Reader and Making Meaning

Within the same domain "Gerald Prince" raised a significant question in the study novels. He asked, why do we study a novel according its narrator, novelist, character etc., but we do not ask ourselves about the cultural and social diversity of the person who reads that discourse? In this respect also, Wolfgang Iser calls for studying the influence of that discourse upon the reader himself rather than other factors. So he argues that the duty of the critic is to shad light upon the ways in which the discourse or the text can have an effect on the reader. Jacques Derrida, on the other hand, argues that there is a meaning focused on the “ a high self” of the author, yet for the same purpose it is possible to focus on “ other self” which is the reader.

If we look for the literary work, we can see that it does not represent topics, but it indicates beyond it a complete world, through choosing special norms, qualified systems or certain point of view. So any text is seen as a huge storage of those norms turning to imaginative world. Hans-Georg Gadamer also adds that any attempt from the reader to understand the text is based on the different questions selected from the reader’s culture. In his Reception theory Hans Robert Jauss used the term “horizon of expectation” to group different cultural norms, claims, and scales by which the reader can understand the text and then he pays his judgments on a literary work in a certain age.

This horizon of expectations can be formed by certain principles such as traditions, customs and the definition of the art (as an aesthetics), or it is a Prevailing moral codes. So this horizon of different point of views tells us the theory which focused on the reader though it has no one beginning or even dominant logical philosophy. As a result all the above mentioned writer they have different thoughts, yet they do agree on one basic point in the text, which is the impossibility to look or interpret of literary work away from the reader, and asking what is the aim of the text to have an influence upon and why.

Associating the reader is important due to the fact that its first consequence is negative multiplicity and negation of monosemy power. From Bakhtin’s point of view, several sounds are heard at a time while dialoguing with each other. But it does not end to this and polyphony can be examined in three levels. One level is the intra-textual level including those sounds present at text and the other is inter-textual level which establishes communication with other texts in dialogue. The last one is the meta-textual level in which the dialogue affects the readers and releases a huge potential of sounds and concepts multiplicity. In fact, Bakhtin passes the author’s intention through dialogical logic, then the reader’s reception and pays attention to the novel creation occurred here.

Bakhtin rejects what he sees as the structuralist tendency to analyse texts as though they were completely self-contained units whose meaning could be established independently of context. Rather any attempt to understand parole must take into account the circumstances, assumptions and the time of the enunciation of the utterance. In effect Bakhtin urges that account must be taken of the contingency of language (Lechte, 2001: 11).

The main contribution of Bakhtin’s theory is to reject the traditional way of explaining or even look for literature. The special focus then is paid for the “principles of literary criticism” and “practical criticism” in order to analyze the process of reading, i.e. study literature with paying much attention for the emotive function of it, which uses to evoke the author and the reader’s emotions or to create a personal and objective view about the world. Furthermore, the term “reading” has become one of the prominent and well-known term in the cultural studies and one of the 20th _{-century important critical trend.}

From this perspective, reader does not read the common concept of word, but creates. From Bakhtin’s point of view, it is admirable that it has the capacity of uttering the sounds. It should not be monosemy and allows the multiplicity. Such writing expect the most from the audience and it can be said that it has been given values, since through making meaning opens the spaces it come in dialogue and requests the ways of making meaning from the audience while makes him to assess the words. It is from this perspective that criticism can be equivalent to the creation.

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It is important to remind that here those readings are not discussed that criticize the text concepts. Even those criticisms are not posed which extract the latent and pre-determined themes of work like an ore. But actually we are speaking about those criticisms which create new concepts. Similarly, elements of one work are only excuses for making the meaning.

From this perspective, novels are not necessarily mere imitations, and even are not dependent on the realities, but they are themselves new horizons for creating the new realities. This approach tries to excellence the reader as an author and moves towards the point where even the idea of necessity of “semantic center” is rejected. Hence, limiting the writings within the author’s intention is void and ridiculous.

The important point to which we should pay attention is that the reception that a reader has is not fully personal, but it is created through affecting the codes accessible for the audience. In fact, these are the cultural codes which provide a framework for making the meanings. In this sense, concepts have not been specified and determined and nor loosely left, but messages are related to the system of implications before dealing with an objective and real thing.

In this approach, Bakhtin reminds us that in connection to language, we do not face a material device, but we connect to a live, dynamic network and a layer including various variables and they update themselves ceaselessly. It is likely to say that the most important result of this approach supervising the independent and expressive sounds is decentralization; the issue that makes to release the choked sounds. Importance of such issue reveals when affairs like class, gender, race, power and etc. enter the language area automatically and show the close relation between language and society.

Polyphony is a phenomenon which has a close relationship with other concepts. In his studies, Bakhtin lists a set of critical system from which polyphony is originated. In fact, it is not possible to recognize the polyphony without recognizing the concepts.

