hans robert jauss interview

8/10/2019 Hans Robert Jauss Interview

1/14

An Interview with Hans Robert JaussAuthor(s): Rien T. Segers, Hans Robert Jauss, Timothy BahtiSource: New Literary History, Vol. 11, No. 1, Anniversary Issue: II (Autumn, 1979), pp. 83-95Published by: The Johns Hopkins University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/468872

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2/14

An

Interview

with

Hans

Robert

Jauss

Rien

T.

Segers

I

Q:

In

1972

you

came to the

conclusion

that

the aesthetics of

recep-

tion

had

introduced a new

paradigm

for

literary

studies. Do

you

still

hold this

opinion?

Rene

Wellek,

for

example,

has

demurred,

noting

that there have

always

been

investigations

like the aesthetics of

recep-

tion;

Manfred

Naumann

speaks

of a

swing

of the

pendulum

rather

than

a

change

of

paradigms.

In

other

words,

what was

paradigmati-

cally

new that

the

aesthetics

of

reception

brought

to

literary

studies?

A:

As

in

other

disciplines,

a

scholarly

change

of

paradigms

in

literary

studies

is

not an event that

falls from heaven like

some

pure

innova-

tion.

When a new

paradigm

is

effective,

this is

judged

by

the

new

questions

which

it

can

formulate for old

problems,

by

seeing

whether

it

can solve them

in

new

ways, by

unknown

problems

which

thereby

come to

light,

and

by

seeing

whether,

in all these

cases,

methods can

be

developed

which

contribute to the

enrichment of the

scholarly

tradition. The

history

of art

has

always

played

itself out as a

process

among

author, work,

and

public;

the

dialectic of

production

and re-

ception

has

always

been mediated

through

the interaction of the

two,

that

is,

through

literary

communication.

In

this

sense,

the

aesthetics

of

reception

was

always

possible,

but this

is

not

to

say

what Rene

Wellek

means,

namely,

that

there also

always

were

investigations

like

the

aesthetics

of

reception.

Before the

beginning

of the

great

period

of

historicism,

at

the

turn

from the

eighteenth

to the nineteenth cen-

tury, literary

reception

was

always

seen from the

perspective

of

an

aesthetics

of effect

[Wirkungsisthetik]

which stood

in

the tradition of

rhetoric

and

Aristotelian

poetics,

but which

was

not interested

in

the

historical

conditions

of

the

aesthetic effect of works of

art.

The last

great

aesthetics of effect was

Kant's

critique

of aesthetic

judgment.

Research

interests then

swung

to

the side of

production,

as

Manfred

Naumann has

himself indicated

(Poetica

[1976],

pp.

451

ff.):

the

sensus

communis and

the aesthetic taste linked to

it

fell into

dis-

repute,

and the

aesthetics of

genius,

art

for art's

sake,

and

litterature

engagee

arose

in

their

stead.

Since

then,

and

until

our

time,

the

ques-

tion of

the

effect and

reception

of art-and

the communicative

Copyright?

1979

by

New

LiteraryHistory,

The

University

of

Virginia


3/14

NEW

LITERARY HISTORY

achievement of

aesthetic

experience

which

comes

with

them-has

no

longer been in the foreground of our interests.

The

objectivism

of

the

nineteenth-century

philological

method,

to

which Rene

Wellek-as

one of its most

prominent representatives-is

still

indebted,

could not

fully

appreciate

this

problem,

for it was con-

cerned above all

with

the

question

of timeless

aesthetic value.

Other

disciplines

such

as

theology

or

jurisprudence

have overcome

dogma-

tic

historicism

and

positivism

earlier

than

has

philology.

There the

methodological

problem

of hermeneutics

has

long

since been seen

in

the threefold

unity

of

understanding,

interpretation,

and

application.

The problem of application-put another way, the insufficiency of a

mere reconstruction of the

past

as

it

really

was,

of an

interpretation

or

description

of a text for

its

own

sake,

and

the

effort

to mediate

past

literature

in

the

experiential

horizon of

our own

present-was

a

suppressed

demand,

and

it

is the real content

of

that

turn toward the

aesthetics

of

reception

which occurred

in

the mid-sixties and

which,

evidently,

was successful.

II

Q:

If the

aesthetics of

reception

of

the

sixties is to

have established

a

new

paradigm,

must

it

not-like

the

paradigms

of

other

disciplines-presuppose

new

instruments which

would

give

a new

meaning

to

the

concept

of

interpretation?

Does

it

lead

beyond

in-

terpretation,

as

structuralism

and semiotics

claim of themselves?

In

regard

to the

aesthetics of

reception,

can

one

speak

of

a

specifically

scientific

interpretation?

And

what

do

you say

to the

oft-made

objec-

tion

that the

receptive analysis

of

texts

is

sheer

subjectivism,

and

dis-

covers as

many

interpretations

as there are readers?

