WEBVTT

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Prof: So today we turn
to a mode of doing literary

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criticism which was
extraordinarily widespread

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beginning in the late seventies
and into the eighties,

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called the New Historicism.

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It was definable in ways that
I'll turn to in a minute and,

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as I say, prevalent to a
remarkable degree everywhere.

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It began probably at the
University of California at

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Berkeley under the auspices,
in part, of Stephen Greenblatt,

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whose brief essay you've read
for today.

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Greenblatt and others founded a
journal,

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still one of the most important
and influential journals in the

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field of literary study,
called

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Representations--always
has been and still is an organ

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for New Historicist thought.

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It's a movement which began
primarily preoccupied with the

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Early Modern period,
the so-called

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"Renaissance."

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The New Historicism is,
in effect, responsible for the

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replacement of the term
"Renaissance"

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with the term "Early
Modern."

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Its influence,
however, quickly did extend to

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other fields,
some fields perhaps more than

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others.

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It would be,
I think, probably worth a

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lecture that I'm not going to
give to explain why certain

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fields somehow or another seem
to lend themselves more readily

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to New Historicist approaches
than others.

01:37.420 --> 01:40.950
I think it's fair to say that
in addition to the early modern

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period,
the three fields that have been

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most influenced by the New
Historicism are the eighteenth

01:47.462 --> 01:50.672
century,
British Romanticism,

01:50.669 --> 01:57.479
and Americanist studies from
the late colonial through the

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republican period.

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That age--the emergence of
print culture,

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the emergence of the public
sphere as a medium of influence,

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and the distribution of
knowledge in the United States--

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has been very fruitfully
studied from New Historicist

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points of view.

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So those are the fields that
are most directly influenced by

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this approach.

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When we discuss Jerome McGann's
essay, you'll see how it

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influences Romantic studies.

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Now the New Historicism
was--and this probably accounts

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for its remarkable popularity
and influence in the period

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roughly from the late seventies
through the early nineties--

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was a response to an increasing
sense of ethical failure in the

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isolation of the text as it was
allegedly practiced in certain

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forms of literary study.

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Beginning with the New
Criticism through the period of

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deconstruction,
and the recondite discourse of

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Lacan and others in
psychoanalysis,

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there was a feeling widespread
among scholars,

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especially younger scholars,
that somehow or another,

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especially in response to
pressing concerns--

03:30.610 --> 03:33.830
post-Vietnam,
concerns with globalization,

03:33.830 --> 03:40.670
concerns with the distribution
of power and global capital--

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all of these concerns inspired
what one can only call a guilt

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complex in academic literary
scholarship and led to a

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"return to history."

03:54.068 --> 03:59.058
It was felt that a kind of
ethical tipping point had been

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arrived at and that the modes of
analysis that had been

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flourishing needed to be
superseded by modes of analysis

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in which history and the
political implications of what

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one was doing became prominent
and central.

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I have to say that in debates
of this kind there's always a

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considerable amount of hot air,
perhaps on both sides.

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In many ways it's not the case
that the so-called isolated

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approaches really were isolated.

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Deconstruction in its second
generation wrote perpetually

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about history and undertook to
orient the techniques of

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deconstruction to an
understanding of history,

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just to give one example.

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The New Historicism,
on the other hand,

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evinced a preoccupation with
issues of form and textual

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integrity that certainly
followed from the disciplines,

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the approaches,
that preceded them.

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Also to a large degree--and
this is,

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of course, true of a good many
other approaches that we're

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about to investigate,
approaches based in questions

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of identity also--
to a large degree,

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appropriated the language of
the generation of the

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deconstructionists and,
to a certain extent,

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certain underlying
structuralist ideas having to do

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with the binary relationship
between self and other,

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and binary relationships among
social entities,

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as opposed to linguistic
entities;

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but still, as I say,
essentially inheriting the

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structure of thought of
preceding approaches.

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So, as I say,
it was in a polemical

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atmosphere and at a moment of
widespread self-doubt in the

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academic literary profession
that the New Historicism came

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into its own--
a response, as I say,

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to the isolation of the text by
certain techniques and

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approaches to it.

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Now very quickly:
the method of New Historical

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analysis fell into a pattern,
a very engaging one,

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one that's wonderfully
exemplified by the brief

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introduction of Greenblatt that
I have asked you to read:

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a pattern of beginning with an
anecdote,

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often rather far afield,
at least apparently rather far

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afield,
from the literary issues that

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are eventually turned to in the
argument of a given essay.

06:50.350 --> 06:52.880
For example:
a dusty miller was walking down

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the road,
thinking about nothing in

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particular,
when he encountered a bailiff,

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then certain legal issues
arise,

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and somehow or another the next
thing you know we're talking

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about King Lear.

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This rather marvelous,
oblique way into literary

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topics was owing to the
brilliance in handling it of

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Greenblatt,
in particular,

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and Louis Montrose and some of
his colleagues.

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This technique became a kind of
a hallmark of the New

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Historicism.

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In the long run,
of course, it was easy enough

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to parody it.

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It has been subjected to parody
and, in a certain sense,

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has been modified and chastened
by the prevalence of parody;

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but it nevertheless,
I think, shows you something

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about the way New Historicist
thinking works.

07:53.100 --> 07:55.910
The New Historicism is
interested, following

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Foucault--and Foucault is the
primary influence on the New

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Historicism.

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I won't say as much about this
today as I might feel obliged to

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say if I weren't soon be going
to return to Foucault in the

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context of gender studies,
when we take up Foucault and

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Judith Butler together--
but I will say briefly that

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Foucault's writing,
especially his later writing,

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is about the pervasiveness,
the circulation through social

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orders,
of what he calls

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"power."

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Now power is not just--or,
in many cases in Foucault,

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not even primarily-- the power
of vested authorities,

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the power of violence,
or the power of tyranny from

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above.

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Power in Foucault--though it
can be those things and

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frequently is--
is much more pervasively and

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also insidiously the way in
which knowledge circulates in a

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culture: that is to say,
the way in which what we think,

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what we think that it is
appropriate to think--

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acceptable thinking--is
distributed by largely unseen

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forces in a social network or a
social system.

09:19.700 --> 09:22.310
Power, in other words,
in Foucault is in a certain

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sense knowledge,
or to put it another way,

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it is the explanation of how
certain forms of knowledge come

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to exist--
knowledge, by the way,

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not necessarily of something
that's true.

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Certain forms of knowledge come
to exist in certain places.

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So all of this is central to
the work of Foucault and is

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carried over by the New
Historicists;

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hence the interest for them of
the anecdotes.

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Start as far afield as you can
imaginably start from what you

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will finally be talking about,
which is probably some textual

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or thematic issue in Shakespeare
or in the Elizabethan masque or

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whatever the case may be.

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Start as far afield as you
possibly can from that,

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precisely in order to show the
pervasiveness of a certain kind

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of thinking,
the pervasiveness of a certain

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social constraint or limitation
on freedom.

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If you can show how pervasive
it is,

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you reinforce and justify the
Foucauldian idea that power is,

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as I've said,
an insidious and ubiquitous

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mode of circulating knowledge.

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All of this is implicit,
sometimes explicit,

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in New Historicist approaches
to what they do.

