The desire for meaning, or the hermeneutics of equivalence

The most powerful instrument for the analysis of lyrical poetry is the device that Roman Jakobson in his seminal “Closing statement” “Linguistics and Poetics” from I960 called equivalence. Equivalence comprises two different relations at the same time: similarity and dissimilarity. In his central definition, Jakobson determines the connection between sound structures and semantic correlations: “Equivalence in sound, projected into the sequence as its constitutive principle, inevitably involves semantic equivalence, and on any linguistic level any constituent of such a sequence prompts one of the two correlative experiences which Hopkins neatly defines as ‘comparison for likeness’ sake’ and ‘comparison for unlikeness’ sake’ ” [Jakobson 1981, 40]. Yury Lotman takes this dialectical structure into account when he names the equivalence with the term co-opposition (in Russian: so-protivopostavlenie). In “The Structure of the Artistic Text” he explains: “As a result of the co-opposition of textual units, similarity is revealed in what is different, and the difference of meanings emerges in what is similar” [Лотман / Lotman 1970, 102].

There are at least three things to be criticized about the use Jakobson, Lotman and their followers make of co-opposition as an instrument in the analysis of lyric poetry:

• 1)    The predominance of the cognitive and the neglect of gestalt formation (I use the term Gestalt in the sense of Gestalt theory as developed by Christian von Ehrenfels and Max Wertheimer).

• 2)    The description of text structures without regard to their perceptibility.

• 3)    The denial of the role that the desire for meaning plays in finding the equivalences to be evaluated.

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• 1)    In Lotman’s interpretations of lyrical poetry, the device of equivalence

  

  appears as a generator of a static construction whose elements are relatively abstract semantic complexes that Lotman calls archisemes [Лотман / Lotman 1970, 181]. It should be: archisememes [Griibel 1975, 299, 315]. In the resultant static construction, at least two characteristics of the aesthetically functioning work are lost: 1) the concrete forms of the equivalence-forming carriers, 2) the event character of the meaning-forming process. In the Lotmanian approach, two insights of the Russian formalists and their environment are neglected. In his book on “Rhyme”, Viktor Zirmunskij (1923) had stated that before confronting the equivalent words with each other semantically, the sound equivalence has two effects: 1) isolation and intensification (the equivalence “highlights these words in relation to the others”), 2) actualization (the equivalence “makes them the center of attention”) [Жирмунский / Zhirmunsky 1923, 9]. In Lotman’s approach, all effects of intensification and actualization are sacrificed to the semantic yield that results from the hierarchical construction of archisemems. What is getting lost in this shortening, impoverishing semantic perception? First of all, it is the concrete sounds and phonetic formations of a higher order that are getting lost, then the objects represented with their “schematized aspects” (using Roman Ingarden’s (1931) term schematisierte Ansichten [Ingarden 1965]). Ultimately, the semantic result lacks that correlative in the consciousness of the recipient which gestalt psychology designated with the concept of Gestalt (In my book “Der Asthetische Inhalt” (1977) I have dealt with gestalt as a partial correlative of the aesthetic structure of lyrical poems).

• 2)    The second point of criticism of the structuralistic exploitation of equivalence, the neglect of perceptibility, is best formulated by Michael Riffaterre (1966) in his extensive essay on Jakobson’s and Levy-Strauss’ approach to Baudelaire’s poem “Les Chats”. Riffaterre asks very doubtfully: “are the linguistic and poetic actualizations coextensive?” [Riffaterre 1966, 213]. And he comes to the sober conclusion: “No grammatical analysis of a poem can give us more than the grammar of the poem” [Riffaterre 1966, 213]. In his excellent overview of the theory of equivalence and the structuralist attempts to determine the overall structure of a literary work of art from the correlation of equivalence classes, the German semiotician Roland Posner (1969) also states: “The aesthetic code of the work in question remains largely outside the scope of a procedure that is limited to the distanced description of the text and the summation of the text characteristics” [Posner 1971, 255]. In Riffaterre’s approach, which places the reception process with its experiences of contrast and perceptions of equivalence in the foreground of the analysis, Posner sees the advantage of a more adequate consideration of the aesthetic structure: “Relevant is what drives the process of anticipation and correction. <...> Riffaterre does not classify abstract elements of the text, but reader reactions that are characterized by strong evaluations” [Posner 1971, 262]. The sacrifice that Riffaterre’s structuralist reception analysis makes, however, is the fiction of a superreader, which has been criticized several times in scholarly literature.