What is important is then, this cultural relativity has been paved the way for relative ideas of dealing with different cultures. This means that it is impossible to evaluate a culture or create a universal picture, rather what only give is a relative picture of that culture, according to the criteria of that culture in itself ( not by the standards of other cultures).

This kind of critical awareness contributed in opening a diversity of critical discourses in different areas making it a double or multi-discourse. It exercises reading, analysis and criticism on two or more levels together and at the same time it criticizes the critical discourse which exists as an institution and as privileges, and bursts into other horizons.

5- Conclusion

Mikhail Bakhtin’s influence and participation in literary theory can be seen in creating a unique culture at the level of the language focusing on the dialogism. The language in this sense, as Bakhtin claims, is an incomplete and partial project, and it is a continually growing process. Thematically and technically, then, the novel is based on this spirit of the age, rejecting the monotheistic authority. Therefore, the new narrative technique creates a hostile and different text to the cultural of despotism that orders unity and rejecting the multitudes, by creating a new culture of knowing ourselves by knowing others. In this way we will succeed in creating our new identities throughout differences rather than similarities.

Thus, we may find variety of characters in the novel, patterns that may vary to the extent of contradiction but that differences provide opportunities and possibilities of a rich cultural diversity. These possibilities have noticed well by Bakhtin arguing that language should be studied and analyzed as a cultural production i.e. a cultural work in light of the novel. Moreover, the move away from unity to the new novels resulted in showing self-sufficiency and the emergence of identities, whether it is seen away from race, sex or the generation or the institutional and geopolitical location. What is new in this trend is the need to think beyond the traditional narration of original and primal objects and to focus on those processes produced by the disclosure of cultural and all these liminal spaces.

Bibliography

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- Bakhtin, Mikhail (1999). Problems of Dostoevsky s poetics. Ed and trans . Caryl Emerson. Theory

and history of literature 8, Minneapolis: University of Minneapolis Press.

- _______________(1981). The dialogic imagination :four Essays. Ed by Michael Holquist. Trans by

Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist. Minneapolis: University of Texas press.

- Holdcroft, David(1991) Saussure : signs, system, and arbitrariness, New york, Cambridge university press

- Jorgensen, Marianne and Louise Phillip(2002). Discourse Analysis: as theory and method,

London, SAGE publication

- Lechte, John (2001). Fifty key contemporary thinkers: from structuralism to postmodernity. New

York, Routledge.

- Mills, Sara(1997). Discourse, London, Rotledge

- Todorov, Tzvetan (1984). Mikhail Bakhtin: the dialogical principle. trans by Wlad Godzich ,

Manchester , Manchester University press.

- Selden, Raman(2005). A reader s guide to contemporary literary theory, fifth edition published in

united kingdom

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A comparative criticism of Feminism in Virginia Woolf's "The Lady in the Looking-Glass: A Reflection" and Moniroo Ravanipoor's "The Gray Friday"

Sedigheh Badiei

Department of English Literature, University of Payam-e-Noor, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

Feministic ideas root in the western modernism, after industrial revolution and two great wars. The evolutions were reflected in the literary works in the end of ninth century and twenty century. Feminism in the western world established to change and improve the women's conditions. Feminists try to trace their feministic worldview through literary works like short story, romans, and different types of art. "The Lady in the Looking-Glass: A Reflection" is a short story by the great feminist, Virginia Woolf, in which her feministic ideas have reflected. In Iran, Moniroo Ravanipoor affected by Woolf's wrote "The Gray Friday", a short story about her feministic perspective to challenge her local women's conditions. This study try to compare these short stories, "The Lady in the Looking-Glass: A Reflection" and "The Gray Friday", to debate the different perspectives of feminism such as liberal feminism, radical feminism and existentialist feminism.Woolf's feministic idea is more existentialistic than liberal or radical in this story. RavaniPoor narrates the story in which can find existentialist footsteps more than radical's.

Keywords: feminism; Virginia Woolf, Moniroo Ravanipoor, The Gray Friday, The Lady in the Looking- Glass: A Reflection, Existentialist feminism

1. Introduction

Comparative literature is a branch of literary criticism which discusses the various nation relationships all together and reflections of their literature in each other (Farshidvard, 1373: 808). Abdolhossein Zarrinkoob in literary criticism believes that "comparative literature does not emphasis only on comparison and equilibration, but it tries to present which literary work is created by affection and influence of another one and measures the amount of these on literary figures of various nation( 1386, p:126). Primarily, Feminism is a basic idea in the women literary writings, which can propose in study of two different literary works. Virginia Woolf was the famous English feminist novelist who challenged women's contributions in her stories. "The Lady in the Looking-Glass: a Reflection" is a short story by Woolf, in which she reflects many feministic ideas. In this short story, she expose woman with herself and her past experiences. Woolf's feministic thoughts in modern era effected on the literary writings greatly. Consequence of the event, modernism in Iran was influenced by western feminism and Iranian women writers reflected the ideas in their works. Moniroo Ravanipoor, Southern Iranian writer, in a collection titled Kanizoo remarks her own specific feminism in the forms of short stories, which one of them is "The Gray Friday". Ravanipoor inspired by feministic school, imaged loneliness of a lady who involves with her feministic issues both internally and externally.