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So as I said,
Foucault is the crucial

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antecedent and of course,
when it's a question of

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Foucault, literature as we want
to conceive of it--

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perhaps generically or as a
particular kind of utterance as

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opposed to other kinds--
does tend to collapse back into

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the broader or more general
notion of discourse,

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because it's by means of
discourse that power circulates

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knowledge.

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Once again, despite the fact
that New Historicism wants to

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return us to the real world,
it nevertheless acknowledges

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that that return is language
bound.

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It is by means of language that
the real world shapes itself.

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That's why for the New
Historicist--

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and by this means,
I'll turn in a moment to the

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marvelous anecdote with which
Greenblatt begins the brief

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essay that I've asked you to
read--

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that's why the New Historicist
lays such intense emphasis on

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the idea that the relationship
between discourse--

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call it literature if you like,
you might as well--

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and history is reciprocal.

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Yes, history conditions what
literature can say in a given

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epoch.

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History is an important way of
understanding the valency of

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certain kinds of utterance at
certain times.

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In other words,
history is--as it's

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traditionally thought to be by
the Old Historicism,

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and I'll get to that in a
minute--history is a background

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to discourse or literature.

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But by the same token there is
an agency, that is to say a

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capacity, to circulate power in
discourse in turn.

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Call it "literature":
"I am Richard II,

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know you not that?"

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says Queen Elizabeth when at
the time of the threatened Essex

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Uprising she gets wind of the
fact that Shakespeare's

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Richard II is being
performed,

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as she believes,
in the public streets and in

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private houses.

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In other words,
wherever there is sedition,

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wherever there are people who
want to overthrow her and

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replace her with the Earl of
Essex,

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the pretender to the throne,
Richard II is being

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performed.

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Well, now this is terrifying to
Queen Elizabeth because she

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knows--
she's a supporter of the

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theater--she knows that
Richard II is about a

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king who has many virtues but a
certain weakness,

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a political weakness and also a
weakness of temperament--

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the kind of weakness that makes
him sit upon the ground and tell

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sad tales about the death of
kings,

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that kind of weakness,
who is then usurped by

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Bolingbroke who became Henry IV,
introducing a whole new dynasty

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and focus of the royal family in
England.

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Queen Elizabeth says,
"They're staging this play

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because they're trying to
compare me with Richard II in

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preparation for deposing me,
and who knows what else they

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might do to me?"

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This is a matter of great
concern.

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In other words,
literature--Fredric Jameson

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says "history
hurts"--literature hurts,

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too.

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>

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Literature, in other words,
has a discursive agency that

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affects history every bit as
much as history affects

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literature: literature "out
there," and theater--

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especially if it escapes the
confines of the playhouse

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because,
as Greenblatt argues,

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the playhouse has a certain
mediatory effect which defuses

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the possibilities of sedition.

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One views literary
representation in the playhouse

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with a certain objectivity,
perhaps, that is absent

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altogether when interested
parties take up the same text

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and stage it precisely for the
purpose of fomenting rebellion.

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Literature, especially when
escaped from its conventional

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confines,
becomes a very,

15:46.345 --> 15:50.895
very dangerous or
positive influence,

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depending on your point of view
on the course of history.

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So the relationship between
history and discourse is

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reciprocal.

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Greenblatt wants to argue with
a tremendous amount of stress

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and, I think,
effectiveness that the New

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Historicism differs from the Old
Historicism.

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This is on page 1443 in the
right-hand column.

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John Dover Wilson,
a traditional Shakespeare

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scholar and a very important
one, is the spokesperson in

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Greenblatt's scenario for the
Old Historicism.

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The view I'm about to quote is
that of John Dover Wilson,

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a kind of consensus about the
relationship between literature

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and history:
Modern historical scholarship

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[meaning Old Historicism]
has assured Elizabeth

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>

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that she had [this is the
right-hand column about two

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thirds of the way down]
>

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nothing to worry about:
Richard II is not at all

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subversive but rather a hymn to
Tudor order.

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The play, far from encouraging
thoughts of rebellion,

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regards the deposition of the
legitimate king as a

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"sacrilegious"
act that drags the country down

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into "the abyss of
chaos";

17:15.690 --> 17:19.620
"that Shakespeare and his
audience regarded Bolingbroke as

17:19.618 --> 17:21.328
a usurper,"
declares J.

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Dover Wilson,
"is incontestable."

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But in 1601 neither Queen
Elizabeth nor the Earl of Essex

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were so sure…
Greenblatt wins.

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It's a wonderful example.

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It's the genius of Greenblatt
to choose examples that are so

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telling and so incontrovertible.

17:40.880 --> 17:43.340
We know Queen Elizabeth was
scared >

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on this occasion,
which makes it quite simply the

17:46.327 --> 17:50.247
case that John Dover Wilson was
wrong to suppose that Richard

17:50.248 --> 17:52.238
II was no threat to her.

17:52.240 --> 17:57.720
It's not at all the point that
a broad, ideological view of

17:57.724 --> 18:03.404
Richard II was any
different from what Wilson said;

18:03.400 --> 18:05.180
that was perfectly true.

18:05.180 --> 18:07.400
Bolingbroke was
considered a usurper.

18:07.400 --> 18:11.340
It was considered tragic that
Richard II was deposed;

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but that doesn't mean that the
text can't be taken over,

18:15.482 --> 18:18.122
commandeered and made
subversive.

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Wilson doesn't acknowledge this
because his view of the

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relationship between history and
literature is only that history

18:26.074 --> 18:29.504
influences literature,
not that the influence can be

18:29.500 --> 18:30.160
reciprocal.

18:30.160 --> 18:34.510
You see, that's how it is that
the New Historicism wants to

18:34.507 --> 18:38.477
define itself over and against
the Old Historicism.

18:38.480 --> 18:45.520
If there is a political or
ideological consensus about the

18:45.519 --> 18:50.049
legitimacy of monarchy,
the divine right of kings,

18:50.046 --> 18:53.086
the legitimacy of succession
under the sanction of the Church

18:53.085 --> 18:55.005
of England and all the rest of
it--

18:55.009 --> 18:58.389
all of which is anachronistic
when you're thinking about these

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history plays--
if there is this broad

19:01.267 --> 19:05.817
consensus, that's it,
that's what the play

19:05.823 --> 19:08.733
means according to the Old
Historicism,

19:08.730 --> 19:12.630
even though plainly you can
take the plot of the play and

19:12.625 --> 19:17.515
completely invert those values,
which is what the Essex faction

19:17.522 --> 19:22.022
does in staging it in those
places where Queen Elizabeth

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suspects that it's being staged.

19:24.880 --> 19:25.800
Okay.

19:25.798 --> 19:29.508
Now another way in which the
Old Historicism and the New

19:29.507 --> 19:32.797
Historicism differ--
correctly, I think-- according

19:32.801 --> 19:36.121
to Greenblatt is that in the Old
Historicism there is no

19:36.124 --> 19:38.674
question--
I'm looking at page 1444,

19:38.674 --> 19:42.494
the right-hand column about a
third of the way down--

19:42.490 --> 19:52.510
of the role of the historian's
own subjectivity.

