2. DIAGNÓSTICO ESTRATÉGICO
2.3 Componente Socio Cultural
conditions of reception. It stimulates observation and sets to work the imagination of the
ob-
I3Sce Gombrich, Art and Illusion, p. 121, passim.
"Kichard Wollheim, "Art and Illusion," in Actlhetic* in the Modern World, Harold fKborne, <:d. (London, 1968), p. 2-15. '••GcmihnVli, Art un<l Illusion, pp. HO. 1(59, 301, 3301.
gs The Reality of Fiction
server, who is guided by the correction to the extent that he will try to discover the motive behind the
change in the schema.
It is in this sense that the concepts of schema and correction have a heuristic value as regards the strategies of literary texts. If we apply these concepts to the description of such texts, however, we must make one important modification, which will also remove Wollheim's objections. The literary
correction of schemata cannot come about through a special perception, as it does in the pictorial arts, for there is no special objective reality against which the text can be measured. The relation of the text to the world can only be discerned by way of the schemata which the text bears within itself, namely, the repertoire of social norms and literary conventions which condition the particular 'picture' offered by the work. Now if these schemata are to be changed, the 'correction' cannot ' be guided by
perceptual data from the existing outside world, because in literary texts the correction is meant to evoke something that is not to be found and has not been formulated in the outside world. The correction can therefore only take place through the restructuring of points of significance in the schemata. Herein lies the particular function of the literary schemata—in themselves they are elements of the text, and yet they are neither aspect nor part of the aesthetic object. The aesthetic object
signalizes its presence through the deformations of the schemata, and the reader, in recognizing these deformations,10 is stimulated into giving the aesthetic object its shape. It is the very insubstantiality of
the aesthetic object that spurs on the reader's imagination. This, however, does not mean that the imagination is left completely free to produce what it will. It is here that the strategies play their part, in laying down the lines along which the imagination is to run. But how these strategies fulfill their function is explained neither by the deviationist model nor by
Gombrich's schema and correction.
FOREGROUND AND BACKGROUND
If we take a term from R. Posner, the schemata of the text stand as the first code, while the aesthetic object stands as the second code, which the reader himself must produce: "it (the aesthetic object) does not exist prior to the text that concretizes it, but only assembles itself in the text, and it is not known to all participants, but is only ascertained during the reading process. It is mainly from this activity—the deciphering of the 'second code'—that is derived the aesthetic pleasure which the reader feels as he reads."17
10On the subject of tVie reader's competence, see J. P. Sartre, Was ist Literatur? (rcle 65), transl. by I lans Georg Brenner
(Hamburg, 1958), p. 29.
17Roland 1'osncr, "Zur struktnralistischen Interpretation von Crclicliten. Darstollung ,,;.,^
r M,.ilir.<lfti_Knntrnvf*txr nm
Urispirl von TCamlrlaires Let Chain," Die Sproc/ic im
Strategies 93
Now if the function of the prirrtary code is to give the reader directions for deciphering the secondary code, the primary cannot be a pure denotation, as the selected schemata are not an end in themselves. They are component parts of a structure which transcends both the individual schema and the original context from which the schema has been taken. This structure consists of the relationship between the now depragmatized schemata, and thus sets out the conditions under which the new arrangement is to be experienced. But these conditions, in turn, cannot be binding, for while the primary code (the schemata) remains invariable, the secondary (the aesthetic object) certainly does not. It will vary in accordance with the social and cultural code of each individual reader. The strategies, then, carry the invariable primary code to the reader, who will then decipher it in his own way, thus producing the variable secondary code. The basic structure of these strategies arises out of the selective composition of the repertoire. Whatever social norms may be selected and encapsulated in the text, they will automatically establish a frame of reference in the form of the thought system or social system from which they were selected. The very process of selection inevitably creates a background-foreground relationship, with the chosen element in the foreground and its original context in the background. And, indeed, without such a relationship, the chosen element would appear meaningless.
Now the norms of social realities have a definite meaning within their particular pragmatic context, but when they are removed from that context, hitherto unsuspected meanings are bound to make their presence felt. The same applies to literary allusions; in a parody, for instance, the change of context results in a complete reversal of the original meaning. And so once the norm is lifted from its original context and transplanted in the literary text, new meanings come to the fore, but at the same time it drags its original context in its wake, so to speak, because it is only against the background of that context that it can take on its new form. The selections that underlie all literary texts will always give rise to this foreground-background relationship. The chosen element evokes its original setting, but is to take on a new and as yet unknown function. By means of this foreground-background relationship, the principle of selection exploits a basic condition for all forms of comprehension and experience, for
the as yet unknown meaning would be incomprehensible were it not for the familiarity of the background it is set against.
