Logocentrism

[Terrance]

Paul Mackin wrote:
> 
> On the Sunday Henry Adams discussion on C-span2, Brooks Simpson the
> author of _The Political Education of Henry Adams_ was asked what
> he thought of _The Education of Henry Adams_ being named by Modern
> Library to be the best NONfiction book of the century. He answered that it
> might have been all right if they had left off the non.
> 
>                         P.

Were they selling books? 

Aristotle O'Modernerty:  Excuse me Sir, where is the Henry
Adams section? 
 
Salesperson Joyce Bibliolatousis: That would be next to the
Literature section. 

Aristotle: Such a fluid term. 

Aristotle's complaint that he had no single term for all the
Kinds of literary works still holds. What's the difference
between a play and a newspaper? About fifty bucks in New
York. Between a science textbook and a cookbook? Between a
child's poem and Hamlet? What is the difference between the
ingredients listed on the back of a Greek pastry box and a
scientific formula on a blackboard? Does it have anything to
do with the text? Does it have anything to do with syntax,
the sentence structure, and the language, the presence or
absence of metaphor, allusion, character, and plot? What is
a pastry box that Hamlet is not?
I was in the airport, and as usual, I had time to murder.
The last thing I wanted to do before sitting in an airplane
for four hours reading newspapers, was sit down. So I walked
into the bookstore and I looked around. I decided to buy
Roth's new book. I couldn't find it. I asked the store
proprietor to assist me. She looked it up, in a computer of
course, and to her astonishment and mine, the book was
listed under Self-help and Health. Well that's odd, she
said. Not really I said, after all, a text is nothing more
than an object of paper and ink. Until someone reads it, she
said. Yes, I said, how else can those black marks become
verbal symbols. Oh, being and becoming, she said. Oh, I
said.  And those that seek the things that distinguish
Roth's new book from Chicken soup labels in the text can
only arrive at confusions arbitrary and partial, she said.
And Partial too, I said. Yes, she said, that's why we don't
just sell books, we sell experiences with texts, she pointed
to the sign above the door, The Privileged Reader.