C. Texts Again: Physical, Semiotic, and
Conceptual
The terms Version, Text, and Document have brought us in the life
of a literary work of art only through the down-swing of the pendulum from
the "mind of the author" to the concrete manifestations of the work in
Material Texts (i.e., books). And it should perhaps be emphasized once
again that a Work may be "implied" by more than one Version and by
more than one swing of the pendulum. But now we must face the Material
Text in the absence of the Author and with a realization that as we
approach the Material Text we are not before a verbal construct and that we
cannot see prelocution, perlocution or illocution, or even intention or
meaning. What we have before us is molecules compounded in paper and
ink. Everything else must be inferred from that, beginning with the
recognition of the sign shapes, which the ink shapes materially represent.
I have mentioned that the Material Text is the starting point for further
processes, the up-swing, necessary before the Work can be perceived, for
the Material Text is not equivalent with the Work but is instead merely a
coded representation or sign of the Work. Furthermore, the Material Text
before us is only a single instance of many possible manifestations of the
Work. Not all Material Texts are necessarily representative of the same
Version of the Work, nor are they all equally accurate representatives of the
Work. Nevertheless, a Material Text is where the reader begins the process
of perceiving or experiencing the work of art. This process is one of
decoding or dematerializing the Material Text into some mental construct
of it. It is in this decoding process that the Work can be said to
function.[31]
