Temp wrote:

I suspect the text I have made bold in the quotation above refers to the myths of both the Old and New Testaments.

Not quite, though the works cited are definitely candidates within that category. However I would suggest the actual authorship collective (so many have contributed in this case) to which we owe our greatest debt in terms of these particular books was the one assembled to compose the English prose in the King James bible, in particular the ten members of the Second Oxford Company. While the world may or may not have been a better place had it been denied the sentiments conveyed in the bible, only a fool would argue against the huge impoverishment we would have suffered in terms of lyricism, succinct prose and complex philosophical and metaphysical concept conveyed with beautiful economy, had it not occasioned that particular composition in the first decade of the 17th century. One only has to read modern English renditions of the same sentiments to realise just how fortunate we are.

I would also only partially agree with your comment that "we read to know we are not alone". It goes further than that in my view . Reading the words of others - good, bad or indifferent in literary terms - affirms not only that we are not alone but that we are in fact members of a long continuum in terms of common human experience, and vital ones at that. The act of reading - the absorption of sentiments, thoughts and impulses generated at a remove from from us which can span hundreds of generations as easily as it can thousands of miles - is an act of communion with humanity that was almost impossible before the written word and as yet unmatched through alternate media in my view.

I have been ridiculed already today by the original poster for taking her question seriously, and now have been apparently  accused of causing slight for wondering earlier why no one else seemed to be doing the same. I apologise therefore if Priscilla only accidentally asked an intelligent question which I then foolishly took on face value should merit an intelligent response. Since anything longer than a few sentences from me is now allegedly a "dissertation" and unwelcome, I'll leave it at that.

You can all get back to whatever you were up to here.

Oh, nordmann, please do stop being so bloomin' huffy. No one is "ridiculing" you at all. I am doing my very best to restore equilibrium here - can't you see that? You did not cause me "slight" - I was "stung" because I thought I had been dead profound in my comments about Camus. I probably sulked for all of ten minutes.

Honestly this is all so daft.

Have you listened to the reading of De Profundis? (See TV and Radio thread)? Read in the cell in which it was written. Incredibly moving.

Nordmann,

"I would also only partially agree with your comment that "we read to know we are not alone". It goes further than that in my view . Reading the words of others - good, bad or indifferent in literary terms - affirms not only that we are not alone but that we are in fact members of a long continuum in terms of common human experience, and vital ones at that. The act of reading - the absorption of sentiments, thoughts and impulses generated at a remove from us which can span hundreds of generations as easily as it can thousands of miles - is an act of communion with humanity that was almost impossible before the written word and as yet unmatched through alternate media in my view."

That's the most splendid survey I read up to now about the written word. Thanks for that. It is worth to be published on a wider public than here between our tiny team.

With high esteem, Paul.

PaulRyckier wrote:

Nordmann,

"I would also only partially agree with your comment that "we read to know we are not alone". It goes further than that in my view . Reading the words of others - good, bad or indifferent in literary terms - affirms not only that we are not alone but that we are in fact members of a long continuum in terms of common human experience, and vital ones at that. The act of reading - the absorption of sentiments, thoughts and impulses generated at a remove from us which can span hundreds of generations as easily as it can thousands of miles - is an act of communion with humanity that was almost impossible before the written word and as yet unmatched through alternate media in my view."

That's the most splendid survey I read up to now about the written word. Thanks for that. It is worth to be published on a wider public than here between our tiny team.

With high esteem, Paul.

It was all right, I suppose. He always gets all the esteem - it's not fair. I'm going to have a huff now.

PS I am joking, Paul. Someone's got to keep a sense of humour around here. Going to bed with a good book now.

You might explain this going to bed with a good book, further, madam. We are somewhat short on evidence of Benefits mentioned in the OP. And you cannot have a huff - as in tantrum - you assume one and make off in style. Cocoa and a good book doesn't quite have impact enough.

nordmann wrote:

You can all get back to whatever you were up to here.

