ABSTRACT
A linguistic basis in common speech or non-literature must no doubt be presumed, but in literature language has been modified to a greater or less degree by style. As a Then-Meaning is conditioned by the artifact's genre, the scholar-critic confronted by an unfamiliar work will be well advised to begin by asking himself what is the style appropriate to the literary kind to which this work belongs. Genres and styles are the most delicate aspects of Then-Meaning and vary, if only marginally, not only between the separate works of a single author but from one part of such a work and another. If the reader has recognized the genre correctly, the Now Meaning may be expected to coincide with the Then-Meaning. The continuum that constitutes the history of any national literature is certainly not a plain, but neither is it broken up into a series of mountain ranges, as the textbooks tend to assert.
