View Poll Results: Does the intention of the artist matter

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Thread: Intentional Fallacy

  1. #21
    Moderator Platinum Hubber P_R's Avatar
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    Many parts of this essay are germane to the discussion at hand
    http://www.jeyamohan.in/?p=6241

    Here is a last paragraph I didn't post yesterday because I didn't want to aathify too much tea in weekend emptied shop in one day
    __________________________________________

    Will reveal another reason why I am annoyed. I dismiss most of current Tamil short story writing <the only form I persist reading>. When the half-baked attempts are passed of as if 'there is something in there' I have just given up on a perhaps-its-beyond-me politeness. i.e 'there is something the reader should bring to the table' and I came with just fork and spoon. But then on repeating reading and <horrors> reading the author's thiruvaai-malarndharuLal in intrees - I am at ease. I 'know' there is nothing in those stories which I didn't get.

    Now, that has become the standard. That you can let go on creative control and just be. And that sweatless scrawl can go on to be called 'art' is just annoying. And the foundation of all this is the contention that the 'author is dead' and each reader will have his reading (with the author subtly beaming that his text was open enough to permit the varied reading experiences - I keep thinking of the inkblot joke).

    Of what little I read, the creative control of oldies like aadhavan or asOkamitran - is something to bow to. And no-one is even striving in that direction because now it is 'easy' to become an artist.
    மூவா? முதல்வா! இனியெம்மைச் சோரேலே

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  3. #22
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    P_R - enjoyed the posts but I really dont have much to say.

  4. #23
    Senior Member Seasoned Hubber
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    Quote Originally Posted by P_R
    Many parts of this essay are germane to the discussion at hand
    http://www.jeyamohan.in/?p=6241
    I don't think so. I'm only halfway through reading it, but reading parts of it and your post, it looks like we're going in many directions here. Firstly, as I see it, this is not particularly about the "the author is dead" movement. (Where I come from, not at all.) I'm not even familiar with it, nor have read Roland Barthes's related essay. (It's ironic that even some of the naysayers of the excesses of postmodernism tend to attribute many older ideas to the movement.) Why, long before Barthes, D. H. Lawrence said, "never trust the teller, trust the tale."

    I think many of your concerns, if not all, are related to the 'negation' of an artist's vision/work by moving the focus on the reader and thus rendering several possible readings, many of which might not have anything at all to do with the work. But there's a lot of difference between this and what we're discussing. Just because I do "not trust the teller," it doesn't in any way mean that I'm inclined to trust the 'democracy' of readers. The best evidence is in the work itself. Of course, this means there's no central consensus on the said work, which is as it should be.

    As I said before, to me, the qualities that spill on an artist's work without his/her being conscious of it are too significant to be disregarded or even treated as any less praiseworthy. In Jeyamohan-speak, the artist's nuNNuNarvu is very crucial. A good artist makes certain leaps to challenge oneself (including those purely concerned with form) without even being aware of it. If a reader asked, "why did you do it?" the writer might say, "I don't know, it just happened." But that's not reason enough to be backhanded in one's praise, or worse, take the writer's response at face value and believe that it's simply incidental.

  5. #24
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    Quote Originally Posted by P_R
    I think it is important to make a distinction between art forms.
    Oh, yes, I agree with this. But even here, I guess the conclusions I draw are different.
    Quote Originally Posted by P_R
    Now I tried extending it to music. For example the 'mathematical' perfection

