ABSTRACT
The act of reading a narrative involves an appropriation of the temporal perspective, being the implicit or explicit viewpoint of the ‘implied author’ which precipitates a dialectical relationship with an interrogative stance of the Self. The reader’s imaginative habitation of the narrative’s Lebenswelt provides the temporal ‘space’ for a critical stance of the Self in terms of who, why, where, when and what. This chapter shows how the temporal perspectival understanding, grounded in an ontological unity of Sonorous Being in relation to the primordial dialectic, creates the temporal ‘space’ for rational interrogation and explanation. With respect to the temporal perspective of narrative, and the spectrum of textual rhythm the reader’s particular attention is rhythmically grasped by the iconic moments of metaphor against a background of prose rhythm ‘operative’ at the ‘edge’ of her consciousness. From the perspective of Merleau-Ponty’s notions of operative and particular intentionalities, the views of William Wordsworth and Coleridge may be seen to be complementary not contradictory.
