manipulate time intentional actions are predicated on involun- (e.g., pacing, flashbacks) create such effects tary processes. In “Te Turn to Afect” (2011), as mystery, tension, or surprise.” By twelfh Ruth Leys claims that contemporary theories grade, the requirement is that students under- of afect are staunchly “anti- intentionalist”: stand how “an author’s choices . . . contribute they believe that “action and behavior” are to [a text’s] overall structure and meaning as “determined by afective dispositions that are well as its aesthetic impact” (38). In defance independent of consciousness and the mind’s of the New Critics of old, the Common Core control” (443). Responding to Leys, Jona- wants students and teachers to reconstruct than Flatley argues that “afects and moods the “author’s choices”—his or her decisions, may not be directly subject to intentions . . . voluntary actions—from the text. In efect, it but this does not mean that there is no way asks them to infer the author’s intentions—to to exert agency in relation to our afects and infer from literature the same sorts of things afective experiences, only that such agency they infer from conversation and texting. is mediated, variable, and situated” (505). In Te Common Core is deeply fawed in many this framework, intentions are only knowable ways—particularly in the idea that close read- or accessible insofar as they are mediated or ing is the only way to understand a work of lit- mitigated by affects. And these affects, in erature. On this point of the author’s choices, turn, are not necessarily knowable by or ac- however, it’s moving in the right direction. cessible to the conscious mind. But while the Common Core invokes in- Surface reading and afect theory may be tention readily, contemporary literary criti- new to literary study, but the concerns we have cism doesn’t. We’re not as dogmatic about about intention today are largely the same as it as the New Critics were. Nonetheless, those expressed by Richards and the New concerns about intention remain. In recent Critics. Te reasoning is as follows: As a reader 130.3 ] Joshua Gang 

I only have empirical knowledge of the texts in obstacles, as if there were any form of com- methodologies and theories front of me. Much in the way I don’t have ac- munication that didn’t struggle with other cess to other minds, I don’t have access to the minds or mediated agencies.4 As critical read- author’s intentions. At the same time, I also ers of literature, we hold ourselves to a stan- know that many of my own intentional actions dard that would paralyze understanding in are predicated on unintentional processes— most other contexts. whether physiological, cognitive, or afective. For example, a man tells you the road Terefore, even if I could access an author’s in- is closed ahead. You’re unable to confrm or tentions, I’d have no guarantee that they were deny this statement. His cadence, facial ex- fully intentional or fully realized. pressions, and body language give you no Nonetheless, my claim here is that in- sense of his state of mind. You can’t tell if he’s tention is an essential concept for literary lying or telling the truth. All you have is his study. I am not the first person to attempt utterance; you can’t infer his intentions or this argument—nor will I be the last.3 To be even be sure that the utterance was intended clear, this is not a case for strong intentional- at all. Does this mean that the category of ism: I’m not saying that we have perfect ac- intention is irrelevant here? Should you pro- cess to authorial intentions. Nor am I saying ceed as if his intentions weren’t an issue? A that authors have complete control over, or more literary example: “no symbols where knowledge of, their own works of literature. none intended,” which is the maddening fnal Instead, I’m suggesting that readers know sentence of Samuel Beckett’s novel Watt (1953 more about intention than they think—and [214]) and which returns us to Anscombe’s that the perceived inaccessibility or mitiga- definition of intentional actions. Why end tion of intention doesn’t make it any less cru- the novel this way? As the fnal words in the cial to language use or critical understanding. novel, it dangles Beckett’s intentions in front In her book Intention (1957), the philosopher of us—but never gives us access to them. We G. E. M. Anscombe defned intentional actions end up in a position like Watt himself, who as “the ones to which the question ‘Why?’ is looks at an abstract painting and tries to cal- given application” (24). What matters most for culate all the possible intentions the artist literary critics is not whether we answer that might have had: “he wondered what the artist question correctly (though we hope we do) but had intended to represent (Watt knew noth- whether we are permitted to ask it at all. ing about painting), a circle and its centre in Indeed, no one doubts that we perceive