by Dave
I know that I’m a bit late on this subject. I’ve been fighting a good case of the flu (which has morphed into a sinus infection), and the Thanksgiving holiday threw me out of the loop, too. Combined with the fact that ideas new to me take some time to percolate and that the blogosphere sometimes moves at lightning speed, I am now quite tardy on the Shared Books discussion. One thing the Internet has accomplished is that our discourse now happens almost instantly. Medieval and Renaissance scholars often conversed via letters, delivered over days of traveling. They didn’t have communal outlets in which they could post massive amounts of commentary and discuss it with likeminded peers in real time. Consequently, I’m a Johnny-come-lately to all this because I’ve been out of the loop for a few days.
But, in the end, perhaps the tardiness has also helped me a bit. Rowling’s new status as “Entertainer of the Year” throws some interesting twists into the discussion of HP’s place as a book that can range across cultures and potentially create a common discursive bond between disparate groups. We live in a time of cultural fracture and division. What’s worse, the language of unity and commonality is appropriated by members of all political stripes to foment these cracks among us. Whether we are discussing diversity, unity, tolerance, conformity, or any other worldview, we need not possess genius intellects to see that divisiveness often better serves the purposes of those with both voice and power. We find it easier to rally against a perceived common enemy than to rally around a true common cause. The latter takes far more effort on our part, and, frankly, is sometimes far less “fun”.
So, to find the figure bringing us all together named as the “Entertainer of the Year” by Entertainment Weekly induces both a smile and some perplexity. An author as “entertainer” is an interesting phenomenon in and of itself. It’s not something we tend to consider very often. Even media hounds like Stephen King aren’t generally labeled as entertainers, though we sometimes label their books as “entertainment”. I ran into a reappraisal of this term recently when I gave a faculty colloquium presentation on rethinking the theory of narrative in light of the complicated relationship between videogames and their audiences. A colleague emailed me later to say that he believed I was right, but that games were a market-driven, capitalism infused form of “entertainment” still bereft of true artistry and cultural benefit. He’s right about the vast majority of games, but not all of them. Entertainment can have true artistic merit; for a host of people, it can have true spiritual merit.
The opening page of the EWarticle on Rowling is an illustration by Matt Mahurin of Rowling under a cloak with a quill and parchment in front of a nearly infinite landscape of children and adults pouring over her novels. 
It is a strange, utopian vision that seems to my untrained eye to combine Mary GrandPre with da Vinci. I know very little about art, but even I can pick up on the odd, postmodern conflation of the Virgin Mary into a scene of a witch in her robes scrawling across parchment a text both unknown and knowable. Mahurin has painted the perfect picture of Rowling as a postmodern Shakespeare — at once sage and businesslike; artistic and accessible; creative and marketable. She has a popular appeal that A.S. Byatt and Thomas Pynchon might secretly salivate over (or that Tom Clancy and John Grisham might lust after), but has maintained enough artistic ethos to be addressed quite seriously within the academy, whether the attention is praise or condemnation. As Mark Harris’s article has put it:
she did something very, very hard, and she did it very, very well, thus pleasing hundreds of millions of children and adults very, very much. In an era of videogame consoles, online multiplayer “environments,” and tinier-is-better [web-based entertainment], she got people to tote around her big, fat old-fashioned printed-on-paper books as if they were the hottest new entertainment devices on the planet. (36)
One reason Rowling’s books have met with such condemnation from both conservative and liberal reactionaries alike, whether they are guarding their besieged piety or their intellectual fiefdoms, is that she threatens to bridge popular fan culture, deeper spiritual life, literary artistry, and deeper-thinking philosophy more than any other product of the Western, English-speaking world in the last several decades. As John Granger states the case: “A book and the ideas in this book are defining a generation’s mental landscape, and, not to exaggerate the effect, shaping an important part of their future” (para 1).
The above portrait points this bridging capacity out with bludgeoning (perhaps jabbing?) clarity.
