Intention (literature)

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The intention of a literary work is the intention that is pursued with or in the work. The theory of literature distinguishes between the intentio auctoris ( the intention of the author of a text) and the intentio operis (the intention of the text itself). Often the intentio lectoris , which denotes the intention of the respective reader, is also taken into account in literary theory.

Author intention

The intention of the author is often to draw the reader's attention to something, to move the reader to something or to convey something or to teach him something. Often the intention is also to create entertainment . In addition, the term intention is used with regard to the author to describe a variety of other aspects in his creative process; Sometimes a distinction is made between “the motive to write” and “the intention when writing” - two completely different, but partly interlocking aspects.

The author can pursue various basic intentions:

  • appellative : appeal to the reader (for example advertising with the intention of making the reader buy a product, or a party program of a party)
  • informative : information for the reader (= value-neutral texts such as news, press reports)
  • expressive : expression of the author: expression intended to arouse certain feelings in the reader, for example solidarity, pity, sadness, joy (in novels or epic texts )

The author's intention is also referred to in the context of edition philology when it comes to establishing or reconstructing the original form of a text.

In the last few decades, the interest of literary scholars in the author's intentions has greatly diminished and lost its original meaning after Roland Barthes published his work on the author's death , postulating that the author should be treated as dead from a literary perspective.

The American literary scholar E. D. Hirsch, however, forms an exception in the more recent literary theory and studies, who further developed his concept of the author's intention so that it also includes elements that logically follow from the original intention of the author. Hirsch sees the intention as the basis of a scientifically oriented interpretation, which otherwise no longer has any criteria for distinguishing between correct and incorrect text interpretations.

The concept of the author's intention is used as a regulative idea in some versions of literary hermeneutics for the assessment of interpretations of a work. However, this does not rule out that the author of a literary text did not know his (actual) intentions well or even misunderstood them, nor that he was able to implement them appropriately.

An analogy to the hermeneutic circle can be formulated here, the so-called “ fallacy of intentionality ” (“ intentional fallacy ”). This means that if the intention of an author is carried out in his work, i.e. if it is realized in the work, it is a circular reason to use this in turn to interpret a work.

Since the 1970s, the intention as the basis of text interpretation has also been called into question by post-structuralism, especially by Foucault and Derrida ; The idea of ​​the origin and the fixed meaning of the literary text is taken ad absurdum in these (literary) scientific approaches and already becomes a highly problematic criterion for the interpretation of the text simply through the performative aspect of language.

Text intention

The intentio operis is the "task" that a book has. For example, a textbook has the task of providing further education, whereas a novel can have the intention of entertaining.

Reader intention

The intention of the reader can be very different, although it also depends on the intentio operis . When the reader reads a textbook, he usually wants to educate himself, he reads a novel, he usually wants to be entertained.

literature

  • Axel Bühler: A plea for hermeneutic intentionalism . In: Maria E. Reicher (Ed.): Fiction, Truth, Reality. Philosophical foundations of literary theory . KunstPhilosophie 8. mentis, Paderborn 2007, ISBN 978-3-89785-354-6 , pp. 178-198.
  • Lutz Danneberg: On the author's construct and on a methodological concept of the author's intention. In: Fotis Jannidis / Gerhard Lauer / Matias Martinez / Simone Winko (eds.): Return of the author. To renew a controversial term . Niemeyer, Tübingen 1999, ISBN 3-484-35071-7 , pp. 77-105.
  • Lutz Danneberg / Hans-Harald Müller: The "intentional fallacy" - a dogma? Systematic research report on the controversy about an intentionalist conception in the text sciences (Part I and II) . In: Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 14 (1983), pp. 103-137 and 376-411.
  • Jacques Derrida : The writing and the difference. Translated from the French by Rodolphe Gasché. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1972. stw 177, ISBN 3-518-57341-1 .
  • Jacques Derrida: Grammatology . Translated from the French by Hans-Jörg Rheinberger and Hanns Zischler . Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1983 (Paris 1967). stw 417, ISBN 3-518-28017-1 .
  • Jacques Derrida: Préjuges. Before the law . Translated from the French by Detlef Otto and Axel Witte. Vienna: Passagen Verlag 1992 (= Edition Passagen 34).
  • Martin A. Hainz: Intentio scripturae? On Revelation and Scripture, at Klopstock and in Derrida's Kafka reading . In: TRANS - Internet magazine for cultural studies , No. 16/2005.
  • Jeremy Hawthorne: Intention . In: Jeremy Hawthorne: Basic Concepts of Modern Literary Theory · A Handbook . Translated by Waltraud Korb. Francke Verlag, Tübingen / Basel 1994, ISBN 3-8252-1756-6 , p. 138 f.
  • Uwe Spörl: Intention . In: Uwe Spörl: Basislexikon Literaturwissenschaft . Schöningh Verlag, Paderborn u. a. 2004, ISBN 3-506-99003-9 , p. 132 f.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jeremy Hawthorne: Intention . In: Jeremy Hawthorne: Basic Concepts of Modern Literary Theory · A Handbook . Translated by Waltraud Korb. Francke Verlag, Tübingen / Basel 1994, ISBN 3-8252-1756-6 , p. 138 f.
  2. ^ Tilmann Köppe: Intention . In: Gerhard Lauer and Christine Ruhrberg (eds.): Lexicon literary studies · Hundred basic concepts . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 2011, ISBN 978-3-15-010810-9 , pp. 124–126, here p. 124.
  3. ↑ See Hans-Peter Wagner: Intention . In: Ansgar Nünning (ed.): Basic concepts of literary theory . Metzler Verlag, Stuttgart / Weimar 2004, ISBN 3-476-10347-1 , p. 104. See also Jeremy Hawthorne: Intention . In: Jeremy Hawthorne: Basic Concepts of Modern Literary Theory · A Handbook . Translated by Waltraud Korb. Francke Verlag, Tübingen / Basel 1994, ISBN 3-8252-1756-6 , p. 139.
  4. ↑ Jeremy Hawthorne: Intention . In: Jeremy Hawthorne: Basic Concepts of Modern Literary Theory · A Handbook . Translated by Waltraud Korb. Francke Verlag, Tübingen / Basel 1994, ISBN 3-8252-1756-6 , p. 138 f.
  5. ↑ Uwe Spörl: Intention . In: Uwe Spörl: Basislexikon Literaturwissenschaft . Schöningh Verlag, Paderborn u. a. 2004, ISBN 3-506-99003-9 , p. 132 f.
  6. ↑ Uwe Spörl: Intention . In: Uwe Spörl: Basislexikon Literaturwissenschaft . Schöningh Verlag, Paderborn u. a. 2004, ISBN 3-506-99003-9 , p. 132 f. See also Hans-Peter Wagner: Intention . In: Ansgar Nünning (ed.): Basic concepts of literary theory. Metzler Verlag, Stuttgart / Weimar 2004, ISBN 3-476-10347-1 , p. 104. Likewise, Tilmann Köppe: Intention . In: Gerhard Lauer and Christine Ruhrberg (eds.): Lexicon literary studies · Hundred basic concepts . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 2011, ISBN 978-3-15-010810-9 , p. 126.
  7. ↑ See, for example, Hans-Peter Wagner: Intention . In: Ansgar Nünning (ed.): Basic concepts of literary theory . Metzler Verlag, Stuttgart / Weimar 2004, ISBN 3-476-10347-1 , p. 104.