• 3)    My third point of criticism of structuralist analysis is the denial of the desire for meaning. Jakobson’s and Levi-Straus’ heuristic procedure leads to

an immense amount of equivalences on the different levels of the text. We can completely disregard the fact that in the authors’ analyses above all the horizontal correlations of the equivalences are taken into account and the vertical relationships of the equivalences from heterogeneous levels are largely disregarded. This is regrettable because the interplay of the equivalence levels is of primary importance for the formation of meaning. However, we are first moved by the question of how the interpreters come to choose from the infinite abundance of equivalences that can be found in Baudelaire’s poem those that are relevant for the formation of meaning. This question becomes precarious in the analysis of “Les Chats”. What guides the heuristics of the two authors?

The matrix of phonic, grammatical, syntactic, positional and semantic equivalences cannot give any guidance. In it, all equivalences are equally important, none is predestined to be the starting point or even the crystallization axis of interpretation. What is the basis of the hierarchy in heuristics? The two authors do not strive for motivations of their choice of equivalences. Their approach suggests that no choice is necessary. They give the impression that they are describing everything that the text contains in terms of equivalences. They also include grammatical categories such as singular vs. plural, animation vs. inanimation, phonetic qualities such as nasality of vowels, and the correlation of rhymes. Considering these devices, they refer to their markedness in the system of oppositions. But not everything in the text can be equally marked. In reality, the authors select the equivalences they consider according to how they correspond to their secret desire for meaning.

This procedure has three aspects. On the one hand, the selected equivalences are to guarantee the conclusiveness of an overall sense, on the other hand, they are to generate a certain sense. This sense, however, is not derived from the step-by-step construction of the equivalences but seems to exist in advance. This is a methodological fallacy that corresponds to what Aristotle has called to ev dpxfj ойтЕюЭаг (in Latin petitio principii, “asking the original point” or “begging the question”).

The third aspect of the authors’ procedure that has to be criticized is the semantic evaluation of the considered equivalences. According to Jakobson’s axiom in “Linguistics and Poetics” formal equivalence prompts “comparison for likeness’ sake” and “comparison for unlikeness’ sake”. According to Jakobson’s axiom, what is formally similar need not be semantically similar. It can also be semantically dissimilar. This is the reason of Lotman’s term so-protivopostav-lenie that underlines the dialectical simultaneity of similarity and dissimilarity.

Semiotically speaking, formal equivalence functions as a signal. This signal expresses the following message: Dear reader, take me and my partner, put us next to each other and bring out the same thing in us and also notice the inequality between us and then draw your semantic conclusions.

Jakobson and Levi-Strauss, however, tend to simplify the semantic dialectics and to reduce the chosen equivalence to similarity. In practice, they follow the principle that formal similarity implies semantic similarity.

We can follow this tendency, for example, in the interpretation of lines 6 and 7 of the poem.

Ils cherchent le silence et 1’horreur des tenebres;

L’Erebe les eut pris pour ses coursiers funebres...

They seek silence and the honor of the shadows;

Erebos would have taken them as his gloomy coursers...

The authors state the following: “The semantic affinity between L’Erebe <.. .> and the cats’ predilection for 1’horreur des tenebres, corroborated by the phonic similarity between /tenebro/ and /erebo/, all but harness the cats, heroes of the poem, to the grisly task of coursiers funebres'” [Jakobson 1987, 189-190].

We can ask four questions about this semantic evaluation:

• 1)    Why do the authors consider only semantic similarity between /tenebro/ and /erebo/. They could also have seen a contrast between the two sememes according to Jacobson’s axiom, that formal equivalence involves both similarity and dissimilarity on the semantic level.

• 2)    Why do they see only the formal similarity between ЛепгЬгэ/ and errbo neglecting the formal dissimilarity between /ebr/and /геЬ/.

• 3)    Why is the difference between the sequence labial consonant + liquid consonant /br/and its inversion liquid consonant + labial consonant /rb/ not considered?

• 4)    Why is the density of liquid and labial consonants in the 7th line not considered?

L’Erebe les eut pris pour ses coursiers funebres

How would the fourfold occurrence of the combination liquid and labial be evaluated semantically? This is hard to imagine. Perhaps Jakobson would point out that the phonic similarity in this case underlines the linguistic contiguity of the words and the thematic contiguity of the things designated. But what similarity could be found between pris, pour and funebres? In the sense of Lotman, one could point out that the sound-like words form an abstract archisemem, which cannot be expressed in our primary language. One could follow this, but at the same time one would have to admit that the semantic interpretation has thus reached its limit.

Beyond semantics, the phonic series of labials and liquids has a correlate in the consciousness of the recipient. This correlate is what is referred to by the concept of gestalt. This gestalt is part of the aesthetic content, i.e. the content formed in aesthetic attitude.