What is it then that we "get up to" here? Well, most of us "get up to" trying to be friendly and polite, and, if we find ourselves having the occasional mardy moment, we generally try to jolly ourselves - or others - out of it quickly. We have also, over the past few years, "got up to" trying to post interesting messages on your excellent site - messages that we hope are usually reasonably intelligent and, God help us, sometimes to do with history. That, my dear nordmann, is what we have been getting "up to" here.

Is it just me, but I have to admit to feeling a tad miffed. Has to be a miff, as it's far too hot for a huff - nearly 90 degrees here.

I think the B12 is kicking in - I could cheerfully murder someone at the moment. Must be the heat and/or the tablets.

Feel free to thump my shoulder, Temp, as long as you  don't deliberately create a puncture to my powered wheelchair.

I'm still with Priscilla, imbibing the port.

I don't get all the "port" etc. jokes, Nielsen. Sorry to be so stupid.

Ridicule is not a nice thing, especially when it's nasty. I don't want to be part of the giving  - or the receiving - of such, so I too shall take a break. Life is too short for this.

I'm not trying to make fun of anyone, Temp, the port jokes are just that - jokes as in play on double meaning of words, port as in harbour or in wine - Niepoort is a brand of port wine.

Ridicule is about the farthest thing on my mind, definitely in this place, and certainly on Res His generally when dealing with matters in a language that's not my first, and listening to so many minds, much cleverer than mine.

nordmann wrote:

In fact one could go further and say that if the principal benefit of literature is to promote an evolution of thought in our species, one of the main attributes of which has to be the presence of dialogue and argument, then it does not take a genius to see that the mediocre and bad examples play as pivotal a role in that process. How else can we consensually attempt to isolate greatness except in comparison to lesser worth, and how can we do this in the area of literature without therefore having literary output of all shades in which to run these comparisons?

I would conclude therefore that the real benefit to humanity from literature is not therefore to be derived from having "great" examples, but from having literature at all - literature being one important part of that evolutionary process, signifying as it does the first opportunity in the history of our species for the author of a thought to communicate directly and with some clarity with a prospective audience of huge size over many generations without the certainty of implicit dilution, distortion or corruption of the thought by interlopers within the communication chain as pertains in oral diessemination, something that had been impossible prior to the advent of systematic and popularly adopted methods of recording those thoughts.

This is true with regard to literature in the strict interpretation of the word. The problem is that much 'Great Literature' is not intended to be literature at all but is produced as script. The most obvious example being plays, sonnets and poems. They were and are intended to be performed by actors and reciters etc. The writers' works are specifically intended to be disseminated orally with the  obvious variable that, by definition, the interpretation is subjective.

The advent of the novel, however, heralded literature in its strictest form - i.e. a direct communication between the writer and the reader. Even then, in the heyday of the 'Great Novel' in the 19th Century, novels tended to be read aloud in company often in the form of a recital.

It is noteworthy that since the development of film, radio and television, the novel has remained popular as a literary form. There are scores more novels published each year now, for example, than in any given decade in the 19th Century. As for the Great Literature of the past, then very few people today have actually read those works but will nevertheless be familiar with quotes and characters from, say, Shakespeare and Dickens etc as a result of televisual or cinematic interpretation. Thus it ever was.

Vizzer wrote:

The problem is that much 'Great Literature' is not intended to be literature at all but is produced as script.

I don't see that as a problem at all, and fully agree with you that much of literature was recorded with a different dissemination method in mind than simply private readership. The important point is that the act of recording trapped and crystallised the author's thoughts, so to cite some obvious examples we are as indebted to literature for the convenient summary of a great truth like "this above all to thine own self be true ..." (intended and expected to be always spoken aloud) as we are for "terror made me cruel" (expected to be read aloud as often as privately) or "we lived in the gaps between the stories" (expected only to be read in private) . Shakespeare, Brontë and Atwood could not have been further apart in terms of motive, sentiment and intended audience, but all are authors speaking to us directly when we absorb their genius, through whatever method. They are all equal exemplars of great literature, I would still maintain.

