Analysis of two articles arguing for the importance of literary aestheticism as an adjunct to ideological critique.
Analysis of two articles arguing for the importance of literary aestheticism as an adjunct to ideological critique
By Jimmy Jackson
While many people (the ingenuous) may argue that literature has no function whatsoever, and that it is only the product, like any other product, such as a Chia pet, music videos, and video games, meant solely for personal gratification, those reflective and erudite few who prefer lucubration to the mental masturbation (which video games and music videos engender) of the majority in society understand that the functions of literature and reasons for its production, and indeed everything in society that can be read as a "text", are multifarious and have a profound impact on those who "read" them. However, despite the agreement about the many functions that literature performs, there is striking dissension over the existence and degree of such things as overt and implicit ideological and political agendas, the value of literature as a product entirely free of such agendas, the qualities that constitute "literary greatness" (if there is such a thing), and whether literature is subjective, and meant for the individual, or inherently objective, either in implicit or explicit language, helping to form communal bonds through inter-subjectivity, or perhaps to use that same inter-subjectivity as a hostile take-over measure by indoctrinating unsuspecting masses with clandestine ideologies. The complications that literature, which extrinsically seems to be linguistic constructs signifying concepts, in the abstract, or constructs, in the concrete, that is literal, categorical, and ubiquitously accepted by both the hoi polloi and the literati alike pose for the sophisticated reader, regardless of whether such concerns are incontrovertible sooths or just the fiction of pedants, ideologues, hypochondriacs, and lunatics (Levine believes that they are certainly veracious) is that it blinds them to the, in recent years, much neglected aesthetic realm, precluding them from seeing the value of literature as literature and not an arena for the cacophonous din of authorial polemic or the surreptitious sibilance of the oppressed attempting to subvert a societal construct that they despise.
A noted literary critic, Levine does not in any way discount the value of cultural studies, and sympathizes with those who seek to overcome oppressive political dominance. However, the possibility that aestheticism may be entirely eschewed in favor of extrinsic concerns frightens him, and he feels compelled to "rescue it from its potential disappearance into culture and politics" (380). Unfortunately, he fears that he may be derided or ostracized by his contemporaries for his defense of the aesthetic, for as he admits himself, " Many of those who have attempted to argue for literary value have clearly pandered to popular audiences through self-righteous and universalizing rhetoric that posits a generalized human nature and remains blind to its own provincialism" (381).
Rather than remaining reticent, quashed by fear of others' reactions, Levine begins his apology for aesthetics as he exposes the pharisaical few who are too ashamed to defend the aesthetic, as he defiantly asserts "... critics have not been able or willing to account, for example, for their own continuing preoccupation with the texts that are being exposed as imperialist, sexist, homophobic, racist, and in most respects ideologically pernicious, but that have long been "canonized." (382). He then proceeds to claim that the aesthetic has a purpose (one that must be recognized and appreciated) other than implicit and ...
This is a preview of the whole essay
Rather than remaining reticent, quashed by fear of others' reactions, Levine begins his apology for aesthetics as he exposes the pharisaical few who are too ashamed to defend the aesthetic, as he defiantly asserts "... critics have not been able or willing to account, for example, for their own continuing preoccupation with the texts that are being exposed as imperialist, sexist, homophobic, racist, and in most respects ideologically pernicious, but that have long been "canonized." (382). He then proceeds to claim that the aesthetic has a purpose (one that must be recognized and appreciated) other than implicit and explicit political agendas and the inertia of traditional literary study.
His panegyric of the aesthetic, as he makes overtly manifest, is not simply the result of a love affair with formalism - he is not sitting in his bedroom, lights dimmed, "You are so beautiful to me" softly resonating throughout the room, as he osculates with the ethereal language, and things such as metonymy and hyperbaton in "A Tale of Two Titties - cities that is. Conversely, the aesthetic, in addition to the ..."goose bumps of intense personal encounters with literature and art" (385) can create a "utopian space" where information can be analyzed objectively, and can also lead to a sense of community. While Levine admits that no utopian space can truly exist (the word literally means nowhere) he firmly believes that it is certifiable not to strive for an arena where the myopia caused by partisanship is, at least held in suspension, and the aesthetic of objective reasoning "makes its way by indirection and by infusing all questions with affect and value" (385). It is when this "free space" is developed, that it "opens up possibilities of value resistant to any dominant political power" (384).