search of each other, or a circle and its centre intentions when we read. If readers didn’t in search of a centre and a circle respectively, perceive what felt like authorial intentions, or a circle and its centre in search of its cen- there wouldn’t be a critical prohibition tre and a circle respectively, or a circle and against them. And it goes without saying its centre in search of its centre and a circle that we don’t generally read literary texts as respectively . . .” and so on (104). Whether unintentional—as if authors had no intention reading Watt or debating the road’s closure, or agency whatsoever. Terefore, the issue is we can act only by recognizing intention as how we think about the intentions we already a relevant category even if specifc intentions perceive. Te trouble isn’t that these percep- can’t be deduced. Deciding that intention is tions might be wrong (they might well be). irrelevant is just not an option. Nor is it that we can’t separate them from un- I’m not suggesting that reading literature intentional actions (which we might or might is comparable to strange conversations with not know about). Instead, the trouble is that inscrutable strangers (although it ofen feels we treat these mitigating factors as absolute that way, particularly with Watt). Nor am I  “No Symbols Where None Intended” [ PMLA

suggesting that literature is entirely compara- intractability are, in part, products of our ble with ordinary language. Compared with own critical suppositions. In Te Concept of ordinary language, literary language is more Mind (1949), Gilbert Ryle suggested that “the intricate, aestheticized, transportable, and sorts of things that I can fnd out about myself durable (insofar as it can be read by differ- are the same as the sorts of things that I can ent people at diferent times under diferent fnd out about other people” (155). We don’t circumstances). Also, it’s ofen fctional. But need to agree with Ryle that other minds are an idea such as intention shows how helpful just as knowable as our own. But we do need ordinary language and ordinary-language to acknowledge that intentions are not en- philosophy can be to literary study.5 What- tirely private experiences and that we perceive ever type of language we’re examining, the other people’s intentions all the time. Tis is

theories and methodologies category of intention remains essential even true whether these perceptions are accurate or when particular intentions are doubted, miti- not. As readers, we know more than literary gated, or unknown. Intention is an inherent criticism allows us to acknowledge. And when aspect of language and therefore of litera- we deny that knowledge, we make things less ture, whether we like it or not. In Must We accessible—whether we’re examining texts, Mean What We Say? (1969), Stanley Cavell making inferences about other minds, or de- suggests that “the category of intention is as scribing the world around us. Necessarily, we inescapable (or escapable with the same con- diminish our efectiveness as readers, as crit- sequences) in speaking of objects of art as in ics, and as teachers. speaking of what human beings say and do: And this is why the Common Core, how- without it we would not understand what ever much it gets wrong, is valuable to literary they are” (198). When we declare authorial study today. In asking students to think about intention to be irrelevant, we aren’t merely the author’s choices, the standards require ignoring some ornamental or vestigial aspect them to think about the intuitions they al- of the text. Instead, we are gutting language ready possess as readers—instead of doubting itself and devaluing our abilities as readers. or dismissing those intuitions categorically. In our frst, second, third encounters with a When these students take our classes, they piece of literature, we perceive authorial in- will realize that 1930s- style close reading is tentions, whether those perceptions are right not the only way toward “understanding and or wrong. As I said earlier, we wouldn’t have enjoying complex literature” (3). At the same a critical prohibition if these perceptions of time, these students might help us shake of intention didn’t exist. It’s only later on, when nearly ninety years of dogma and cynicism. we’re writing criticism or teaching close read- When they refer to an author’s choices, when ing, that we ofer theoretical arguments for they talk about an author’s possible intentions why these perceptions don’t matter. and the diferent forms those intentions took, In that way, our trouble with authorial intention is as much a problem of self- we should listen. knowledge as it is one of other minds. While it’s true we’ll never have enough information to flesh out authorial intention completely, that’s no reason to disregard the information NOTES about intention that we have. In dismissing 1. As of December 2014, the following seven states our perceptions of intention in literary texts, had either refused to adopt or repealed the Common we make authorial intention seem all the more Core standards: Alaska, Indiana, Nebraska, Oklahoma, distant and intractable. But such distance and South Carolina, Texas, and Virginia. 130.3 ] Joshua Gang 

