C. S. Lewis
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Literature, as a part of communication, is one of the most important vehicles for human compassion and understanding. Through literature we achieve a kind of freedom not allowed in verbal interpersonal communication. With verbal interpersonal communication, our prejudices, preconceived notions, and social stigmas prevent us from allowing the true meaning of an expression to come through, especially in the case of someone unfamiliar to us. In the pages of a book, the author controls how much the reader knows of his or her personal experience and, in that way, controls the lens through which the reader sees the message. This freedom allows the author to guide our imagination and revel meaning in the intended time. This transference of perspective gives us the ability to walk in the shoes of another person, to see through their eyes, to hear their thoughts. There can be no greater form of empathy. There is a strong desire to convey experience in our species and no one can say which vehicle is the most efficient method to share understanding. If you were to ask me, I would say that the underlying drive to share is more important than the method by which the sharing takes place. Literature is a vital part of the mosaic of human compassion. I suppose the answer is yes, then. We choose to convey.
Literature transmits incontrovertible condensed experience... from generation to generation. In this way literature becomes the living memory of a nation.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
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Literature transmits incontrovertible condensed experience... from generation to generation. In this way literature becomes the living memory of a nation.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Read more athttp://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/literature.html#pUEdbRWBOOJcQMtZ.99
I think the freedom that the author exercises isn't necessarily bestowed upon the reader, though. Like you said they put the lens in front of the readers eyes and focus that lens where they want. This handcuffs the reader to focus primarily on what the author wants them to see. With that said, I'm with you that the freedom an author has to choose their themes makes those themes that much more important to pay attention to. They had the freedom to address anything they wanted, and these are the things that they chose to convey to us, the reader.
ReplyDeleteI like how Achebe uses a device in the reading to sort of put the reader in Chike's shoes. On page 829 he uses the Igbo phrase "Onye nkuzi ewelu itali piagbusie umuaka." I think that by choosing to tell us the verse in a language the reader probably doesn't understand is a way to put the reader in Chike's place. Experiencing new words and languages without necessarily knowing the meaning (I'm assuming that the translation is not footnoted in the original text.) is reflected later by Chike's fascination with words like "periwinkle", a word that he likes to use, although doesn't understand the meaning. At that point, the reader knows exactly how Chike feels because they just went through the same thing!