19:52.509 --> 19:55.569
"It is not thought,"
says Greenblatt,

19:55.568 --> 19:57.678
"to be the product of the
historian's

19:57.683 --> 20:00.523
interpretation…"
History is just what is.

20:00.519 --> 20:03.609
One views it objectively and
that's that.

20:03.608 --> 20:08.078
Now notice here that we're back
with Gadamer.

20:08.078 --> 20:12.268
Remember that this was
Gadamer's accusation of

20:12.265 --> 20:16.615
historicism,
the belief of historicism--what

20:16.622 --> 20:20.352
Greenblatt calls the Old
Historicism--

20:20.348 --> 20:26.028
that we can bracket out our own
historical horizon and that we

20:26.034 --> 20:31.444
can eliminate all of our own
historical prejudices in order

20:31.438 --> 20:36.748
to understand the past
objectively in and for itself.

20:36.750 --> 20:39.000
This is not the case,
said Gadamer,

20:39.000 --> 20:39.730
remember.

20:39.730 --> 20:43.860
Gadamer said that
interpretation must necessarily

20:43.855 --> 20:49.185
involve the merger of horizons,
the horizon of the other and my

20:49.185 --> 20:52.105
own horizon as an interpreter.

20:52.108 --> 20:56.508
I cannot bracket out my own
subjectivity.

20:56.509 --> 20:57.689
Okay.

20:57.690 --> 21:00.850
If that's the case,
then Gadamer anticipates

21:04.371 --> 21:08.411
of the Old Historicism is its
supposition that it has no

21:08.409 --> 21:12.079
vested interest in what it's
talking about--

21:12.078 --> 21:15.318
that is to say,
its supposition that it wants

21:15.319 --> 21:19.079
history to accord in one way or
another with its own

21:19.076 --> 21:22.406
preconceptions,
but isn't aware of it.

21:22.410 --> 21:26.480
The anecdote--again,
wonderfully placed in the

21:26.480 --> 21:29.680
polemical argument--
that after all,

21:29.675 --> 21:34.335
John Dover Wilson delivered
himself of these opinions about

21:34.339 --> 21:39.329
Richard II before a group
of scholars in Germany in 1939

21:39.326 --> 21:42.166
is,
after all, rather interesting.

21:42.170 --> 21:45.900
Hitler is about to be the
Bolingbroke of Germany.

21:45.900 --> 21:48.250
John Dover Wilson wants his
audience to say,

21:48.251 --> 21:49.731
"Hey, wait a minute.

21:49.730 --> 21:51.860
Stick with vested authority.

21:51.859 --> 21:52.939
>

21:52.940 --> 21:55.460
You have a weak democracy,
but it is a democracy.

21:55.460 --> 21:58.290
Don't let it get away from
you."

21:58.288 --> 22:02.478
And so he is speaking,
the horse already having

22:02.480 --> 22:07.240
escaped from the barn,
in this reassuring way about

22:07.242 --> 22:12.652
German politics as a means of
sort of reinforcing his own view

22:12.653 --> 22:16.383
of the politics of Elizabethan
England.

22:16.380 --> 22:20.860
But this, Greenblatt supposes,
is something about which he has

22:20.856 --> 22:23.276
very little self-consciousness.

22:23.278 --> 22:26.068
That is to say,
his own interest,

22:26.068 --> 22:30.078
as of course it should be on
this occasion,

22:30.078 --> 22:33.338
is in the preservation of
vested authority,

22:33.338 --> 22:38.738
and his own interest then folds
back into his understanding of

22:38.743 --> 22:44.153
Elizabethan ideology in such a
way that it can conform to that

22:44.147 --> 22:45.297
interest.

22:45.298 --> 22:49.968
He has, in other words,
as we say today,

22:49.970 --> 22:54.730
a hidden agenda and is very
little aware of it,

22:54.730 --> 22:59.110
unlike the New Historicist who,
following Gadamer in this

22:59.108 --> 23:02.518
respect,
is fully cognizant of the

23:02.520 --> 23:08.440
subjective investment that leads
to a choice of interest in

23:08.441 --> 23:11.571
materials,
a way of thinking about those

23:11.574 --> 23:15.394
materials,
and a means of bringing them to

23:15.394 --> 23:18.814
life for us today and into
focus.

23:18.808 --> 23:21.808
In other words,
it's okay for Greenblatt,

23:21.805 --> 23:25.245
as it was for Gadamer--much to
the horror of E.

23:25.250 --> 23:25.700
D.

23:25.700 --> 23:28.920
Hirsch--to find the
significance of a text,

23:28.917 --> 23:31.827
as opposed to the meaning of a
text.

23:31.828 --> 23:36.978
The significance of the text is
that it has certain kinds of

23:36.980 --> 23:38.990
power invested in it.

23:38.990 --> 23:43.310
Those kinds of power are still
of interest to us today,

23:43.314 --> 23:47.884
still of relevance to what's
going on in our own world.

23:47.880 --> 23:51.780
All of this is taken up openly
as a matter of

23:51.784 --> 23:57.024
self-consciousness by the New
Historicists in ways that,

23:57.019 --> 24:00.279
according to Greenblatt and his
colleagues,

24:00.278 --> 24:06.158
were not available consciously
in the older Historicism.

24:06.160 --> 24:10.770
Now the world as the New
Historicism sees it--

24:10.769 --> 24:16.379
and after I've said this,
I'll turn to McGann--

24:16.380 --> 24:23.210
is essentially a dynamic
interplay of power,

24:23.210 --> 24:25.850
networks of power,
and subversion:

24:25.848 --> 24:29.748
that is to say,
modes of challenging those

24:29.746 --> 24:34.276
networks even within the
authoritative texts that

24:34.280 --> 24:37.210
generate positions of power.

24:37.210 --> 24:40.220
The Elizabethan masque,
for example,

24:40.220 --> 24:46.430
which stages the relation of
court to courtier,

24:46.430 --> 24:53.420
to visitor, to hanger-on in
wonderfully orchestrated ways,

24:53.420 --> 24:58.350
is a means--because it's kind
of poly-vocal--

24:58.348 --> 25:04.048
of containing within its
structure elements of

25:04.047 --> 25:07.467
subversion,
according to the argument

25:07.467 --> 25:11.217
that's made about these things:
the same with court ritual

25:11.223 --> 25:14.633
itself,
the same with the happenstance

25:14.625 --> 25:19.525
that takes place once a year in
early modern England,

25:19.528 --> 25:26.008
in which the Lord of Misrule is
so denominated and ordinary

25:26.010 --> 25:31.040
authority is turned on its ear
for one day.

25:31.038 --> 25:34.578
Queen for a day,
as it were, is something that

25:34.577 --> 25:37.877
is available to any citizen once
a year.

25:37.880 --> 25:42.150
These are all ways of defusing
what they,

25:42.150 --> 25:45.950
in fact, bring into visibility
and consciousness--

25:45.950 --> 25:49.000
mainly the existence,
perhaps the inevitable

25:48.998 --> 25:52.838
existence,
of subversion with respect to

25:52.838 --> 25:57.368
structures and circulatory
systems of power.

25:57.368 --> 26:01.518
It's this relationship between
power and subversion that the

26:01.515 --> 26:05.135
New Historicism,
especially in taking up issues

26:05.137 --> 26:10.567
of the Early Modern period,
tends to focus on and to

26:10.567 --> 26:12.577
specialize in.

