Polytropy

Reading a book as if it had “no introduction, no notes, no aids or guides, no nothing but the naked text” (as William Deresiewicz puts it): such a reading seemed to need a defense. Here is my elaborate one, which seemed in the end to fall into nine sections as summarized below.

Let me note first that searching on “ahistorical reading” led me to a textbook chapter called “What Is Ahistorical Reading?” (in Intro to Poetry, by Alan Lindsay and Candace Bergstrom). The chapter seems to say well what every high-school graduate ought to know, though unfortunately they may not in fact. If you don’t want to slog through what I wrote, read that.

1. Some Novels and Novelists.

These may be read in school or for pleasure – mine, or that of writer and blogger Hai Di Nguyen. There can be epics such as War and Peace, Moby-Dick, and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. George Steiner finds the last two comparable. There can be an unreliable narrator.

2. Reading Comprehension.

This may be challenged by some poetry, such as Wordsworth’s, and annotations may not help.

3. Reading Without Preconceptions.

St John’s College accustomed me to this.

4. Reading Groups.

There are many that (thanks to the Catherine Project) I have been able to join and enjoy, all pursued in the St-John’s way as I understand it.

5. Story.

Mythos or logos. We inevitably tell it in our own words (unless perhaps somebody else has fed us the words).

6. Giving What Is Wanted.

“Ask me no questions, and I’ll tell you no fibs.” (To Goldsmith’s comedy She Stoops to Conquer, the saying is traced by Grammarist, which however has “lies” for “fibs”; Wikipedia currently repeats this apparent misquotation, citing Grammarist.) People are trained now to give most of their attention to their mobiles; in school we may be trained to supply what teachers want to hear.

7. Historicism.

I continue not to understand the objection of Leo Strauss to the “historicism” of R. G. Collingwood, but I agree with such ahistorical reading as is practiced at St John’s and was defended in my day (as I recall) by Strauss’s student and my teacher, David Bolotin.

8. The Classics.

There is something to be said for being assigned to read what one might not otherwise. My example is John Donne.

9. Re-Enactment.

Collingwood came to understand history as the re-enactment of thought, but this can be misunderstood, either when reading a poet such as John Donne, or when thinking of a certain major general who happened to read poetry while getting ready for battle.

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