I fully take your point about how the consumption of literature often diverges from intended method, and that the nature of this divergence changes with time, sometimes in a manner that leaves us with fragmentation, bowdlerisation and abridgement of original texts, dramatisation where dramatisation was never originally intended being one method whereby this occurs. I suppose the bottom line is that great epithetic narrative will naturally free itself from its literary context and attain a life of its own, these processes indeed often instigating the excision. But this is still good, and simply yet another example therefore of an obvious benefit of literature - that literature conveys these great sentiments even when the literary context in which they were first presented loses relevance, is ignored, or is even discarded as a result. Yet without literature they simply would not exist.

Paul, for clarity, During the Church of England morning services of old - pre-clappy - after the first readinng, the Reader said before taking a pew in polished squeaky shoes, "Here endeth the First Lesson.' Old fashioned English. Our non church goers know it - no reasons given as to how - but I doubt it is heard these days. More likely, 'Yeah, man, First High Five!' or something even more modern. 

Now to return to this most interesting dialogue. Some egs would be interesting. Does one epithet alone make a work great literature?

The question of translation perplexes me. What is the source of the "literature" in such cases? The original - or the efforts of the translator? I have read two translations of "Anna Karenina" - well, I have read one and discarded another quite rapidly. Similarly, the Warwickshire poacher, and Chaucer both re-used existing stories, and would today perhaps have faced the cry of "Plagiarism!"         

This, for example, cannot have been the actual wording set down as Ea's words to Enlil.
Lay upon the sinner his sin,
Lay upon the transgressor his transgression,
Punish him a little when he breaks loose,
Do not drive him too hard or he perishes;
Would that a lion had ravaged mankind
Rather than the flood,
Would that a wolf had ravaged mankind
Rather than the flood,
Would that famine had wasted the world
Rather than the flood,
Would that pestilence had wasted mankind
Rather than the flood.

That's a very good point, Gil. And its relevance extends right back to the first document that was ever presented in published form to people in an alternative culture to that in which it originated. It calls into question the semantic interpretation of almost every such text ever produced, a question mark with potentially serious consequences for religious texts, for example, and less serious but certainly no less prevalent consequences for how we commonly interpret, gauge and consume "literature".

For me however it is not a problem solely related to literature, but a facet of a larger problem that exists anyway in cross-cultural communication. While some works most definitely lose certain qualities in translation others in fact probably acquire some extra dimension of interpretation unintended by the author. In both cases however the original author's expression has been filtered through a prism after which it becomes almost impossible to ascertain with certainty how close the received images and impressions match the intention and effect when originally produced. This uncertainty surrounds all expression thus translated, be it written or oral, and even extends to visual media and less obvious cross-cultural transitions too.

What we have apparently decided collectively to do, without even thinking about it much, is to weigh the value of taking a chance on such unintentional corruption not adversely affecting our interpretation too much against the obvious loss to our collective cultural experience by never having had such translation of literary output. In fact the latter alternative is unconscionable if fully contemplated. Imperfect communication to our minds will always trump no communication at all, and we quite happily accept the splatter-gun probability that enough semantic integrity makes it across the cultural divides to keep the exercise worthwhile.

Plagiarism is another matter altogether. I reckon our concept is very much a modern one, its significance enforced by stricter controls on intellectual "property". In the past it seems that anything that made it into wide circulation in written format, so extremely difficult as it was to achieve that status, automatically became common "property" in the minds of those who enjoyed such privileged access, and was recycled under various authors' nominal stewardship and temporary ownership claims almost inevitably. It was a natural, if deceptive, practice related to dissemination and certainly leads to quandaries now when we attempt to trace the pedigree of certain literary "classics" back to an original concept, and conceiver. If, in some literary heaven, Omar Khayam were to bump into Edward Fitzgerald, for example, I often wonder just how that conversation would pan out.

nordmann wrote:

I would suggest the actual authorship collective (so many have contributed in this case) to which we owe our greatest debt in terms of these particular books was the one assembled to compose the English prose in the King James bible, in particular the ten members of the Second Oxford Company. While the world may or may not have been a better place had it been denied the sentiments conveyed in the bible, only a fool would argue against the huge impoverishment we would have suffered in terms of lyricism, succinct prose and complex philosophical and metaphysical concept conveyed with beautiful economy, had it not occasioned that particular composition in the first decade of the 17th century.