26:12.578 --> 26:18.948
Now it's not wholly clear that
Jerome McGann has ever really

26:18.952 --> 26:23.492
thought of himself as a New
Historicist.

26:23.490 --> 26:25.980
He has been so designated by
others,

26:25.980 --> 26:29.870
but I think there is one rather
important difference in

26:29.874 --> 26:32.714
emphasis,
at least between what he's

26:32.710 --> 26:37.180
doing and what Greenblatt and
his colleagues do in the Early

26:37.181 --> 26:38.471
Modern period.

26:38.470 --> 26:43.080
McGann doesn't really so much
stress the reciprocity of

26:43.079 --> 26:45.129
history and discourse.

26:45.130 --> 26:49.640
He is interested in the
presence of history,

26:49.636 --> 26:54.766
the presence of immediate
social and also personal

26:54.771 --> 26:59.281
circumstances in the history of
a text.

26:59.279 --> 27:04.069
His primary concern is with--at
least in this essay--textual

27:04.071 --> 27:05.211
scholarship.

27:05.210 --> 27:10.610
He himself is the editor of the
new standard works of Byron.

27:10.608 --> 27:14.308
He has also done a standard
works of Swinburne,

27:14.308 --> 27:18.588
and he has been a vocal and
colorful spokesperson of a

27:18.590 --> 27:23.440
certain point of view within the
recondite debates of textual

27:23.438 --> 27:28.118
scholarship: whether textual
scholarship ought to produce a

27:28.123 --> 27:32.893
text that's an amalgam of a
variety of available manuscripts

27:32.888 --> 27:36.808
and printed texts;
whether the text it produces

27:36.807 --> 27:40.377
ought to be the last and best
thoughts of the author--

27:40.380 --> 27:44.090
that's the position that McGann
seems to be taking in this

27:44.085 --> 27:45.825
essay--
or whether the text,

27:45.827 --> 27:49.087
on the contrary,
ought to be the first burst of

27:49.085 --> 27:51.075
inspiration of the author.

27:51.078 --> 27:53.978
All the people who prefer the
earliest versions of

27:53.981 --> 27:56.351
Wordsworth's Prelude,
for example,

27:56.351 --> 27:58.721
would favor that last point of
view.

27:58.720 --> 28:02.440
In other words,
McGann is making a contribution

28:02.435 --> 28:06.955
here not least to the debates
surrounding editing and the

28:06.961 --> 28:10.841
production of authoritative
scholarly texts.

28:10.838 --> 28:15.338
It's in that context that the
remarks he's making about Keats

28:15.338 --> 28:17.138
have to be understood.

28:17.140 --> 28:21.270
I think the primary influence
on McGann is not so much

28:21.265 --> 28:24.855
Foucault,
then, with the sense of the

28:24.863 --> 28:30.193
circulation of power back and
forth between history and

28:30.190 --> 28:34.030
literary discourse,
as it is Bakhtin,

28:34.027 --> 28:38.357
whom he quotes on pages
eighteen and nineteen;

28:38.358 --> 28:41.218
or whose influence he cites,
I should say rather,

28:41.220 --> 28:43.970
in a way that,
I think, does pervade what you

28:43.971 --> 28:47.351
encounter in reading what he
then goes on to say at the

28:47.348 --> 28:50.788
bottom of page eighteen in the
copy center reader:

28:50.788 --> 28:54.878
What follows [says McGann]
is a summary and extrapolation

28:54.884 --> 28:59.344
of certain key ideas set forth
by the so-called Bakhtin School

28:59.344 --> 29:02.214
of criticism,
a small group of Marxist

29:02.214 --> 29:05.974
critics from the Soviet Union
who made an early attack upon

29:05.973 --> 29:09.023
formalist approaches to poetry
[just as he,

29:09.019 --> 29:12.529
McGann, is, and as the New
Historicists are themselves,

29:12.529 --> 29:14.509
in their turn, doing].

29:14.509 --> 29:17.709
The Bakhtin School's
socio-historical method

29:17.711 --> 29:20.541
approaches all language
utterances--

29:20.538 --> 29:24.668
including poems--as phenomena
marked with their concrete

29:24.674 --> 29:26.334
origins and history.

29:26.328 --> 29:30.088
That is to say,
phenomena voiced by the

29:30.094 --> 29:35.744
material circumstances that
produce them or phenomena,

29:35.740 --> 29:39.550
in other words,
in which the voice of the

29:39.547 --> 29:45.637
Romantic solitary individual is
not really that voice at all,

29:45.640 --> 29:50.730
but is rather the polyglossal
infusion of a variety of

29:50.731 --> 29:53.561
perspectives,
including ideological

29:53.558 --> 29:56.558
perspectives,
shaping that particular

29:56.559 --> 30:00.889
utterance and also,
in the case of the textual

30:00.893 --> 30:04.403
scholar,
shaping which of a variety of

30:04.401 --> 30:09.451
manuscripts will be chosen for
publication and for central

30:09.453 --> 30:15.043
attention in the tradition of
the reception of a given text.

30:15.038 --> 30:22.218
So all of this McGann takes to
be derived from Bakhtin rather

30:22.224 --> 30:24.744
than from Foucault.

30:24.740 --> 30:28.160
I do think that's a significant
difference between our two

30:28.160 --> 30:28.760
authors.

30:28.759 --> 30:34.329
Now McGann's most important
contribution to the return to

30:34.325 --> 30:40.185
history of the seventies and
eighties is a short book called

30:40.188 --> 30:44.688
The Romantic Ideology,
and this book--well,

30:44.688 --> 30:47.218
what it is is an attack on
Romanticism.

30:47.220 --> 30:50.920
At least it's an attack on
certain widely understood and

30:50.923 --> 30:53.353
received ideas about
Romanticism--

30:53.348 --> 30:55.948
ideas with which,
by the way, I don't agree,

30:55.950 --> 30:57.810
but this course isn't about me.

30:57.808 --> 31:03.158
The Romantic Ideology is
an amalgam of two titles.

31:03.160 --> 31:07.360
One of them is the important
early critique of Romanticism by

31:07.355 --> 31:11.405
the German poet and sometime
Romantic Heinrich Heine called

31:11.412 --> 31:16.332
Die romantische Schule,
or The Romantic School,

31:16.326 --> 31:20.216
in which the subjectivity,
even solipsism,

31:20.220 --> 31:26.050
and the isolation from social
concern and from unfolding

31:26.048 --> 31:32.298
historical processes of the
Romantic poets is emphasized and

31:32.304 --> 31:34.004
criticized.

31:34.000 --> 31:36.230
In addition to that--that's
where the word

31:36.230 --> 31:38.950
"Romantic"
comes from in the title The

31:38.951 --> 31:42.011
Romantic Ideology--
the other title that it

31:42.005 --> 31:45.585
amalgamates is Marx's book
The German Ideology,

31:45.588 --> 31:49.258
which is about many things
but is in particular about

31:49.259 --> 31:52.669
Lumpenproletariat
intellectuals who think with

31:52.667 --> 31:55.297
Hegel--
still following Hegel despite

31:55.304 --> 31:58.014
believing themselves to be
progressive--

31:58.009 --> 32:01.059
who think with Hegel that
thought produces material

32:01.057 --> 32:03.857
circumstances rather than the
other way around:

32:03.863 --> 32:07.883
in other words people,
in short, who are idealists and

32:07.881 --> 32:10.851
therefore,
under this indictment,

32:10.845 --> 32:12.235
also Romantic.