2. De Man was not the only poststructuralist to argue Cavell, Stanley. Must We Mean What We Say? A Book of methodologies and theories against the availability and relevance of authorial inten- Essays. London: Cambridge UP, 1976. Print. tion. In “Te Death of the Author” (1967), Roland Barthes Common Core State Standards for En glish Language Arts suggested that authorial intentions and meanings were su- and Literacy in History/ Social Studies, Science, and perseded by the act of reading. In “Signature Event Con- Technical Subjects. Common Core State Standards text” (1972) and “Limited Inc.” (1988), Jacques Derrida Initiative. Common Core State Standards Initiative, argued that the inherent iterability of language, whether 2 June 2010. Web. 3 Mar. 2015. written or spoken, detached authorial intention from any Derrida, Jacques. “Limited Inc.” Limited Inc. Trans. Jef- given utterance: “To be what it is, all writing must, there- frey Mehlman. Evanston: Northwestern UP, 1988. fore, be capable of functioning in the radical absence of 29–110. Print. every empirically determined receiver in general” (“Sig- ———. “Signature Event Context.” Limited Inc. Trans. nature” 8)—as if both writer and reader were dead. Jefrey Mehlman. Evanston: Northwestern UP, 1988. 3. Over the past seventy years, there have been a num- 1–24. Print. ber of diferent arguments against both the intentional Flatley, Jonathan. “How a Revolutionary Counter- mood fallacy and poststructuralist rejections of intention. See, Is Made.” New Literary History 43.3 (2012): 503–25. e.g., Cavell; McKenzie; Knapp and Michaels; and Herman. Web. 3 Mar. 2015. 4. In Philosophical Investigations (1953), Ludwig Witt- Herman, David. Storytelling and the Sciences of Mind. genstein claimed that no language could be private and Cambridge: MIT P, 2013. Print. that the shared conventions of language were precisely Knapp, Steven, and Walter Benn Michaels. “Against Te- what allowed communication between minds. “Suppose ory.” Critical Inquiry 8.4 (1982): 723–42. Web. 3 Mar. everyone had a box with something in it,” he explained. 2015. “We call it a ‘beetle.’ No one can look into anyone else’s box, and everyone says he knows what a beetle is only Leys, Ruth. “Te Turn to Afect: A Critique.” Critical In- by looking at his beetle.—Here it would be quite possible quiry 37.3 (2011): 434–72. Web. 3 Mar. 2015. for everyone to have something diferent in his box. One Lindstrom, Eric. “Sense and Sensibility and Sufering; or, might even imagine such a thing constantly changing.— Wittgenstein’s Marianne?” ELH 80.4 (2013): 1067–91. But suppose the word ‘beetle’ had a use in these people’s Love, Heather. “Close Reading and Tin Description.” language?—If so it would not be used as the name of a Public Culture 25.3 (2013): 401–34. Web. 3 Mar. 2015. thing” (sec. 292). Tese beetles, of course, exemplify the McKenzie, D. F. Bibliography and the Sociology of Texts. problem of other minds. But they also show how shared London: British Lib., 1986. Print. conventions make this problem more manageable, if only Moi, Toril. “‘They Practice Their Trades in Different through elimination. Worlds’: Concepts in Ordinary Language Philosophy 5. For more on the contributions that ordinary- and Poststructuralism.” New Literary History 40.4 language philosophy might make to literary study, see (2009): 801–24. Cavell; Moi; Lindstrom; Wright; and Quigley. Quigley, Megan. Modernist Fiction and Vagueness: Phi- losophy, Form, and Language. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2015. Print. WORKS CITED Richards, I. A. Principles of Literary Criticism. New York: Harcourt, 1961. Print. Anscombe, G. E. M. Intention. Cambridge: Harvard UP, Ryle, Gilbert. Te Concept of Mind. Chicago: U of Chi- 2000. Print. cago P, 2002. Print. Barthes, Roland. “Te Death of the Author.” Image, Mu- Wimsatt, William K., and Monroe C. Beardsley. “The sic, Text. Trans. Stephen Heath. New York: Hill, 1977. Intentional Fallacy.” Te Verbal Icon: Studies in the 142–48. Print. Meaning of Poetry. By Wimsatt. Lexington: U of Ken- Beckett, Samuel. Watt. New York: Grove, 2013. Print. tucky P, 1954. 3–18. Print. Best, Stephen, and Sharon Marcus. “Surface Reading: An Wittgenstein, Ludwig. Philosophical Investigations. Introduction.” Representations 108.1 (2009): 1–21. Trans. Gertrude E. M. Anscombe, Peter M. S. Hacker, Web. 3 Mar. 2015. and Joachim Schulte. Ed. Hacker and Schulte. Chich- Brooks, Cleanth, and Robert Penn Warren. Understand- ester: Wiley, 2009. Print. ing Poetry: An Anthology for College Students. New Wright, Daniel. “George Eliot’s Vagueness.” Victorian York: Holt, 1938. Print. Studies 56.4 (2014): 625–48.