To judge the value of an argument or the significance of an act (including the actions of artists as evidenced in their texts), it helps if you understand what the alternatives are.
What other choices might the actor/writer/artist/character have made? How would those choices alter the results? What choices did other people make in similar circumstances? What makes this text or argument different from others?
Another way to think about that (!) is to say that we understand better what we ourselves think (and know and value and trust and... ) in contrast to what someone else thinks. Listening carefully to what someone who disagrees with us doesn't indicate the weakness of our own convictions, does not demonstrate a lack of faith in our own beliefs and ideas. In fact, I suggest that it demonstrates just the opposite! In learning about and listening to ideas we haven't heard before or that we have heard and rejected, we see our own ideas and their assumptions and influences and consequences all the more clearly. Will our ideas change? Probably. Will they lose out or will we give up on them? Well, it's possible. But if our ideas are not strong enough to engage with competing or imagined or alternative ideas, do we really want to hold so tightly to them anyway?
ReplyDeleteI just read some of Terry Eagleton's analysis (It's both aesthetic and ideological and plays them alongside each other.) of Robert Frost's poem "Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening", and I thought it was absolutely fascinating. And in some places I thought it was absolutely wrong! And I thought about why and tried to figure out what it was that I saw differently from him. And I learned! That's the idea, isn't it? It's all about learning and understanding, not about being right or convincing someone else or winning the debate.
And, by the way, thanks, Dr. B, for introducing me to How to Read a Poem. Where can I get one of those WWTES? shirts you have?
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