This calls to mind Alec McCowen's award-winning one man show St Mark's Gospel which began touring in 1978. Basically he recited the entire text of the gospel on his own to paying theatre audiences in London and New York and elsewhere in what was a remarkable tour de force. I was lucky enuff to see his performance in a provincial theatre in England in the mid-1980s. And here's the thing - the recital (and its reception) was not intended as a religious exercise. It was primarily about literature, language and drama. I remember, for example, McCowen's delivery of the word 'straightway' (which appears frequently enuff in the script) taking on a whole new emphasis merely as a result of the actor's choice of syllable stress and timing.

I remember hearing McCowern on "Start the Week" - one of the other guests was Enoch Powell, who said he had always rejected the Marcan priority hypothesis - he was convinced Matthew's gospel was the first to be written, and Mark's was always intended as a dramatic recitation, and had, accordingly, been edited to heighten the effect.

Got to be King James version though - it wouldn't be the same with The Message text of Saint Mark. Sort of EastEnders version of the Word of the Lord    . (Actually it was the word of Saint Mark, but that's another argument.) I suppose all the Gospels were written to be read aloud - "performed" -  rather than read silently. But others would not agree...

I'm interested in the idea that the author's intent is of no relevance once a work of art is complete. It is the reader (or viewer or listener) who creates meaning - and greatness? Roland Barthes' essay "The Death of the Author" and Michel Foucault's response "What Is An Author?" have been hugely influential over the past few decades, but are probably out-of-date now. Here's a bit from Wiki:


In his essay, Barthes argues against the method of reading and criticism that relies on aspects of the author's identity—their political views, historical context, religion, ethnicity, psychology, or other biographical or personal attributes—to distill meaning from the author's work. In this type of criticism, the experiences and biases of the author serve as a definitive "explanation" of the text. For Barthes, this method of reading may be apparently tidy and convenient but is actually sloppy and flawed: "To give a text an Author" and assign a single, corresponding interpretation to it "is to impose a limit on that text".

Readers must thus separate a literary work from its creator in order to liberate the text from interpretive tyranny (a notion similar to Erich Auerbach's discussion of narrative tyranny in Biblical parables). Each piece of writing contains multiple layers and meanings. In a well-known quotation, Barthes draws an analogy between text and textiles, declaring that a "text is a tissue [or fabric] of quotations", drawn from "innumerable centers of culture", rather than from one, individual experience. The essential meaning of a work depends on the impressions of the reader, rather than the "passions" or "tastes" of the writer; "a text's unity lies not in its origins", or its creator, "but in its destination", or its audience.

Is that true of a text's "greatness" then? Are we back to "What Is Art?" - or "What Is Great Art?" again? Old Barthes certainly had a point. But is the audience always to be trusted? Who decides?

Some scholars, however, have rejected Barthes's argument in toto. Camille Paglia, for example, wrote:

"Most pernicious of French imports [into American academia] is the notion that there is no person behind a text. Is there anything more affected, aggressive, and relentlessly concrete than a Parisian intellectual behind his/her turgid text?  

If this post is a bit muddled, blame the vitamin deficiency - my excuse for everything now.

Sometimes knowing something about the author enhances appreciation of their work. Sometimes the opposite. I suppose it depends, and it's folly to try to impose a rule one way or the other.

However I agree that it doesn't really matter which side of the argument one takes in this respect regarding a work of literature (or anything) which can be deemed to have been elevated to a universally agreed "greatness". Which is why I shied away earlier from attributing greatness subjectively to any individual works, but rather to the entire process which produces candidates. A bit of a cop-out, I suppose, so I probably should apologise.