This study attempts to apply the comparative criticism on "The lady in the Looking-Glass: a Reflection" and "The Gray Friday", in which can explore the differences and similarities of them and find the influences. Correspondingly, this study discusses the questions concerned with liberal, radical, and existentialist feminism in two short stories by Woolf and Ravanipoor.

2. Feminism

The roots of feminism can be attributed to developments such as the Renaissance and the post- Enlightenment and then French and Industrial Revolutions, which have questioned the relationship between men and women in some or all aspects (Sajadi, 1384). In the twentieth century, women's struggles arose in any systematic way. In History of Literary Criticism and Theory, Habib categorizes feminism to three types: first, modern French feminism was drawn from the revolutionary atmosphere of May 1968 which saw massive unrest on the part of students and workers; it discusses biological contributes. The second is American model that received a major stimulus from the civil rights movement

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of the 1960s; therefore, it tied Marxism to feminism. The last one is English, which is initiated with Virginia Woolf and her 'political orientations' and ' rewriting of history by women'. (Habib, P: 669-671) Since the early twentieth century feminist criticism has grown to encompass a vast series of concerns: a rewriting of literary history so as to include the contributions of women; the tracing of a female literary tradition; theories of sexuality and sexual difference, drawing on psychoanalysis, Marxist, and social science; the representation of women in male literature (Habib, P: 667). By considering the most literary works are product of thinking dominant patriarchy in the society, literary criticism examines the women's role and the level of activism and action of them in literature. With changing the world of text, behind of the text changes, so the visible world can be changed by reader's attitude. Consequence of that is leading the action to eliminate the distinction between women and men (Gholamhossienzade, 1392). There are many various tendencies related to feminism, liberal, radical, and existentialist feminism, which have particular characteristics and specific result. Liberal feminism is the most widely known form of feminist thought and it is often seen as synonymous with feminism perse—that is, responses to the question ' what is feminism?' or 'are you a feminist?' commonly draw upon liberal versions of feminist thought. It is certainly the 'moderate' or 'mainstream' face of feminism. Not surprisingly, liberal feminism involves an emphasis upon reform of society, rather than revolutionary change (Beasley, P: 51). Radical feminism, unlike liberal and Marxist/socialist feminism, is not drawn directly from previous bodies of 'malestream' thought. It offers a real challenge to and rejection of the liberal orientation towards the public world of men. Indeed it gives a positive value to womanhood rather than supporting a notion of assimilating women into arenas of activity associated with men. Radical feminism pays attention to women's oppression as women in a social order dominated by men. According to this approach, the distinguishing character of women's oppression is their oppression as women, not as members of other groups such as their social class (Beasley. P: 53).

Existentialist feminism, first described by Simone de Beauvoir (1949/1989), suggests that women's "otherness" and the social construction of gender rest on society's interpretation of biological differences. Existentialists see "women's and men's lives as concretely situated" and emphasize concepts like "freedom, interpersonal relations, and experience of lived body" (Hesse-Bter, P: 272).

Feminism rapidly found its way in both eastern and western literary works, which changed the women's condition in family and society. Basically, the movement does not belong to Iran but in modern era could creep in Iranian literature. Iranian writers, inspired by western feminism, created literary works to represent their different feministic ideas and interpretations. Iranian feminists have not followed a particular way and critical approaches which distinct them from wester feminism (Zibaiinezhad, 1388).

3. Virginia Woolf in "The Lady in the Looking-Glass: A Reflection"

Virginia Woolf was born in London in 1982 as the daughter of a philosopher and scholar. Her world was from the beginning the cultured world of the middle-class and upper-middle class London intelligentsia. Woolf was increasingly concerned with the position of women, especially professional women, and the constrictions they suffered under (Abrams, 1986, p: 2330). Though her views have been criticized by some feminists, Virginia Woolf was in many ways a pioneer of feminist literary criticism, raising issues_ such as the social and economic context of women's writing, the gendered nature of language, the need to go back through literary history and stablish a female literary tradition, and the societal construction of gender-that remain of central importance of feminist studies. Woolf's literary criticism is closely tied to the modernist nature of her fiction, and expresses the broad philosophical and feminist dispositions underlying her novels. Her work is modernist in its complexity of characterization, its use of multiple and shifting narrative perspectives, its manipulation of time, its intricate conception of experience, its accumulation of esoteric symbolism, its treatment of connections between human identity and its surroundings, and, above all, in its implicit acknowledgement that language does not intrinsically refer to some "external" reality, but itself shapes the realities that we experience. Indeed, the "reality" explored in Woolf's novels is largely that of the "internal" psychology of given characters as this interacts with the