Granger’s point on this is important, but another step must be taken, as well. If we are to consider HP as a “shared book”, one that becomes a cross-cultural phenomenon capable of giving differing people a common philosophical, lexical, and spiritual touchstone, then we should both be reassured by the implications and face up to the dilemma inherent within. It’s a shared text from a culture that values multimedia presentations alongside the decentralization of knowledge and its control, and extends to other cultures with different practical and philosophical points from which to enter into the books as readers. Harry’s story is told in multiple ways in multiple formats that demand different forms of interaction and thinking in each case because the books, films, and games emphasize different aspects of the Harry Potter text. And Rowling often points out the inherent dangers of looking to texts as sources for information, and, thus, meaning. Whether she writes about diary/horcruxes, tabloid style journalism, disappearing maps, or sundry other items, Rowling riddles her books with warnings of accepting anything as “the source” for Truth. Granger’s repeated assertion of Rowling’s credos as a postmodern author are right when they point out this theme in her work.
So, can a “shared text” be one preoccupied with the dangers of texts as sources from which to construct meaning? In one sense, yes. After all, the projects of no less than Aristotle and Plato were preoccupied with a similar dilemma: Truth and its understanding using human faculties. But, our cultures have certainly reinterpreted the value of these texts, if not the actual meanings, in light of the progress of knowledge in other areas. The Aristotelian/Ptolemaic cosmology so important to ancient cultures until Medieval/Renaissance transformations is now, at best, considered as a matter of historical interest rather than the theosophical construct from which one might find knowledge. Galileo crystallized a different idea of the cosmos, conducted a few simple experiments, and developed an entirely different model of the way the planets moved. His challenge to Aristotle and Ptolemy put him at great risk, but we understand, thus value, Aristotle’s work differently now.
More importantly, perhaps, the Internet’s capacity to facilitate discussion at a breakneck speed changes the intellectual landscape of what is a “Great Book”, or how any book might be read. The ability to write quickly doesn’t always allow the train of thought to keep pace. And, if the author is fortunate, someone will read what she posts, perhaps almost as soon as she taps the “submit” button under the blog form. Everyone with a computer (and in the Western world this can include even the poorest and most disenfranchised) can ponder and bespeak their point of view. But, not all opinions present themselves very well. We are empowered to think and write at will, but often do not engage in both at the same time.
Thus, discourses often lack centralization (good, maybe) leading to a profusion of crappy ideas (bad, for sure) through which we must attempt to wade (downright exhausting). To carry on an informed discussion requires a tremendous amount work precisely because the resources at one’s disposal are so staggering, and often without needed provenance. Discussing Henry David Thoreau in my college courses provided interesting and challenging common ground from which I and my classmates found all kinds of fruit. But we had some direction, some centralized focal point (our professor) that guided us to the necessary and relevant points. Yet, that classroom is a very different environment than a full-fledged “culture” in which such a centralized focal point often does not exist, at least not in the same authoritative manner as my college professor, or Dr. Allan Bloom might have for John Granger.
And Rowling doesn’t seem to help the matter, either. Her recent comments have left HP fandom in a twitter because her “revelations” about some of the characters and plot points don’t seem to mingle well with our readings of the texts. And she is aloof, rarely taking part in the discussions of her books. Thus, we can’t look to Rowling, at least not very strongly, as the guiding light to understanding her books.
It seems to me that a truly shared text needs a some sort of guide, our own version of Dante’s Virgil to guide us through the subtext(s) we encounter throughout. Keep in mind that Rowling addresses a number of issues dealing in the good versus evil theme that are never quite resolved. Thus, even as a truly shared text, what might be the concrete lesson to be learned? And Rowling herself has made numerous references to the idea that the texts are more about her struggles with these dilemmas than any answers she has to them — maybe the ultimate postmodern trope: a book with a lesson to teach about the dilemmas inherent in clearly defined lessons.
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{ 26 comments… read them below or add one }
Don’t need a guide. Don’t want a guide. Don’t need issues resolved.
Never needed a guide to help me through books, postmodern or not. Shared or not. Don’t need one now. Don’t need issues resolved. Don’t need lessons clearly defined.
Discussing and debating the books is fun, but I don’t need to. The author’s backstory and comments are interesting, but don’t need them either.
Reading is a very private business. One hundred and twenty-million other people could be doing it at the same time. It’s still a private business. It takes place somewhere between the ink on the paper, and the neurons and synapses in the brain.
All I need for that is the book.