As I should for seemingly singling out the KJV bible for its literary masterfulness, which it "exudes in oodles", as Christopher Robin's nurse might have said. In fact you can take any of the lads who contributed to the language of that translation and then seek out almost anything else they ever wrote, including Sir Henry Savile's letter to his bank manager asking for an extension to his loan, and be just as gob-smacked by their skill. They were just lucky enough to live at a time when a good education in England allowed one to compose prose that already smacked of heavenliness (even if the aforementioned is merely a metaphorical construct, as Edward Bear might have told Piglet).

Did you know Savile was so intent on producing his eight volume "John Chrysostom" that he spent £8,000 of his own cash (or his bank manager's) on getting it published? According to my Real Price Index calculator that's almost 1.2 million in today's jargon. If you're a fan of his New Testament bits you'll find many of them in JS, and even some improvements on his colleagues' contributions to the KJV. In addition you'll get automatically thrown in about ten year's reading worth of Savile - almost like finding another 50 bibles (Jesus - the Director's Cut). It's brilliant, by the way, is what I'm trying to say.

I don't know anything about Sir Henry Savile, but I believe he was given the responsibility for translating Acts and parts of the Gospels?

Isn't it true that the "great" mind behind the King James Version - and the Geneva Bible (1557), which Shakespeare would have known - was actually William Tyndale? I think it has been estimated that 80-90% of the KJV was taken from Tyndale's much earlier (1525/6) translation. I've got a little copy of Tyndale (the exact size as illegally used in England - small enough to hide away in a secret pocket) and also, of course, a copy of the KJV. I'll compare Tyndale's Acts with Savile's translation and see how much of Tyndale Savile pinched used (well, roughly!).

That said, I agree it was a golden age for learning how to gob-smack people with your brilliant prose style. I was going to suggest it was their intensive training in Latin and Greek (and sometimes Hebrew) - training that demanded an intellectual rigour that puts us all to shame these days - that produced the great writers of the age, but of course, as Jonson observed about a third of the way through his poem "To the Memory of My Beloved the Author, Mr. William Shakespeare and What He Hath Left Us":


And though thou hadst small Latin and less Greek,

From thence, to honour thee, I would not seek

For names; but call forth thund’ring Aeschylus,

Euripides, and Sophocles to us,

Paccuvius, Accius, him of Cordova dead

To life again, to hear thy buskin tread

And shake a stage; or when thy socks were on,

Leave thee alone, for the comparison

Of all that insolent Greece or haughty Rome

Sent forth; or since did from their ashes come.


Some people just have the knack - born great, rather than achieving greatness. You can learn writing technique; genius is innate.

I suppose "greatness" now simply means "entertaining" - or is that an unfair condemnation of the modern reader?

PS I think you have been very fair acknowledging as you do the greatness of the KJV - you may be a godless heathen, but you know good stuff when you read it, sir.

Tyndale was no slouch linguistically, I grant you that, and there is a strong claim of theft of intellectual property in his defense regarding all the lads who got credit for the finished KJV version, including Sir H (who did most of Matthew, I believe). "The word of god", indeed! One can see the fun a good lawyer would have had in court if that plagiary trial had ever come about. Mind you, he'd probably have been burned at the stake right afterwards.

Jonson incidentally also wrote a very moving paean to Henry Savile - it's long but begins with a nod to Savile's translation of Tacitus:

If, my religion safe, I durst embrace
That stranger doctrine of PYTHAGORAS,
I should beleeve, the soule of TACITUS
In thee, most weighty SAVILE, liv'd to us:
So hast thou rendred him in all his bounds,
And all his numbers, both of sense, and sounds.
But when I read that speciall piece, restor'd,
Where NERO falls, and GALBA is ador'd,
To thine owne proper I ascribe then more;
And gratulate the breach, I griev'd before:

It's a lovely sentiment, isn't it? Basically saying that were he to believe in Pythagorean reincarnation (P. claimed to have had several lives, learning all the time so that each one perfected his understanding and general Pythagoreanism) then Jonson reckoned Savile was Tacitus himself come back to life, only miles better.