    I mentioned to Plum in a PM - that I don't get what it means for a BGM to be 'appropriate' because music - by the very nature of what it is - cannot help being larger than life. Every user slices the cake as he sees fit. Since last evening, I have the reasonable conviction that the duet between the mridangam and violin in 'I met Bach in my House' is the greatest piece of music I have ever heard. I am not at all uncomfortable about the fact that this may suggest different emotions to different listeners. Each may appreciate it for different memories of emotions and associations (akin to your point of 'our whole life rallies behind us at the moment at which we consume a piece of art'). I know for certain that IR and his musicians - know nothing about 'how' I am going to like it. I am not at all fluttered by this.
    I agree with you to the extent that I think the greatness of a piece of music has nothing to do with the emotions that it elicits in us human beings. To put it in more radical terms, I consider Music as an art form that expressly appeals to our senses and doesn't concern itself with the human condition (here, I'm alluding to Schopenhauer who considered it to be the best form of human artistry for this reason). I think, at a subconscious level, I even desist associating various emotions to compositions.
    Quote Originally Posted by P_R
    I suppose some musical(ly nuanced listeners) appreciates the mathematical perfection in the song, will he be itching to know if IR achieved it consciously or not. (After all, as Poisson once said: music is the pleasure the human mind gets out of counting without actually knowing it). If IR were to reply a la ThiruviLayAdal siVaji : summA kaththunEn (i.e. not the humility - that I guess would be beyond him and anyway irrelevant to our discussion- just the lack of consciousness of the monstrous brilliance of his creation) then would the musical be a tad heartbroken or even more baffled by the 'natural' genius.

    Could be either way.
    I'm not a 'musical' in any sense of word, but it's the latter in my case. And, being a purely abstract form of art, I think the role of nuNNuNarvu -- the intuitive 'leap' to challenge oneself -- is even greater in music.

  6. #25
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    Quote Originally Posted by P_R
    OTOH In literature - I find it very difficult to digest. The writer is doing more than arranging syllables to achieve highest aesthetic appeal from the arrangement. There is a 'meaning' <not sure if that is the right word> coming out of the of the form that makes it appealing. Not to say the arrangement of syllables isn't inherently enticing (eg. aruNagirinAthAr) but the appeal rises beyond that.
    To put it very broadly, I think the appeal is life itself.
    Quote Originally Posted by P_R
    I can at best acknowledge that the creator cannot fully guess how he will be received. But if the creator's intent is 'lost' and the reader's 'principal reading experience' was far removed from the author's intent - then the disappointment is highly justified.
    But in these cases, the problem is because the reading of the work is vague or simply ridiculous. As I see it, the idea that the reader doesn't have to depend on the author's intentions has nothing to do with it. Note that, even in practical terms, if a reader wants to read about/better understand an artist's work, much of what's readily available to him is not written by the respective artists, but by someone else. This is not only a mundane point (though I think that itself is important enough), but in a philosophical sense, this has never been the ‘artist's’ interest.

  7. #26
    Senior Member Diamond Hubber kid-glove's Avatar
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    What is the 'intention' of this thread?
    ...an artist without an art.

  8. #27
    Senior Member Diamond Hubber kid-glove's Avatar
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    Does the intention of the artist matter
    a) Always
    b) Never
    c) It depends
    d) Whatever works.
    ...an artist without an art.

  9. #28
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    Quote Originally Posted by P_R
    Will reveal another reason why I am annoyed. I dismiss most of current Tamil short story writing <the only form I persist reading>. When the half-baked attempts are passed of as if 'there is something in there' I have just given up on a perhaps-its-beyond-me politeness. i.e 'there is something the reader should bring to the table' and I came with just fork and spoon.
    I've to admit that I'm a complete ignoramus on this front. But I've read some of the postmodern critiques in Tamil lit. world that Jeyamohan complains of. So I do see what you mean.

  10. #29
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    Quote Originally Posted by kid-glove
    Does the intention of the artist matter
    a) Always
    b) Never
    c) It depends
    d) Whatever works.
    kid-glove,
    Just curious, how is it different from "It depends" (which is what I think I'd choose if forced to)?

  11. #30
    Moderator Platinum Hubber P_R's Avatar
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    remba length-A pOyitturukka. vaNdi OttaNum.
    vandhu padikkarEn.
    மூவா? முதல்வா! இனியெம்மைச் சோரேலே

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