Wisdom & Metaphor
by Jan Zwicky
Gaspereau Press, 2003
Reviewed by Gilbert W. Purdy
Literary theory, such as it is, has become rather
abstruse these days. Even such daunting theories as
Deconstructionism 'now almost quaint ' are simplicity
itself in comparison with Hermeneutic Phenomenology,
Semiotics and Complexity Theory. While the more
sophisticated writers of twenty years ago were able at
least to import some vague description of
Deconstructionism into a cocktail party conversation,
or to be sufficiently aware of its implications that
they were challenged by it when seated before a blank
sheet of paper, today's theories tend to remain within
the laboratory.
It comes as no surprise, then, that
books are no longer written to explain contemporary
literary theory to a popular audience. Such
popularizing works as the Surrealist manifestoes of
Andre Breton, F. R. Leavis's New Bearings in English Poetry, and even Roland
Barthes' Writing Degree Zero,
could meaningfully grapple with the most recent
advances in the field without assuming a shared reading
list of dozens of scholarly texts and a specialized
vocabulary.
This is the context of Jan Zwicky's
Wisdom & Metaphor. It is not clear whether the book is
a throwback to Modernism with a dash of Post-Modernist
vocabulary or an exegesis of a small corner of the
Post-Modern world which seems strangely out of place
because it tries to target a popular audience. The
confusion may stem from an attempt, on the author's
part, to avoid being perceived as a reactionary while
she strictly limits the vast epistemological
underpinning of the phenomenological method.
Wisdom & Metaphor is composed of a very
brief forward and 118 texts with 118 accompanying
commentaries. The presentation is redolent of the
aphoristic style of Wittgenstein's Philosophical
Investigations (from which several of the texts are
taken). The argument of the book is stated in the
forward:
The shape of metaphorical thought is also the shape of
wisdom: what a human mind must do in order to
comprehend a metaphor is a version of what it must do
in order to be wise.
The thesis has the advantages of being simple, elegant
and thought provoking. Its ultimate advantage, of
course, is that it is right.
The early sections of the book are
concerned with 'phenomena' and 'gestalt' ' as evidenced
by a regular repetition of variations upon the terms.
Zwicky is 'interested in the phenomenon of 'seeing-as'
because it encapsulates the mystery of meaning.'
Certain logistical problems are gotten out of the way
after this fashion: most particularly, all questions of
reality vs. perception are set aside. When one sees a
toad as a toad, it is a sufficient datum. When one
sees a toad as a prince, it is equally sufficient.
The question of the reality of a
perception is answered in the forward, in the
continuation of the quote from above:
But of course we are not wise in a vacuum; we are wise
about things, situations, people, the world. Thus,
this book argues, those who think metaphorically are
enabled to think truly because the shape of their
thinking echoes the shape of the world.
Presumably, we will know if a seeing-as 'echoes' the
shape of the world if it is well received.
The author early provides her
definition of metaphor: 'the linguistic expression of
the results of focussed analogical thinking.' This is
followed by the introduction to the various ontologies
she has discovered are pertinent. It will be important
to understand the ontology of metaphor, after which
more concrete ontologies may properly be addressed.
The ability to think analogically is a reflection of
sensitivity to ontological form.
Ontology ' the study of 'thing-ness' ' has been a major
branch of philosophy, after one fashion or another,
since ancient Greece. It is surprising just how
difficult the questions are that arise from trying to
describe thing-ness. Rather than become bogged down in
epistemology, as we have already observed, she takes
the matter in hand:
One might say: ontological understanding is rooted in
the perception of patterned resonance in the world.
Without the epistemological foundation for these
statements, they take on the quality of axioms. If
these will serve as axioms, then, the following
corollary is inferred: The ability to think
analogically is a reflection of sensitivity to
patterned resonance in the world.