Reading is a very private business. One hundred and twenty-million other people could be doing it at the same time. It’s still a private business. It takes place somewhere between the ink on the paper, and the neurons and synapses in the brain.
I’d say, rather, that reading is a communal and sociocultural event. How we read, why we read, what we read, and how it is interpreted are all affected by our sociocultural contexts.
But I think Dave’s point isn’t that every reader needs a guide in order to understand, so you’re perfectly in the right to reject a guide; it’s that for the book to specifically work as a shared text in the way it was proposed in John’s excellent essay that got this conversation started, a guide is needed.
I am really not following this argument, Travis. For a book to work as a shared text, all that needs to happen is for lots of people to read it. I’m thinking of the nearest thing to Harry Potter in recent history: Dickens’ Little Curiousity Shop. Was there a guide? Was one needed?
What’s the difference here?
Dave’s argument is that the difference is the internet, the information age, and postmodern epistemology. All of these play a huge role in affecting whether or not there can even be any such thing as a “shared text” anymore – “shared text” in a culturally-shaping way.
Dave draws a comparison between a course where there is an instructor to provide direction, some centralized focal point, and the free for all which passes for debate and discussion on the Internet. I too am sometimes dismayed at how discussions go off in all kinds of directions, so nothing is dealt with in a systematic or logical way, and valid and important points get lost in a sea of personal takes. The starting point is usually sound and coherent (hats off to the Blogengamot!) but it peters out in a number of ways, and dies without any clear resolution. The closest we ever seem to get is to agree to disagree!
But what is the purpose of websites such as SoG? Is it to instruct? If so, who is to do the instructing? Obviously there is no clear heirarchical structure as in a classroom, everyone’s opinion gets equal space and equal importance. It’s a true democracy. Mind you, I notice that HogPro seems to be taking a bit of an academic turn: it’s featuring quizzes on the books. Quizzes imply there is a right answer, and they also imply a source of authority. If the material is factual, I suppose there is no harm. But if it’s a matter of opinion, then we’re edging closer to the academic model.
But I don’t think the purpose of the website is to instruct. It is in fact to give people a chance to share thoughts and debate. Any instruction and enlightenment is secondary to the debate. The level of that debate is determined by the level of the contributors (plus a few basic guidelines from the mediators).
Despite the frequently chaotic nature of the debates, I think that we here at SoG have been very lucky that there is a certain standard set for thoughtful commentary, versus impulsive, poorly thought out thought fragments.
But to say that because debate on the internet is chaotic the culture at large needs a guide to help us understand the Harry Potter books, that is taking things to a level which makes me feel very uncomfortable.
Haven’t the academics already co-opted Harry Potter, in courses and articles and books and, for all I know, dissertations? Can’t anyone who is interested look up – and even purchase – these logically reasoned analyses?
Is that not sufficient “guidance”? What more is needed?
I should clarify something. I’m not suggesting that we “need” a guide to understand HP. I’m saying that in order for a book to effectively function as a “shared text”, it needs a controlling point that guides the understanding.
Reyhan, you and I completely agree. I don’t like the idea that we all need a teacher; and my point concerning the internet is that it can sometimes exploit this, but not always in a positive manner. How can we have a truly “shared book” in that environment? We don’t prize the idea of a guide, anymore — think of Dumbledore as an example.
Reyhan,
I’d like to point out that I’ve never agreed to disagree with you; I’ve always disagreed.
Except on this thread I’m more in agreement with you than not. I’ll have to take some time to think on this whole shared text thing. I think it may still be possible to some extent but not in the way it was in the past.
Reyhan made the comment
“I am really not following this argument, Travis. For a book to work as a shared text, all that needs to happen is for lots of people to read it. I’m thinking of the nearest thing to Harry Potter in recent history: Dickens’ Little Curiousity Shop. Was there a guide? Was one needed?
What’s the difference here?”
I want to agree with Reyhan that I see neither the presence of a guide in past shared texts, nor the necessity of a guide in the present text.
Shared texts have long existed on a nationwide level without any instructor. In colonial America, the shared text of Thomas Paine’s COMMON SENSE had a profound effect on the course of the American Revolution. Harriet Beecher Stowe’s UNCLE TOM’S CABIN motivated many northerners to support abolition. Millions of people, especially school children have read TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD by Harper Lee, and it probably has been a big factor in convincing people in the US that racism is an evil.