There are certain similarities between this background-foreground concept and that of redundancy and innovation in information theory, as well as that of figure and ground in Gestalt psychology. In all cases, this relationship is clearly central to processes of perception and comprehension, but there arc definite differences between the literary
94 The Reality of Fiction
which the structure has to perform.
Information will be innovative to the degree in which it stands out from the redundancy in which it is embedded. "Redundancy provides a guarantee against errors of communication, as it allows the information to be reproduced on the basis of the knowledge which the recipient already has of the structure of the language used."18 Consequently, redundancy "is to be regarded as the expression of a
constraint which restricts the sender's freedom of choice,"10 thus making the information "measurable
in quantity."20 Now the background of the literary text does not have this character of redundancy, for
it is not actually formulated by the text itself, but depends for its quantity and quality on the competence of its readers. In the communication of information, however, the redundancy must be formulated so that the newness of the information can be conveyed. This redundancy will also remain stable, for its sole function is to provide an unmistakable setting for the information that is to be imparted. In the literary text, not only is the background unformulated and variable, but its significance will also change in accordance with the new perspectives brought about by the
foregrounded elements; the familiar facilitates our comprehension of the unfamiliar, but the unfamiliar in turn restructures our comprehension of the familiar. This again reflects back on and so transforms the selected elements that have set the whole process in motion. Thus the background-foreground relationship in literary texts is dialectic in character, whereas the redundancy of the information model remains inactive and unactivated.
Gestalt psychology uses the terms figure and ground to describe the 'fields' of perception. The enclosed 'field' is the figure, and that which encloses it is the ground.21 During the process of
perception, we always select specific items from the mass of data available to our senses—a selection governed by our expectations. The figure will remain surrounded by the. diffuse data of which we have, so to speak, taken no account. Within this figure-and ground relationship, which is fundamental to the
process of perception certain distinctions must be drawn. \
The most important of these is the fact that the perceived figure and the perceived ground are not formed in the same way, and in a certain sense the perceived ground has no form at all. A field which had previously been perceived as a ground, and is then for the first time perceived as a figure, can have a surprising effect, and this effect is due to the new form which the observer had not been conscious of before, and which he now perceives. ... In order to draw the fundamental distinction between figure and ground, it is useful to introduce the contour, which may be defined as the borderline common to the two 18Abraham A. Moles, Informationstheorie und asthetische Wahrnehmung, transl. b>-
Horst Rouge et al. (Cologne, 1971), p. 82. "Ibid. 2<>Ibid., pp. 213, 259. aiSrr F.eliTiir Rubin, Visual wahrgenonmtoM Figurcn (Copenhagen, 1921), pp. 5, 6S.
Strategies 95
fields. . . . When two fields border on each other and the one is perceived as the figure and the other as the ground, what is directly perceived may be characterized by the fact that the common contour of the fields has a forming effect, which makes itself felt only in the one, or in the one more than in the other. The field that is most influenced by this forming effect is the figure, and the other field is the ground.2-
If the order is reversed, with the forming effect of the contour being brought to bear on what had previously been the ground, there is a corresponding change in perception, with a corresponding element of surprise. Although the dividing line between background and foreground is by no means so clear in the literary text, the reversal of the two can have a similar effect. We find it, for instance, in social novels, where the norms represented by the characters often serve to draw attention to the social context from which they are taken. Then the background becomes the 'figure', and the reader's surprise indicates that he now begins to perceive the system he is caught up in—a perception that had not been possible as long as his own conduct was guided by that system. Dickens, for example, made great use
of this effect, in order to enable his readers to experience the social system that governed the world they were living in.23
Despite these similarities between the two sets of concepts, the literary background-foreground relationship differs in several ways from the figure-and-ground relationship in Gestalt psychology. First, figure and ground are structures relating to existing data, whereas in literature the background and foreground are not given, but are dependent on selections that are made prior to 'perception'. Second, figure and ground can he interchanged, with a resultant surprise effect, but this exchange is nearly always occasioned by outside influences, whereas in literature the reversal is manipulated by structures within the text. And, finally, the figure-and-ground concept involves a straightforward switch from 'formed things' to 'unformed material',"4 whereas in literature this switch, though it takes
place continually, is not an end in itself, but is simply the precondition for a process which might be described by Arnheim's colorful phrase, "mutual bombardment."-5 •
The background-foreground relation is a basic structure by means of which the strategies of the text produce a tension that sets off a series of different actions and interactions, and that is ultimately resolved by the emergence of the aesthetic object.
"Ibid., pp. 36f. 23Sce also Kathleen Tillotson, Novels of the Eighteen-Forties ( Oxford, 1961), pp. 73-88.
^Rubin, Vlsuell wahrgenoinmene Fignren, p. 48. ws«c Rudolf Arnheini, Toward a Psychology of Art (Berkeley and
Los Angeles, t-W7),pp. 226f.
i
96 The Reality of Fiction
THE STRUCTURE OF THEME AND HORIZON