Post by johntufail on May 19, 2008 16:00:51 GMT -5
Hi Joel, good to have you involed. Concise and sharp as usual.
Caroll, of course always appeared to deny any particular meaning for the Snark. And of course, following the various threads that have appeared, he was strictly correct. You suggestion, for example, would have have as many meanings as there are readers real or potential. And the meanings would change or coalesce as each reader's relationship with the poem develops and as each reader is affected by his or her's interaction with the world.
Not that this is something unique to the Snark, to even Carroll, all great writers/books to a greater or lesser extent contain this potential. However, on the whole, there are certain constraints placed on interpretation by the need for 'story'. Very few witers indeed can throw off this particular shackle. In modern times I can think of only a handful. Those immediately coming to mind are Dante, Skakespeare, Cervantes, Doesteevsky, Beckett and perhaps Proust.
Carroll. though. does appear to go even further than these luminaries - by the simple expedient of adhering to the most basic and universal of literary structure - the hero's journey. Only in S&B does he deviate fom this simplicity and become embroiled in such devices as narrative structure, plot and sub-plot etc.
Mind you, Joel, it appears to me that for your suggestion to work, both the Snark and the Boojum would have to be potentialties of being. There is a darkly spiritual element to the Snark - as evidenced by Holliday's wonderfully evocative and mythic final illustration, with the tree of life symbolism, the simulacre of the damned and the Baker's ethereal presence. Also of course, the mysterious 'Old Uncle'. Yet at the same time, Carroll can get away with rather more mundane contemporary allusion to the Tychborne trial and the Colenso affair without destroying the balance uttely - but only because both, in their own way fit into the themes of identity and understanding.
It's becoming a rathe wondeful thread with everyone making contibutions that would have been unheard of just a few years ago.
Rather exciting - innit!
Regards
JT
Caroll, of course always appeared to deny any particular meaning for the Snark. And of course, following the various threads that have appeared, he was strictly correct. You suggestion, for example, would have have as many meanings as there are readers real or potential. And the meanings would change or coalesce as each reader's relationship with the poem develops and as each reader is affected by his or her's interaction with the world.
Not that this is something unique to the Snark, to even Carroll, all great writers/books to a greater or lesser extent contain this potential. However, on the whole, there are certain constraints placed on interpretation by the need for 'story'. Very few witers indeed can throw off this particular shackle. In modern times I can think of only a handful. Those immediately coming to mind are Dante, Skakespeare, Cervantes, Doesteevsky, Beckett and perhaps Proust.
Carroll. though. does appear to go even further than these luminaries - by the simple expedient of adhering to the most basic and universal of literary structure - the hero's journey. Only in S&B does he deviate fom this simplicity and become embroiled in such devices as narrative structure, plot and sub-plot etc.
Mind you, Joel, it appears to me that for your suggestion to work, both the Snark and the Boojum would have to be potentialties of being. There is a darkly spiritual element to the Snark - as evidenced by Holliday's wonderfully evocative and mythic final illustration, with the tree of life symbolism, the simulacre of the damned and the Baker's ethereal presence. Also of course, the mysterious 'Old Uncle'. Yet at the same time, Carroll can get away with rather more mundane contemporary allusion to the Tychborne trial and the Colenso affair without destroying the balance uttely - but only because both, in their own way fit into the themes of identity and understanding.
It's becoming a rathe wondeful thread with everyone making contibutions that would have been unheard of just a few years ago.
Rather exciting - innit!
Regards
JT