What is interesting about these shared texts in US history is that they were very influential during the times that they were written, but are no longer shared texts at all, except in a historical sense.
Because of the availability of JKR’s texts in the modern world due to greater literacy rates in the world as a whole, cheaper prices for books more quickly translated than ever before, and, of course, the internet, the world of HP is in every way a world-wide shared text. I cannot think of any other way of describing it.
But we do not, indeed, we cannot, estimate whether its impact as a shared text will be a relatively short one or one that will have the profound impact of, say the great Greek and Roman classics.
In all of the cases I mentioned above, there was never a guide to make them work as shared texts. Rowling herself may have some value in partially fulfilling that role, but even she cannot be a completely definitive guide, because, although she can explain some of her thoughts and ideas behind her creation, the sum of her works in the end is what we, as readers, observe and find and share with one another.
Mary Jo,
I agree that Rowling can not be the guide. I doubt that any of the authors you mentioned were the guides to their own books. The books worked as they did because they each had a direct, simple and strong message for the time, about independence, slavery, and racism.
But upon re-reading Dave’s post, I realized that when he talks about shared text, he’s actually talking about great books – the ones with the universally relevant and important ideas that last through generations and hold new meaning upon repeated readings. I would suspect that the messages these books hold would not be simple, they would be challenging and require some analysis to bring out.
But then I ask myself, did the masses of people ever read those great books? Don’t people for the most part prefer books with simple, direct messages which are easily deciphered? What percentage of the population actually read Plato and Plutarch and Dante and Locke? Not forgetting that near-universal literacy is a twentieth-century phenomenon.
And if most people did not read the great books, how was the message shared so that they became shared texts?
I see neither the presence of a guide in past shared texts, nor the necessity of a guide in the present text.
Shared texts have long existed on a nationwide level without any instructor. In colonial America…
Colonial America was not postmodernism and globalization. For the most part, a dominant Enlightenment metanarrative was the guiding principle of interpretation.
I think the one thing everyone agrees on here is that we don’t need a guide.
reyhan, very good points, and I think those questions deserve some attention, though I’m definitely not the one with the knowledge to tackle them! I think the “shared text” discussion is far more complicated than I initially perceived.
Travis, my thought exactly: the concept of shared texts is a lot more complicated than I first thought.
Perhaps what’s throwing me off is my literal interpretation of the word “text”. Maybe a shared text is not so much the written word, as the ideas the word represents. I think that Dave’s definition: a “cross-cultural phenomenon capable of giving differing people a common philosophical, lexical, and spiritual touchstone” could fit that latter interpretation.
Dave, can you help out here? What are some examples of shared texts across time? Beyond the religious ones?
I’m not Dave, of course, but I would think that Shakespeare’s work would be one of them. And it certainly wasn’t the literate who originally benefitted from his work. So much Shakespeare has entered the common parlance and conciousness.
Matthew
Besides texts, Greek art and architecture had an enormous effect cross culturally. From Britain to India, sculptures ranging from Buddhas to the deities at Bath show clearly the imprint of Greek sculptural techniques.
Where Greek art was present, Greek military techniques and legal thought were also present. In the east, this Greek tradition was passed on through Alexander’s empire-as short-lived as it was, it had a profound effect on native cultures. In the west, Greek culture passed through the filter of Roman society, spreading the Romance languages which replaced all the native languages of southern Europe, with the exception of Basque.
Think of the development of the alphabet and how it spread, from a convenient system of notation for merchants in Phoenicia to be the foundation for most of the known alphabets today with the exception of the far East, mainly through the Greeks first and then the Romans.
I’m not a classics expert by any stretch of the imagination. I’m not expert at much of anything, really — just a 29 year old with an MA and an enjoyment of bandying about ideas. So, take my opinion on this for what it’s worth…
In the Western tradition, Matthew has the big one — Shakespeare. He’s really the only author I’m virtually guaranteed my students have read. Other than religious texts, I would also offer some philosphy, most notably Plato and Aristotle. It’s not that people read them, but Plato’s and Aristotle’s ideas still have an impact on our culture, even if my World Cultures students find Plato to be thoroughly boring. Even if one is reading a religious text, Plato and Aristotle’s influence on our understanding of those is pretty palpable.
