ABSTRACT
This chapter argues the necessity to distinguish among fields of investigation: art, literary works of art, aesthetic ideology, while at the same time acknowledging their inextricable relationship. It may seem inappropriate to devote a study to reception theory at a time of a general decline of interest in literary theory, and especially in theories that reflect on the significance of the reception process for the study of literature. The point of reception is the ephemeral interface of the text; it occurs where the text and the reader meet and is simultaneously constitutive of both. Although reception theories are now an integral part of literary and cultural studies, their initial relevance for literary studies has gradually diminished over the last two decades. The basic assumption that inspires this study is that the literary work opens up for the critic the productive possibility of unfolding mechanisms underlining ideological assumptions on the aesthetic.
