Meaning and Interpretation: Wittgenstein, Henry James, and Literary Knowledge by G. L. Hagberg

Author:G. L. Hagberg [Hagberg, G. L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: General, American, Language Arts & Disciplines, Philosophy, History & Surveys, Modern, Rhetoric, Individual Philosophers, Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9781501726972
Google: TpZRDwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Cornell
Published: 2018-03-15T13:51:46+00:00

It is clear that there can be little doubt that the narrator’s characterization of her appearance as “medieval” is justified. He unpacks the term in the context of this description of this particular referent into further descriptive terms and phrases that support his initial judgment, including: “pale”, “angular”, “long thin face”, “inhabited by”, “sad dark eyes”, “black hair”, “curious clasps”, “velvet robe”, “garments of old Italians”, and so on. This aura of a medieval mysterious presence turns out to be deliberate and calculated. Our narrator, having learned of Miss Ambient’s concern for outward appearance and having shaped his description to lead us to expect this, says, “I afterwards concluded that Miss Ambient wasn’t incapable of deriving pleasure from this weird effect.” The ethical significance of this aesthetic depiction is of course already implicit, but a few lines later the narrator renders it explicit: “She was a singular fatuous artificial creature, and I was never more than half to penetrate her motives and mysteries. Of one thing I am sure at least: that they were considerably less insuperable than her appearance announced.” It is, naturally, the tone of this description that leads us to expect this revelation of the moral through the aesthetic, and this leads us into another dimension of meaning as it functions inside this imagined form of life.

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