But this is my issue with the whole concept of a “shared text”. It’s very existence as a tool and moment of communication means that it, at least, might change in some way with each subsequent reading moment. Thus, how can it be really “shared”?
It’s too late to be humble, Dave, it’s your post, you’re the leader.
That’s two different takes on the concept of “shared”: most read, and most influential.
But not a great book?
I think by the first measure, Harry Potter would qualify as a shared text. We don’t really know about the second. And going by the top 10 lists of books coming out now, most intelligensia don’t quite seem sold on Harry as great. Heck, I just saw one list of the 10 Best Children’s Books of 2007 which didn’t mention Deathly Hallows.
History will tell, I guess.
I am intrigued by your comment about how shared texts can change, at least in the interpretation. It sets up an image in my mind. Say a shared text has certain key ideas. And each idea has as many interpretations as there are readers. But the interpretations cluster around certain key points, or nodes. Over time, the key points might drift, merge, lose density, or even re-form in their original clusters.
As an example, take Harry: take one key idea: love. Many, many understandings of love. But three major clusters: agape (Harry, Lily), eros (Snape), and philia (the friendship between Harry and his friends). Over the years, Snape’s love for Lily is forgotten as the more selfless love of Harry and Lily take prominence. Then 12 years down the line a Hollywood director decides to film the books, but from Snape’s perspective. Suddenly, eros is prominent, and the love of Harry and Lily is seen as a rather colourless background kind of love. And 12 years from then, the books are recast as an adolescent bonding tale (which they’re not too far from already) and philia takes centre stage and Snape’s eros is seen as creepy, while Harry and Lily’s selfless love is still viewed as old-fashioned. And then back again.
I think that the interpretations can shift while the text remains shared.
reyhan wrote:
“I think that the interpretations can shift while the text remains shared.”
Except that interpretations still have to be fairly solidly based on the actual text to remain viable interpretations. One can’t make the HP tales or any tale for that matter fit into any interpretation they want. They can certainly try, but the text itself will show whether or not a certain interpretation is even close to the mark.
This is the problem with trying to update classics to fit into the current worldview. It just doesn’t work too well most of the time. I think of the God awful Peter Jackson interpretations of LOTR or the latest movie version of The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe. They just don’t get anywhere near dealing with the actual textual material itself.
On a side note, it can be argued that Lily’s sacrifice for Harry is not necessarily agape love but storgia love, i.e. familial love.
revgeorge, I was going to agree with you until I remembered some of the conditions for a book to be a great book: that it have universal relevance, meaning that it is relevant to people across time, and that it be something people would re-read, and get more, deeper insights from time after time.
That doesn’t mean that you can get any interpretation that you want from a text. However, it does imply that there’s room for multiple interpretations.
And that poses some difficulties. How are we to decide which interpretations are as you say, close to the mark? I think this is where Dave was coming from in his post, when he spoke of needing a guide. Well, I remain unalterably opposed to the idea of a guide. I think people can put forth their reasoned arguments, and Hollywood can make movies, and schools of thought can form around whether Snape was a hero or a pathetic misfit in need of a makeover, and ultimately it’s up to each reader to decide what the meaning of the text is. And if in one generation it goes way off the mark, so be it. The text will always be there for thinking people to return to, and reflect upon.
Reyhan,
But I think the very idea that there may be something such as a ‘great’ book indicates that such books have a message that resonates throughout the centuries & speaks to all world views. The very fact that it speaks to something deeper in people indicates that it is somewhat transcendent of the actual time & place in which it was written.
But that doesn’t mean one sometimes doesn’t need a guide or rather more an explanation to what’s going on. I mean, can anybody really pick up Dante’s Divine Comedy & know what’s going on unless all the people who are depicted in the various circles & levels are explained?
It seems like a good time to mention William Goldman’s The Princess Bride. No, not the movie. His original book. It has much that is not in the movie especially his invented backstory to the book. He describes how his father used to read this book to him whenever he was ill and how it would transport him into wonderful worlds of imagination. When he had grown up he wanted to get the book for his son to read. He was horrified to hear that his son thought it boring and couldn’t continue. He decided to read it for himself to find out if he remembered it differently to how his father read it. He was extremely surprised to learn that his father had only read him the “good” bits and the book was actually a satirical look at the European aristocracy!
