ABSTRACT
Can both kinds of statement be tolerated? I suppose this question would, conventionally, be answered affirmatively: after all, it is
empirically evident that there are in existence many diverse critical 'metalanguages', the speakers of which operate happily and productively in their own literary fields-indeed the present volume [the volume from which this paper is reprinted; see Acknowledgments, above, xi] would seem to celebrate a multiplicity of critical schools, a healthy diversity of opinion and interest. Again, tolerance of different critical metalanguages seems to be justified on a priori grounds: the plea for pluralism, like pleas for religious or political toleration, is self-evidently reasonable and attractive. The range of literature-in this context I hardly dare to say the range of kinds of literature-is enormous, as is the range of readers, motives for reading, performances, audiences, markets for publications, teachers, and studying communities. In these circumstances diversity of method and interpretation is inevitable and, if the alternative is repressive and authoritarian bigotry, desirable. Freedom of interpretation, if responsible, can only be laudable; so also flexibility of method. This much admitted and approved, one begins to have doubts. In practice, twentieth-century pluralism has meant discord, intolerance, and mutual ignorance. One of the benefits of a true pluralism, one would think, would be healthy and productive interchange of views, informed agreement to differ, and certitude on what it is one is differing about. This is certainly not the case with contemporary criticism. It would be a grave mistake to regard the 'schools' as simply possessing alternative descriptive terminologies which could, in the last resort, be translated one into another. Critical discourse saturated with a distinctive and highly developed functional vocabulary is not merely in a situation of using certain special terms; it is conditioned by the terms it uses. As Olson and Crane make clear, a framework which is superficially a set of terms is more exactly a system of assumptions, attitudes, and expectations -to use a specialized vocabulary is to commit oneself to a specialized attitude. At the very least, learning a specific metalanguage may unfit one for understanding any other. (See, for example, Elder Olson's failure to understand Empson's language and method. l ) It is a sad state of affairs if critic A cannot understand critic B, and the logical independence of A and B (the truth of A cannot disprove B) justifies neither A nor B, does not excuse their egocentricity, and certainly does not encourage our toleration of either. Since criticism, like literature, 'belongs to the public', the critic (as opposed to other, less reputable, sorts of commentators on literature) should earn his right of free speech by openness and clarity; willingness to understand and to be understood.