32:12.240 --> 32:15.920
McGann's title,
as I say, cleverly amalgamates

32:15.924 --> 32:21.334
these two other titles and sets
the agenda for this short book,

32:21.328 --> 32:25.898
which is an attack not just on
Romanticism but on what he

32:25.903 --> 32:29.833
believes to be our continued
tendency still to be

32:29.825 --> 32:32.435
"in"
Romanticism,

32:32.440 --> 32:33.970
still to be Romantic.

32:33.970 --> 32:38.850
There his particular object of
attack is the so-called Yale

32:38.853 --> 32:43.823
school, which is still under
attack in the essay that you've

32:43.819 --> 32:45.419
read for today.

32:45.420 --> 32:49.580
Paul de Man and Geoffrey
Hartman's well-known essay on

32:49.577 --> 32:54.207
Keats's "To Autumn"
are singled out for particular

32:54.208 --> 32:59.978
scorn and dispraise,
all sort of on the grounds that

32:59.981 --> 33:02.171
yes,
it's all very well to read

33:02.169 --> 33:04.419
Romanticism,
to come to understand it,

33:04.423 --> 33:06.373
and even to be fascinated by
it;

33:06.369 --> 33:08.629
but we can't be Romantic.

33:08.630 --> 33:10.560
In other words,
our reading of Romanticism--

33:10.558 --> 33:14.518
if we are to be social animals,
politically engaged,

33:14.519 --> 33:21.329
and invested in the world as a
social community--

33:21.328 --> 33:25.248
must necessarily be an
anti-Romantic critique.

33:25.250 --> 33:27.800
This is, as I say,
still essentially the position

33:27.796 --> 33:28.906
taken up by McGann.

33:28.910 --> 33:34.440


33:34.440 --> 33:35.150
All right.

33:35.146 --> 33:39.456
So I've explained the ways in
which he differs from Greenblatt

33:39.460 --> 33:43.350
in leaning more toward Bakhtin
than toward Foucault.

33:43.348 --> 33:47.708
I have explained that McGann is
engaged primarily in talking

33:47.710 --> 33:51.630
about issues of textual
scholarship in this particular

33:51.626 --> 33:54.546
essay,
that he defends Keats's last

33:54.554 --> 33:58.134
deliberate choices,
that he believes the so-called

33:58.131 --> 34:01.521
"indicator"
text of 1820 of "La Belle

34:01.517 --> 34:04.637
Dame Sans Merci"
is Keats's last deliberate

34:04.636 --> 34:08.056
choice,
as opposed to the 1848 text

34:08.059 --> 34:13.659
published by Monckton Milnes in
the edition of Keats's poems

34:13.655 --> 34:17.065
that he brought out at that
time.

34:17.070 --> 34:23.300
Now I think that in the time
remaining to sort of linger over

34:23.302 --> 34:29.642
McGann, I do want to say a few
things about what he says about

34:29.641 --> 34:30.681
Keats.

34:30.679 --> 34:36.609
I want to emphasize that his
general pronouncements about the

34:36.608 --> 34:41.798
historicity of texts,
about the permeation of texts

34:41.802 --> 34:45.992
by the circumstances of their
production,

34:45.989 --> 34:50.179
their conditioning by
ideological factors,

34:50.179 --> 34:51.869
is unimpeachable.

34:51.869 --> 34:56.059
It seems to me that this is a
necessary approach at least to

34:56.056 --> 34:59.206
have in mind if not,
perhaps, necessarily to

34:59.208 --> 35:02.708
emphasize in one's own work of
literary scholarship.

35:02.710 --> 35:07.220
The idea that a text just falls
from a tree--if anybody ever had

35:07.217 --> 35:10.507
that idea, by the way
>

35:10.510 --> 35:16.560
--is plainly not a tenable one,
and the opposite idea that a

35:16.561 --> 35:22.511
text emerges from a complex
matrix of social and historical

35:22.510 --> 35:26.820
circumstances is certainly a
good one.

35:26.820 --> 35:30.570
So if one is to criticize,
again it's not a question of

35:30.570 --> 35:33.280
criticizing his basic
pronouncements.

35:33.280 --> 35:37.320
It seems to me nothing could be
said really against them.

35:37.320 --> 35:39.750
The trouble is that in the case
of McGann--

35:39.750 --> 35:44.640
who is a terrific,
prominent Romantic scholar with

35:44.641 --> 35:47.681
whom one,
I suppose, hesitates to

35:47.677 --> 35:52.387
disagree--everything he says
about the text that he isolates

35:52.393 --> 35:55.753
for attention in this essay is
simply,

35:55.750 --> 35:57.320
consistently, wrong.

35:57.320 --> 36:02.720
It's almost as if by compulsion
that he says things that are

36:02.719 --> 36:07.279
wrong about these texts,
and the reason I asked you in

36:07.284 --> 36:10.614
my e-mail last night to take a
look at them,

36:10.610 --> 36:15.180
if you get a chance,
is so that these few remarks

36:15.179 --> 36:19.369
that I make now might have some
substance.

36:19.369 --> 36:22.189
Take for example "La Belle
Dame Sans Merci."

36:22.190 --> 36:25.700


36:25.699 --> 36:30.189
In the first place,
who says we only read

36:30.190 --> 36:31.720
the 1848 text?

36:31.719 --> 36:36.719
A scholarly edition--and his
main object of attack is Jack

36:36.719 --> 36:42.069
Stillinger's scholarly edition
of Keats--gives you basically a

36:42.072 --> 36:44.092
variorum apparatus.

36:44.090 --> 36:47.940
Yeah, maybe it gives you a
particular text in bold print,

36:47.936 --> 36:51.646
but it gives you the variant
text in smaller print in a

36:51.646 --> 36:52.536
footnote.

36:52.539 --> 36:55.949
It doesn't withhold the variant
text from you.

36:55.949 --> 36:58.999
It says, "No,
look, there's this too.

36:59.000 --> 37:00.860
Take your choice."

37:00.860 --> 37:04.790
Really the atmosphere of a
variorum scholarly edition is an

37:04.786 --> 37:09.326
atmosphere of take your choice,
not a kind of tyrannical

37:09.333 --> 37:15.133
imposition on the public of a
particular version of the text.

37:15.130 --> 37:18.810
Everybody knows the 1820
Indicator text.

37:18.809 --> 37:20.739
"What can ail thee,
wretched wight?"

37:20.739 --> 37:23.529
is at least as familiar to me,
as a Romanticist,

37:23.530 --> 37:26.560
as "What can ail thee,
knight at arms?"

37:26.559 --> 37:29.339
the way in which the 1848 text
begins;

37:29.340 --> 37:33.040
and frankly how many people who
aren't Romanticists know

37:33.039 --> 37:34.989
anything about either text?

37:34.989 --> 37:37.149
What are we talking about here?