… I’m sure I had a point there…
Matthew
Matthew,
Perhaps your point was that the interpretation of a book changes from reader to reader and generation to generation. So that something that starts out as a satire ends up a children’s story.
And how about Gulliver’s Travels? That was a satire too, and now it’s a fantasy/adventure tale. And Robinson Crusoe was full of religious (how to be a good Christian) and cultural (imperialism, slavery) significance but is now considered purely an adventure tale. And how about nursery rhymes? Yankee Doodle was a satire of the British during the War of Independence, Mary, Mary Quite Contrary was Mary Queen of Scots, and Ring Around the Rosie was about the Great Plague! And in opera, the Marriage of Figaro was based on a play by Beaumarchais which was banned because it was critical of the aristocracy, a sub-text which has long disappeared (as has the aristocracy which banned it).
Point? The message changes from age to age. As revgeorge says, it would be more helpful to have an explanation than a guide, to show the original intent of a book, and how far it has evolved over time.
Let us consider the New Testament as a shared text. We have many translations, all based on various manuscripts which were reports based on what the writers had heard. For example, I have read that the Gospel of Mark is supposed to be based on the preaching of Peter.
The texts, as far as we know, are in Koine Greek-the common language of the Mediterranean world at that point. Certain Aramaic words are reported, such as Talitha Kumi,(little girl, arise) but for the most part we are dealing with Greek texts. I have always personally believed that Jesus spoke Koine Greek as well as Aramaic. Many people spoke it at the time and how else could He have conversed with Roman officials such as Pontius Pilate?
We can read English translations, we can study Greek and read the variations of the Greek manuscripts; we can study the archaeological evidence; we can read the works of the Church Fathers and other commentators. All these efforts increase our understanding of the world that Jesus lived in.
But, in the end, using all these wonderful guides, I alone am morally responsible for the formation of my understanding of the New Testament.
Actually, Mary Jo, you are not responsible for the formation of your understanding of the New Testament. Since the text is God’s Word, it is responsible for forming your understanding of what it says. Otherwise, you set yourself up as the master of the text & you determine its meaning, rather than God’s Word defining itself for you.
I’ll simultaneously agree and disagree with both Mary Jo and revgeorge. revgeorge is right, from a Christian perspective, to say that the Word shapes us and that there is always danger in eisegesis (reading your own meaning into it). But God’s Word is not an “objective” document written outside of time and space; it was written in a particular cultural context, so to not take the kind of responsibility Mary Jo is advocating for is to make one a prime candidate for eisegesis, and therefore doing exactly what revgeorge is warning about.
There’s my little hermeneutics class for the day.
Travis,
Certainly I didn’t mean to give the impression that Scripture can be read outside of understanding its context & purpose. There are certain rules & principles to reading Scripture, but hermeneutics, i.e. the principles of interpretation, are there to help us draw the meaning from the text rather than us apply a meaning to the text. In most regards the way one reads Scripture is not much different than the way one reads other literature, except in Scripture’s case it is God’s Word & He’s the one having the final say.
To bring this back round to Harry Potter a bit, Rowling will not in the end be the final arbitrator of her own work, because the work will outlive her.
I’m waiting for the post where Travis is going to tackle how she’s not the final arbiter even while alive.
But checking the poll results, I note that no one has picked the “the author’s completely irrelevant” option.
Reyhan wrote:
“I’m waiting for the post where Travis is going to tackle how she’s not the final arbiter even while alive.”
Well, in a way, no, Rowling isn’t the final arbiter of the text even while she’s alive. She can’t make the text say something it doesn’t. She can’t make it contradict itself. Certainly her comments are not irrelevant, but they are also not the law; otherwise we’d have to be constantly crossing out stuff or making side notes in the books, “Rowling says it must be read such & such a way here.”
Now, her comments may be helpful in understanding the books, but they don’t change the actual books themselves. But she can certainly feel free to revise them at any time. Harry Potter 2nd Edition. There she can be the final arbiter. Until, of course, 2nd edition’s out & then it’s the text over which she has given up control by putting it out there, just as she has with the first text.