Our four questions lead to the following conclusion: The choice of the formal equivalences considered is not strongly motivated by the text. If we do not want to assume arbitrariness on the part of the interpreters, we can only justify their privileging of certain equivalences as pursuing a desire for a certain meaning.

The structuralist’s belief in the objectivity of his method is denied by hermeneutics. The hermeneuticist points out to the structuralist that he cannot methodically secure the leap from analysis to interpretation, but that each of his partial findings, which he believes to be objectively founded in the text, is based on unacknowledged anticipations of an intuitively grasped overall sense. We could say even more: Jakobson and Levi-Strauss not only anticipate an intuitively grasped overall sense, but also satisfy desires for a certain meaning in their interpretation. From the immense abundance of equivalences offered by the text, those are selected which promise to lead to the intended goal of meaning.

The desire for meaning plays a strong role not only in the interpretation of poetry. In my studies of Puskin’s prose, I have repeatedly found that entire traditions of interpretation are based on nothing other than the desire for meaning. One example is the role of the count in Puskin’s tale “The Shot”. For the Soviet tradition of interpretation, it was clear that the aristocrat was a negative character and that his opponent, the marksman Silvio, was a democratic liberator of nations who met his tragic death in the Greek struggle for freedom. This interpretation, which is an extreme case of brushing against the grain, is only possible if certain equivalences are chosen from the text and others neglected to ensure the desired meaning. Again a clear case of petitio principii or fulfilling a wish of a certain sense.

Intuition and guessing are not in principle inadequate procedures for interpretation. Hermeneutics even considers them necessary but only in connection with method.

A reconciliation of intuition and method is demanded by the father of hermeneutics, Friedrich Schleiermacher, who introduced the dichotomy of divination and construction for the problem of text comprehension. Divination comes from Latin divinare “to foresee, to foretell, to predict, to prophesy”. For Schleiermacher, divination means the intuitive grasp of the overall meaning of a text to be understood. Construction refers to the rationally checking verification. “Nothing understood that is not constructed,” says the first draft of the Hermeneutics of 1809. In this definition we hear an echo of Immanuel Kant’s Dictum. “We only understand correctly that which we could do ourselves if we were given the means to do so” (Reflexionen Nr. 395). Schleiermacher later called the methodological component of understanding comparison. He expressed himself on the proportion of the two acts in the “Kompendienartige Darstellung von 1819”: “From the very first beginning, there are two methods for the whole business, the divinatory and the comparative <.. .>. The divinatory method is the one in which one transforms oneself into the other, as it were, and seeks to grasp the individual sense directly. Divination is the feminine strength in the knowledge of human nature, comparison the masculine. <.. .> Both must not be separated from each other. For divination gains its certainty only through affirmative comparison, because without it it can always be fantastic [an alternative reading of the same passage says: “because without it it can always be fanatical"^. But the comparative one does not grant unity. The general and the particular must interpenetrate each other, and this always happens only through divination” [Schleiermacher 1977, 169-170].

There are now unpleasant questions to be asked about poststructuralism and deconstructive work analysis, in which divination floats freely without the sup-

port of construction. For example, questions about the validity of the divined sense, about the verifiability and correctability of meanings that obviously owe their existence to a desire for meaning. Empathy seems to be more important than method in the directions critical of structuralism. Empathy is the main characteristic of a widespread everyday hermeneutics, which is unconcerned about the justification of its actions, interpreting literary texts by taking them quite naively into the world of life. In any case, hermeneutics in its everyday forms of appearance threatens to release the interpreter from any responsibility towards the work, its historical context and its disposition of meaning.

The construction helps the interpreter to overcome the solipsism that inevitably accompanies intuition. In divination I am completely with myself, realizing my intuitions, expectations and wishes. In the construction, I encounter the other of the work and its author, who is also someone else than me. In what way can I let this other approach me? By consciously perceiving alternatives to that which my desire for meaning allows me to see, i.e. by looking at equivalences other than those in which my expectations and my desire for meaning seem to be fulfilled.

Transferred from the sacred texts that Schleiermacher had before him to lyrical poems, the combination of divination and construction seems to prevent the mere fulfillment of desires for meaning. With Schleiermacher’s dialectical dichotomy of divination and construction, the possibility of mediating between the two antagonistic operations of understanding emerges. The constant change between divination and construction offers a way out of the vicious circle of understanding. If intuition, which is not denied, and analysis, which is being guided by rational methods, interlock at every step, the hermeneutic circle can be broken up into a hermeneutic spiral. If anticipatory divination is controlled by methodical construction and is also open to correction, then the vicious circle of self-confirming interpretation seems to be overcome. In this way, desire for meaning can also provide the starting point for a hermeneutic spiral in which divination and construction take over from each other.