I love the way the word "glose" changes meaning in Middle English (or perhaps has already begun changing meaning) from "interpret; add one's own thoughts to the interpretation of received text" to "decive; mislead by sophistical practices." Interpration is always so close to fiction, and fiction is always so close to deceit. Which is not to claim for, say, Chaucer (about whom we are talking today in my discussion section) a post-structuralist understanding that perceives all language as essentially meaningless, and every speech as an act. Although of course I'd love to claim that because it would make things easy for me. But what it does show is that, when I think about my books, my reading, as revealing both my true self and my false self, I'm following in an illustrious tradition.
(yes. everything I say today sounds Romantic with a Captial R. I hate that. Among the list of things I'm tired of talking about but can't get away from [because they're actually all I know how to talk about] is "formation of the self." That's probalby why I write less about sex these days and more about community. Because at least community is different from self. Sometimes. Whereas sex has a really unfortuante tendancy in our own community to be very tied to The Individual.)
(yes. everything I say today sounds Romantic with a Captial R. I hate that. Among the list of things I'm tired of talking about but can't get away from [because they're actually all I know how to talk about] is "formation of the self." That's probalby why I write less about sex these days and more about community. Because at least community is different from self. Sometimes. Whereas sex has a really unfortuante tendancy in our own community to be very tied to The Individual.)
Labels: books, early modern, language
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