37:37.150 --> 37:39.300
>

37:39.300 --> 37:41.900
The Romanticists know what's
going on.

37:41.900 --> 37:45.110
They're not in any way
hornswoggled by this historical

37:45.114 --> 37:48.334
conspiracy against the 1820
indicator text,

37:48.329 --> 37:50.819
and people who aren't
Romanticists don't care.

37:50.820 --> 37:55.410
That's what it comes down to;
but, if it's not enough simply

37:55.409 --> 37:59.199
to say that, turning to the
question of which text is

37:59.204 --> 38:02.344
better--well,
it's hard to say which text is

38:02.344 --> 38:03.224
better.

38:03.219 --> 38:07.009
McGann's argument is that the
1820 version is better because

38:07.007 --> 38:10.537
it's a poem about a guy and a
girl who sort of meet,

38:10.539 --> 38:13.999
and the next thing you know
they're having sex and that

38:14.000 --> 38:15.730
doesn't turn out so well.

38:15.730 --> 38:18.090
In other words,
it's about the real world.

38:18.090 --> 38:19.580
These things happen.

38:19.579 --> 38:23.079
It's not a romance,
whereas the "What can ail

38:23.077 --> 38:25.217
thee, wretched knight?"

38:25.219 --> 38:29.619
in the 1848 version--and all of
its other variants,

38:29.619 --> 38:31.299
the "kisses four"
and so on--

38:31.300 --> 38:37.510
the 1848 version is a kind of
unselfconscious--

38:37.510 --> 38:42.310
in McGann's view--romance
subscribing to certain medieval

38:42.309 --> 38:46.699
ideas about women,
simultaneously putting them on

38:46.699 --> 38:50.359
a pedestal and fearing,
at the same time,

38:50.355 --> 38:55.015
that they're invested with a
kind of black magic which

38:55.016 --> 38:59.676
destroys the souls and
dissipates the sap of deserving

38:59.677 --> 39:03.547
young gentlemen:
all of this is ideologically

39:03.547 --> 39:06.947
programmed,
according to McGann,

39:06.945 --> 39:08.755
in the 1848 version.

39:08.760 --> 39:09.730
Why?

39:09.730 --> 39:12.850
Because Charles Brown behaved
despicably toward women,

39:12.849 --> 39:16.389
he didn't like Fanny Brawne,
and because Monckton Milnes,

39:16.389 --> 39:19.369
the actual editor of the 1848
edition,

39:19.369 --> 39:24.239
loved pornography and was a big
collector of erotica.

39:24.239 --> 39:31.899
So that's why the 1848 text
with its fear of and denigration

39:31.903 --> 39:38.923
of women, in contrast to the
1820 text, is inferior.

39:38.920 --> 39:41.670
Well, two things:
first of all,

39:41.670 --> 39:46.990
who's to say the 1848 text
wasn't Keats's last thoughts?

39:46.989 --> 39:49.739
In other words,
yes, he was already ill when

39:49.740 --> 39:52.940
the Indicator text was
published in 1820.

39:52.940 --> 39:56.360
It is pretty close to the end
of his ability to think clearly

39:56.360 --> 39:59.720
about his own work and to worry
very much about the forms in

39:59.722 --> 40:03.602
which it was published,
but at the same time we don't

40:03.599 --> 40:07.529
know when Brown received his
version of the text.

40:07.530 --> 40:09.930
We can't suppose,
as McGann more than half

40:09.931 --> 40:13.391
implies, that Brown just sort of
sat down and rewrote it.

40:13.389 --> 40:14.579
>

40:14.579 --> 40:18.459
Nobody has ever really said
that, and if he didn't rewrite

40:18.463 --> 40:22.283
it, then Keats must have given
it to him in that form.

40:22.280 --> 40:25.510
Who's to say that wasn't his
last and best thoughts?

40:25.510 --> 40:28.280
Who's to say Keats didn't
really want to write a poem of

40:28.284 --> 40:28.894
this kind?

40:28.889 --> 40:33.809
After all, the title,
taken from a medieval ballad by

40:33.806 --> 40:37.716
Alain Chartier,
"La Belle Dame Sans

40:37.722 --> 40:42.612
Merci," bears out the
"What can ail thee,

40:42.610 --> 40:43.930
knight at arms?" version.

40:43.929 --> 40:47.349
It's about a Morgan Le Fay-type.

40:47.349 --> 40:49.689
For better or worse,
whatever we think of that

40:49.686 --> 40:52.236
ideologically,
it is about,

40:52.235 --> 40:58.625
if the title is right,
the kind of woman who is evoked

40:58.628 --> 41:02.648
in the 1848 version,
as opposed to the kind of woman

41:02.650 --> 41:04.740
who is evoked in the 1820
version.

41:04.739 --> 41:08.089
So the 1848 version is simply
more consistent with the title.

41:08.090 --> 41:11.900
That's one point to be made,
but the additional point to be

41:11.900 --> 41:15.250
made is that taking advantage of
the New Historicist

41:15.250 --> 41:18.470
acknowledgement that one's own
subjectivity,

41:18.469 --> 41:22.959
one's own historical horizon,
is properly in play in thinking

41:22.961 --> 41:27.461
about these things,
McGann is then able to infuse

41:27.456 --> 41:32.456
Keats's text and therefore
Keats's intentions with a

41:32.461 --> 41:35.801
pleasing political correctness.

41:35.800 --> 41:38.120
That is to say,
Keats can't possibly have

41:38.119 --> 41:40.669
thought in that demeaning way
about women.

41:40.670 --> 41:43.080
By the way, everything-- I like
Keats,

41:43.079 --> 41:45.839
but everything in his letters
suggests that he did--

41:45.840 --> 41:49.330
but back to McGann:
Keats can't possibly have

41:49.329 --> 41:52.819
thought in that demeaning way
about women.

41:52.820 --> 41:58.260
Therefore, the 1820 text is the
text that he intended and

41:58.255 --> 41:59.415
preferred.

41:59.420 --> 42:00.900
Okay.

42:00.900 --> 42:03.770
That, of course,
makes Keats more consistent

42:03.773 --> 42:07.453
with our own standards and our
own view of the relations

42:07.452 --> 42:09.962
between the sexes,
but does it,

42:09.956 --> 42:11.966
in other words,
make sense

42:16.409 --> 42:19.809
despite his weaknesses and
shortcomings,

42:19.809 --> 42:20.419
love?

42:20.420 --> 42:22.510
There is a great deal,
in other words,

42:22.510 --> 42:28.770
to be said over against
McGann's assertions about this

42:28.771 --> 42:32.851
textual issue,
not necessarily in defense of

42:32.847 --> 42:37.477
the 1848 text but agnostically
with respect to the two of them,

42:37.480 --> 42:40.220
saying, "Yeah,
we'd better have both of them.

42:40.219 --> 42:42.209
We'd better put them
side-by-side.

42:42.210 --> 42:46.600
We'd better read them together;
but if by some fiat the 1820

42:46.599 --> 42:51.369
were somehow subsequently
preferred to the 1848,

42:51.369 --> 42:57.129
that would be every bit as much
of an historical misfortune as

42:57.130 --> 43:00.550
the preference,
insofar as it has actually

43:00.547 --> 43:05.667
existed,
of the 1848 or the 1820."