In addition to the power to escape politicization, and to overcome it, the aesthetic helps to forge bonds between people in society. He bases his argument on the following passage by Derek Attridge:
Modernism's foregrounding of language and other discursive and generic codes through its formal strategies is not merely a self-reflexive diversion but a recognition (whatever its writers may have thought they were doing) that literature's distinctive power and potential ethical force resides in a testing and unsettling of deeply held assumptions of transparency, instrumentality, and direct referentiality, in part because this taking to the limits opens a space for the apprehension of the other which those assumptions had silently excluded ( 386).
Attridge posits that language in literature does not always have an axiomatic referent, one that is unchanging, unyielding to the power of the mind, but that has manifold possibilities, grounded in the realms of subjectivity - individual relativism reigns supreme (within the finite possibilities that their social construct has given them to work with). Levine concurs, but it worries him that the inter-subjectivity that can, ostensibly, be created by literature is seen as pejorative by many because that subjectivism is based on a culturally shared identity, one which is vulnerable to ..."internal constraints so that the illusion of "freedom" can be maintained while the state is actually governing and so that civil society can operate with the least possible disruption" (386). While Levine does not deny the existence of internal constraints, and does not dismiss their nefarious possibilities as pure tosh, he argues for the "value" of such intrinsic devices. " I am suggesting that literature, even dissident literature, functions within a society to help create a desirable community" (387). It is an effort to draw connections, to not indoctrinate, but apprise people of all cultures, races, and classes of various values, understandings, and ways of looking at the world so that they can establish a rapport, a connectivity that will help this country maintain a pluralistic identity while assimilating the spirit into a cohesive and identifiable whole.
Certainly, as Levine concedes at the conclusion of his essay, literature can never be entirely removed from the ideological and from the political, (nor does he want it to be). However, to assume that literature has no merit as an autonomous construction, and to assume that it cannot be used to bring people together, and only has value for tearing things apart, to be on an endless treasure hunt in hopes of striking gold and purchasing independence for the beaten and oppressed, is to overlook the riches that are right before their eyes. There is a wealth of opportunity, for personal and collective growth, for those who embrace aesthetics as a part of and parallel to cultural studies. Anyone who refuses to take the route that Levine espouses will only find fools gold.
Michael Berube, after reading Levine's essay, was overwhelmed with a variety of emotions. He is sympathetic to most of Levine's theories, but disagrees on a few points and has a problem with the structure of the piece, and the seemingly incongruous content. He agrees that literature has fallen into political perdition, enveloped in the flames coming from the mouths of feminists, lesbians, minorities, and myriad other people who feel that they are oppressed (and rightfully so). However, he agrees with Levine about the moribundity of the aesthetic, when he says " there may be nothing wrong with teasing out the ideological tensions and tendencies of a text by way of close formal analysis, but if it became standard practice to read right through the text, eschewing close formal analysis as if it were something that gets in the way of ideologiekritik, then the discipline of literary study would be dead or dying ( 392). However, although Berube can identify with and embrace the need to preserve the aesthetic realm, he is disturbed by Levine's discursive discourse, verbal dysentery that, in Berube's opinion, garbles Levine's intentions and exposes blatant contradictions, juxtaposing ideologies that seem to be antithetical to one another. He first exposes such a problem by citing three questions that Levine poses "Can, in fact, a category, literature, be meaningfully constituted? If so, once constituted, is it worth much attention? Is not, after all, the real subject of literary study ideology, the real purpose political transformation?" Berube posits that the first two questions are powerful, but that the third one is a non sequitur. He bases his reasoning this way: " For if in fact it is not possible to constitute literature as a distinct category of writing ... there is no reason to assume that the subject of literary study is therefore ideology ... and even if the subject of literary study were ideology, there would be no warrant for eliding the study of ideology with the goal of political transformation" (393). Granted, Berube's concerns may seem unqualified to the slack reader; however, it is overtly apparent that Berube is playing on that exact ignorance to try and establish credibility. It is apparent, after analyzing his argument, that it is itself a non sequitur.