There are other simplifications that
are less easy to defend. 'The existence of metaphor',
Zwicky informs us, 'is dependent upon the existence of
a non-metaphorical way of looking at things.' As any
decent philologist might tell us, there is little in
language that is not metaphorical/analogical. Language
is a road map of the progress of thought. It teaches
us that today's non-metaphorical way of looking at
things is made up of yesterday's metaphors become so
familiar over time that their metaphorical origin has
been forgotten. Metaphor itself, for example, is a 'bearing over', as from one side of a river (mountain,
etc.) to the other, itself originally a metaphor for a
kind of thinking that appeared more or less at the same
time as the word that describes it. It now appears 'non-metaphorical' because we have assimilated the
concept it describes.
In the second half of Wisdom & Metaphor, the insistent terms
'hypostasy' and 'reduction' are added to the mix and the going is
slower. Hypostatization, we learn, is a kind of
killing the subject in order to classify it.
Abstraction proper is vital to metaphor but is
problematical in that it constantly threatens to
descend into hypostatization. Ironically, true
abstraction preserves the individual quality of things:
The distinctness of things remains the foundation of
their resonant connexion.
Abstraction is a quality of imagination. Imagination
preserves the distinctness of things while it
generalizes thus wisdom remains possible.
Reductionism is a close cousin of
hypostatization. It consists of explaining the object
in terms of a dominant system - presumably the
historical Eurocentric, male, linear-analytical
system.
Explanation establishes a relationship between two
previously distinct contexts. Reductionist explanation
achieves this by imposing the context of the explanans
onto that of the explanandum, and ignoring what must be
distorted or left out to achieve a fit.
Reductionism is assimilative rather than resonant. It
is difficult to be sure whether Wisdom & Metaphor
suggests a divergence from complexity theory or an
eccentric restatement. The best guess would seem to be
a combination of the two.
By the mere fact that Zwicky has taken
pains to describe what exactly is metaphor, she seems
to mitigate the pitfalls inherent in the contemporary
attack on reductionism. The idea that the text (the
micro-societal) is unfairly measured against such
things as literary canons or techniques, cultural
institutions, or a reader who takes these into
consideration (the macro-societal) constantly threatens
a descent into dysfunction. Equally as problematical
is the ongoing attempt to replace the order of the
reigning macro-social structure with a new order
somehow inexplicably not heir to the conflicts of the
old and therefore not condemned by the rules of the
very system that created it. As a result of these, and
other, conflicted prerequisites, the subjective text ' the supposedly holy self-expression
' is threatened
with a reduction of a sort that seems still worse. It
tends to become an artifact or little more than a
pretext for the existence of a sprawling
politico-critical apparatus.
Reductionism is spoken of in general
terms in Wisdom & Metaphor. The need to include this
central tenet in a discourse on metaphor, where it
could arguably have been foregone, identifies it as a
Post-Modern text. To have tried to limit its purview,
as Zwicky has done, suggests a better direction. It is
more important to show the nature of metaphor, and to
let things go where they will, than to be rigorously
prescriptive.
These questions, however, are likely to be lost upon
the general reader. For him or her, there may be a
more generalized 'less theoretical' reading of the
issues. What anyone who comes to Wisdom & Metaphor
will find is a well-chosen collection of texts. She or
he will discover 'or be reminded of' the remarkable
incisiveness of Max Wertheimer or I. A Richards, even
when placed beside the host of fine and creative
thinkers gathered together in this book. At the same
time, they will share in Jan Zwicky's worthy internal
dialogue with those thinkers.
Gilbert Wesley Purdy's work in poetry, prose and
translation, has appeared in many journals, paper and electronic, including: Jacket
(Australia), Poetry International (San Diego State University); Grand
Street; SLANT (University of Central Arkansas); Rain Taxi, Orbis
(UK); Eclectica; The Danforth Review (Can.); Cosmoetica;
and Polyphony. His hyperlinked online
bibliography appears in the pages of The
Catalyzer Journal. He accepts poetry, poetry-related and topical
nonfiction books for review at: Gilbert Wesley Purdy, P. O. Box 5952, Lake
Worth, FL 33466-5952. Queries to gwpurdy@yahoo.com.
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