43:05.670 --> 43:08.580
I think that's the perspective
one wants to take.

43:08.579 --> 43:12.189
Now I was going to talk about
"To Autumn."

43:12.190 --> 43:14.700
I'll only say about his reading
of "To Autumn"

43:14.695 --> 43:17.245
that McGann,
who doesn't seem to like the

43:17.246 --> 43:19.646
poem very much--
he likes "La Belle Dame

43:19.646 --> 43:21.586
Sans Merci,"
so he makes it politically

43:21.592 --> 43:22.092
correct.

43:22.090 --> 43:24.960
He doesn't like "To
Autumn" because he thinks

43:24.963 --> 43:27.843
that "Autumn"
was published in collusion with

43:27.838 --> 43:31.138
Keats's conservative friends in
the Poems of 1820,

43:31.139 --> 43:34.479
which bowdlerized everything he
had to say of a progressive

43:34.476 --> 43:35.566
political nature.

43:35.570 --> 43:37.800
He thinks that "To
Autumn" is a big sellout,

43:37.800 --> 43:39.790
in other words,
and that yes,

43:39.786 --> 43:43.046
1819 happened to be a year of
good harvest,

43:43.050 --> 43:46.380
and so Keats turns that year of
good harvest into something

43:46.382 --> 43:48.552
permanent,
into a kind of cloud

43:48.545 --> 43:52.785
cuckoo-land in which the fruit
falls into your basket and the

43:52.793 --> 43:56.903
fish jump into your net and
everything is just perfect.

43:56.900 --> 43:59.320
Well, do you think the poem is
really like that?

43:59.320 --> 44:02.260
You've read the third stanza,
which McGann totally ignores

44:02.255 --> 44:04.775
apart from "Where are the
songs of Spring?

44:04.780 --> 44:05.870
Ay, where are they?"

44:05.869 --> 44:08.199
In other words,
he gives you the opening but he

44:08.201 --> 44:11.041
doesn't give you any sense of
the rest of the stanza,

44:11.039 --> 44:14.229
because for him "To
Autumn" is all about the

44:14.226 --> 44:15.126
first stanza.

44:15.130 --> 44:19.330
For him, Keats seems to
identify with the bees who think

44:19.329 --> 44:22.879
warm days will never cease,
"for Summer has

44:22.876 --> 44:25.326
o'er-brimmed their clammy
cells."

44:25.329 --> 44:26.589
Keats is like a bee.

44:26.590 --> 44:28.470
He's all into the sensuous.

44:28.469 --> 44:31.809
Well, again just in terms of
historical evidence,

44:31.809 --> 44:35.779
this is outmoded by at least
eighteen months if we consult

44:35.777 --> 44:37.167
Keats's letters.

44:37.170 --> 44:39.940
He was like that early in his
career,

44:39.940 --> 44:43.870
but he has had severe
misgivings about a point of view

44:43.867 --> 44:47.937
which is represented in what he
said in an early letter:

44:47.942 --> 44:50.692
"Oh,
for a life of sensations rather

44:50.686 --> 44:53.486
than thoughts…"
That's no longer Keats's

44:53.492 --> 44:56.082
position when writing "To
Autumn."

44:56.079 --> 44:58.869
Keats's position when writing
"To Autumn"

44:58.867 --> 45:02.047
is the position of a guy who
has a sore throat just as his

45:02.047 --> 45:05.867
tubercular brother did,
who is increasingly afraid that

45:05.871 --> 45:10.251
he's going to die soon and is
trying to confront mortality in

45:10.246 --> 45:14.106
writing what is in fact--
and I say "in fact"

45:14.114 --> 45:16.864
advisedly--
the most perfect lyric ever

45:16.860 --> 45:22.200
written in the English language,
and which is most certainly not

45:22.202 --> 45:27.322
a celebration of sort of
wandering around like an aimless

45:27.318 --> 45:29.238
bee,
thinking that the autumn is

45:29.244 --> 45:31.194
perfect but that autumn is
always perfect,

45:31.190 --> 45:35.060
that warm days will never
cease, and that everything is

45:35.061 --> 45:37.071
just lovely in the garden.

45:37.070 --> 45:41.020
It is not that kind of poem,
and it's really a travesty of

45:41.019 --> 45:44.969
it to suppose that it is simply
on the grounds that it was

45:44.971 --> 45:49.411
published in the Poems of
1820 as a kind of sellout to the

45:49.407 --> 45:54.187
establishment under the advice
of Keats's conservative friends.

45:54.190 --> 45:54.770
All right.

45:54.768 --> 45:58.558
So much then for McGann's
remarks on Keats,

45:58.559 --> 46:03.099
which I want to say again in no
way impugn or undermine the

46:03.101 --> 46:07.721
general validity of the claims
that he's making about taking

46:07.721 --> 46:11.011
historical circumstances into
account.

46:11.010 --> 46:14.410
Precisely, we need to take them
into account and we need to get

46:14.407 --> 46:15.117
them right.

46:15.119 --> 46:18.329
That's the challenge,
of course, of working with

46:18.333 --> 46:20.183
historical circumstances.

46:20.179 --> 46:22.609
You have to get it right.

46:22.610 --> 46:26.760
With that said,
let me turn quickly to a review

46:26.762 --> 46:31.552
of Tony from Bakhtin to
the New Historicism.

46:31.550 --> 46:35.080
I may glide over Tony
according to Jameson,

46:35.083 --> 46:38.693
because we did that at the end
of the last lecture,

46:38.690 --> 46:41.070
so let me go back to Bakhtin.

46:41.070 --> 46:44.630
You can see the way in which in
the structure of Tony the Tow

46:44.632 --> 46:47.972
Truck the first part of the
poem is absolutely saturated

46:47.971 --> 46:50.631
with the first person singular:
I do this,

46:50.630 --> 46:54.540
I do that, I like my job,
I am stuck-- I,

46:54.541 --> 46:55.521
I, I, I.

46:55.518 --> 46:58.488
Then as you read along through
the text you see that the

46:58.487 --> 46:59.997
"I"
disappears,

47:00.000 --> 47:02.520
or if it still appears,
it's in the middle of a line

47:02.521 --> 47:04.551
rather than at the beginning of
a line.

47:04.550 --> 47:06.800
In other words,
the "I,"

47:06.797 --> 47:09.997
the subjectivity,
the first person singular,

47:09.996 --> 47:12.606
the sense of having a unique
voice--

47:12.610 --> 47:18.880
this is gradually subsumed by
the sociality of the story as it

47:18.880 --> 47:19.910
unfolds.

47:19.909 --> 47:24.669
I am no longer "I"
defined as a Romantic

47:24.666 --> 47:25.926
individual.

47:25.929 --> 47:29.489
I am "I,"
rather defined as a friend--

47:29.489 --> 47:32.569
that is to say,
as a person whose relation with

47:32.574 --> 47:35.664
otherness is what constitutes
his identity,

47:35.659 --> 47:38.289
and in that mutuality of
friendship,

47:38.289 --> 47:41.309
the first person singular
disappears.