Perhaps, as Berube suggests, ideology would not pervade literature if it could not be meaningfully constituted; however, he is putting words in Levine's mouth. Levine is not making any such claims at that point, but leaving the door open, assuming that it CAN be meaningfully constituted, which would make ideological pervasion a veritable possibility. Secondly, Levine never "elides" the ideological with the political. To elide means to "slur together", and he never slurs the two concepts, ideology and politics together, but separates them with a comma. True, Levine does believe that politics pervade the study of literature, but nowhere does he claim than the presence of ideology ALWAYS causes political transformation. Berube is falsely accusing Levine of fallacious logic, and it is absolutely egregious!
In the end of his article, he, (in what seems like something of a diatribe) pummels Levine for insinuating that the aesthetic can be used autonomously, in that free space where objectivity can occur, and successfully coexist as a means of achieving interpersonal solidarity. "The aesthetic, then, is not a space where sociopolitical concerns are bracketed but a place where sociopolitical hinges are forged" (397). Is it possible to have disinterest at the same time that a whole culture is assimilating values and beliefs that, according to Levine, will produce harmony and not hegemony? Of course it is not. However, once again, Berube distorts things. Levine argues that the "utopian space" is " a contested space, one that is never entirely free from the delusions of ideology or combats for control" (384). However, recognizing those limitations, he posits that the same ideologies can be used positively, as internal constraints that are of value to society, reinforcing democratic ideals and engendering solidarity. It is never possible to have a world that is one hundred percent disinterested - it is a political world - we are political beings, an innate characteristic. People will always have socio-political contestations, but the inter-subjectivity of literature, enabled by a shared culture (the result of ideologies that have been bombarding people from birth) can make such subjective sooths objectively available to everyone, and if those sooths are positive, then cohesion will develop. Berube is making overt attempts to discredit Levine, but thus far, is failing miserably. At the end of his essay, he asks " Why, indeed, if we want to foster harmony, charity, and intersubjectivity (oh, all right - peace, love and understanding), should we turn to aesthetic rather than didactic uses of language? And why should we ask the aesthetic to do the work of leading us to some larger sense of community, if indeed, we should be asking the aesthetic to do cultural work of any kind?" (397). These questions remind me of a psychiatrist from the movie "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest." He asks McMurphy, the prison inmate feigning insanity, " Have you ever heard the saying, "a rolling stone gathers no moss? What does it mean to you?" McMurphy, quite amused, thinks a while, and then replies "That's somethin' like don't wash your dirty underwear in public, ain't it?" The psychiatrist replies "I'm not sure I follow you." McMurphy, laughing hysterically, proudly asserts, "I'm smarter than him, ain't I? Afterwards he gives the correct answer.
Berube's questions posit an either/or fallacy. His questions, and their manipulative qualities, don't even deserve an answer. Why cannot the didactic and aesthetic coexist, if they can both successfully help engender solidarity? Secondly, he imputes personal characteristics to literature, making it seems as if it "labors" to build solidarity. Once literature is written, solidarity is formed of its own volition, free will established by internal constraints. We do not ask it to do work; it just works. Levine never insinuates that it is the only way to social salvation, just one way that we should seriously consider, before it dies out and becomes extinct. While Levine's vision may not be a perfect one, it is incredibly hopeful. Berube's attempts to discredit it, even though he also fears the death of the aesthetic, may actually bring his fears to fruition.