47:41.309 --> 47:43.909
What is spoken in Tony the
Tow Truck, in other

47:43.911 --> 47:46.381
words,
in the long run is not the

47:46.376 --> 47:50.746
voice of individual subjectivity
but the voice of social

47:50.748 --> 47:55.908
togetherness,
the voice of otherness.

47:55.909 --> 47:58.529
According to Jauss,
the important thing about

47:58.534 --> 48:02.114
Tony the Tow Truck is
that it is not the same story as

48:02.112 --> 48:04.262
The Little Engine that Could.

48:04.260 --> 48:07.520
In other words,
in each generation of

48:07.518 --> 48:11.668
reception, the aesthetic
standards that prevail at a

48:11.673 --> 48:16.403
given time are reconsidered and
rethought, reshuffled.

48:16.400 --> 48:20.460
A new aesthetic horizon
emerges, and texts are

48:20.460 --> 48:25.080
constituted in a different way,
much also as the Russian

48:25.077 --> 48:28.527
formalists have said,
only with the sense in Jauss of

48:28.525 --> 48:30.235
the historical imperative.

48:30.239 --> 48:34.669
The Little Engine that Could
is all about the inversion

48:34.666 --> 48:38.366
of power between the little guy
and the big guy,

48:38.369 --> 48:41.729
so that the little guy helps
the big guy and that is

48:41.731 --> 48:44.911
unequivocal,
showing, as in Isaiah in

48:44.911 --> 48:47.991
the Bible,
that the valleys have been

48:47.989 --> 48:51.849
raised and the mountains have
been made low.

48:51.849 --> 48:54.299
That's not the way Tony the
Tow Truck works.

48:54.300 --> 48:56.680
The little guy himself needs
help.

48:56.679 --> 48:59.599
He needs the help of another
little guy.

48:59.599 --> 49:04.249
There is a reciprocity not
dialectically between little and

49:04.248 --> 49:07.508
big,
but a mutual reinforcement of

49:07.510 --> 49:11.270
little-by-little,
and that is the change in

49:11.273 --> 49:15.983
aesthetic horizon that one can
witness between The Little

49:15.981 --> 49:20.451
Engine that Could and
Tony the Tow Truck.

49:20.449 --> 49:23.599
In Benjamin the important
thing, as I think we've said,

49:23.596 --> 49:26.856
is the idea that the
narrator is the apparatus.

49:26.860 --> 49:30.930
The humanization of a
mechanized world,

49:30.932 --> 49:37.042
through our identification with
it, is what takes place in

49:37.043 --> 49:39.833
Tony the Tow Truck.

49:39.829 --> 49:42.119
In other words,
all these cars and trucks,

49:42.119 --> 49:45.059
all these smiling and frowning
houses,

49:45.059 --> 49:50.309
of course, have as their common
denominator their non-humanity,

49:50.309 --> 49:55.089
but the anthropomorphization of
the cars and trucks and of the

49:55.085 --> 49:58.135
houses constitutes them as the
human.

49:58.139 --> 50:00.249
They are precisely the human.

50:00.250 --> 50:01.970
We see things,
in other words,

50:01.969 --> 50:04.459
from the point of view of the
apparatus.

50:04.460 --> 50:08.220
Just as the filmgoer sees
things from the point of view of

50:08.217 --> 50:10.677
the camera,
so we see Tony the Tow Truck

50:10.684 --> 50:12.984
from the point of view of
the tow truck,

50:12.980 --> 50:14.440
right?

50:14.440 --> 50:16.760
And what happens?

50:16.760 --> 50:22.250
Just as the camera eye point of
view leaves that which is seen,

50:22.250 --> 50:25.420
as Benjamin puts it,
"equipment-free"--

50:25.420 --> 50:28.890
so, oddly enough,
if we see things from the

50:28.894 --> 50:33.134
standpoint of equipment,
what we look at is the moral of

50:33.130 --> 50:37.450
the story: in other words,
the humanity of the story.

50:37.449 --> 50:39.529
What we see,
in other words,

50:39.527 --> 50:43.527
surrounded by all of this
equipment, is precisely the

50:43.530 --> 50:46.840
equipment-free human aspect of
reality.

50:46.840 --> 50:49.840
So Tony the Tow Truck
works in a way that is

50:49.835 --> 50:52.585
consistent with Benjamin's
theory of mechanical

50:52.590 --> 50:53.610
reproduction.

50:53.610 --> 50:58.390
For Adorno, however,
the acquiescence of this very

50:58.385 --> 51:01.385
figure--
the apparatus of mechanical

51:01.391 --> 51:06.061
reproduction,
of towing again and again and

51:06.061 --> 51:09.551
again--
in the inequity of class

51:09.545 --> 51:15.285
relations,
rejected as always by Neato and

51:15.286 --> 51:18.976
Speedy,
proves that the apparatus which

51:18.981 --> 51:23.611
Benjamin's theory takes to be
independent of the machinations

51:23.610 --> 51:28.640
of the culture industry,
that the apparatus in turn can

51:28.637 --> 51:34.657
be suborned and commandeered by
the culture industry for its own

51:34.661 --> 51:35.811
purposes.

51:35.809 --> 51:36.289
All right.

51:36.289 --> 51:37.539
I will skip over Jameson.

51:37.539 --> 51:45.789
The Old Historicist reading of
Tony simply reconfirms a

51:45.786 --> 51:51.056
status quo in which virtue is
clear,

51:51.059 --> 51:55.389
vice is clear,
both are uncontested,

51:55.389 --> 51:57.799
and nothing changes--in other
words,

51:57.800 --> 52:02.180
a status quo which reflects a
stagnant,

52:02.179 --> 52:06.059
existent, unchanging social
dynamic.

52:06.059 --> 52:08.879
The New Historicism in a lot of
ways is doing this,

52:08.880 --> 52:12.150
but let me just conclude by
suggesting that if literature

52:12.146 --> 52:15.586
influences history,
Tony the Tow Truck might

52:15.588 --> 52:19.838
well explain why today we're
promoting fuel-efficient cars,

52:19.840 --> 52:25.670
why the attack on the gas
guzzler and the SUV or minivan--

52:25.670 --> 52:31.600
remember the car that says
"I am too busy"--

52:31.599 --> 52:35.799
is so prevalent in the story,
and why if we read today's

52:35.800 --> 52:40.840
headlines we need to get rid of
the Humvee if GM is to prosper,

52:40.840 --> 52:46.310
and we need to downsize and
streamline the available models.

52:46.309 --> 52:48.989
The little guys,
Tony and Bumpy,

52:48.987 --> 52:53.477
reaffirm the need for
fuel-efficient smaller vehicles

52:53.481 --> 52:58.321
and you can plainly see that
Tony the Tow Truck is

52:58.318 --> 53:02.638
therefore a discourse that
produces history.

53:02.639 --> 53:05.119
All of this,
according to the prescription

53:05.123 --> 53:07.973
of Tony, is
actually happening.

53:07.969 --> 53:08.579
All right.

53:08.579 --> 53:09.749
Thank you very much.

53:09.750 --> 53:14.040
One thing that needs to be said
about Tony the Tow Truck

53:14.041 --> 53:18.111
is it has no women in it,
and that is the issue that

53:18.110 --> 53:20.700
we'll be taking up on Thursday.

53:20.699 --> 53:26.999