A:

If

it

is true that

literary

structuralism and semiotics lead

one out

of

and

beyond

the

traditional methods

of

interpretation,

then

one can

say

of

the

aesthetics of

reception

and

the

aesthetics

of

effect

that,

in

a

certain

manner,

they

lead back to

interpretation.

But this

clearly

does

not mean that

they

return

to

the

same

point

which

their

predecessors

had

already

surpassed.

The aesthetics

of

reception

and

effect

pre-

cisely

do not

any

longer

have as their

goal

the

tracing

of

a

text back

to

its

statement,

to a

significance

hidden behind

it,

or to its

objective

meaning.

Rather,

they

define the

meaning

of

a text

as

a

convergence

of

the

structure of

the work and

the structure of the

interpretation

which

is

ever to be achieved anew.

Their

instrument is

nothing

other

than the

hermeneutic

reflection,

consciously

and

controllably

employed,

which must

accompany

all

interpretation.

The

aesthetics

of

84


4/14

AN INTERVIEW

WITH HANS

ROBERT

JAUSS

reception

and effect can therefore

also

make use of the achievements

of the structuralist

description

of

texts, as,

for

example, they

use the

Jakobsonian

model of

equivalences

in

order

to

interpret

semantically

structures which are

linguistically

determinable.

Linguistic

instru-

ments,

however,

are used

here

when and

only

when

it

is relevant

semantically.

Grammatical structures

which

only

mean

something

for

linguistic

experts,

or

semantic subtleties which

only

Riffaterre's

om-

niscient

superreader

can

recognize,

must be left aside

in

favor of the

primary

task

of

clarifying

the aesthetic

reception

of a text from out

of

its

conditions

of

effect

[Wirkungsbedingungen].

The first and over-

arching

condition of a text's aesthetic effect is

its

reception by

under-

standing

in

the

succession

of

its

verses,

its

narration,

or its dramatic

unfolding.

Literary

hermeneutics then

distinguishes

among

under-

standing, interpretation,

and

application.

Interpretation

as the con-

cretization of a

specific

significance (among

other

possible signifi-

cances which earlier

interpreters

have concretized or later

interpret-

ers can still

concretize)

always

remains bound

to the

horizon of the

first

reading,

perceiving

aesthetically

and

understanding

with

plea-

sure;

it next

has

the

task

of

illuminating

the verbal

and

poetic

condi-

tions

which,

from

the construction of the

text,

orient

the

primary

act

of

understanding.

Application

ncludes both acts

of

understanding

and

in-

terpretation

insofar as

it

represents

the

interest

in

transporting

the

text out of

its

past

or

foreignness

and into

the

interpreter's present,

in

finding

the

question

to

which the text has an

answer

ready

for

the

interpreter,

in

forming

an

aesthetic

judgment

of the text which could

also

persuade

other

interpreters.

The

reproach

of

subjectivism

is therefore the least

justified,

in-

eradicable

prejudice against

the

aesthetics of

reception.

It

ignores

the

interpretation's

unalterable connection back to the

text's

structure

of

reception,

as well as the

intersubjectivity

of

aesthetic

judgment

which

is to

be

encouraged;

and

it

displays

a

lack of

insight

into the

necessary

partiality

of all

interpretations

in

the

process

of

the

reception

of the

arts.

Subjectivism,

on the

contrary,

resides

exactly

under the

sign

of

the

ideal of

objectivity-namely,

it

triumphs

there where

the

in-

terpreter

denies

his

historically-limited

horizon,

sets

himself

aside

from

a text's

history

of

effect,

sees

only

errors

in

his

predecessors,

and

imagines

himself

to

possess, immediately

and

wholly,

a text's

meaning. By contrast,

it is

a virtue of the

method

of the

aesthetics

of

reception

that

it

opposes

the ambition of

solipsistic interpretation,

and

is

interested

less

in

reciprocal

falsification than

in

the

unifiability

of

different

interpretations

in

which the

meaning

of works

of

art-

yielded

to

us

and

always only

partially concretizable-especially

man-

ifests

itself.

85


5/14


6/14

AN INTERVIEW WITH

HANS ROBERT

JAUSS

elaboration of

semiotics

in a

cultural

concept

of the

text;

the

renewed

questions

of

the

subject

of role and of

a

lived-world

in

social

an-

thropology,

of animal and environment in

biology;

the return of

sociology

of

knowledge

with the

theories

of

interaction which

have

become

active;

and the

disengagement

from

formal

or

expressive

logic

through

a

propaedeutic

or

dialogical

logic.

In

the

transforma-

tion

of these

(and

certainly

other)

paradigms

of research

interests,

the

problem

of

communication

was touched

upon

in

many

ways.

To

this

was added

the

triumphant

march of mathematical communications

science

and

of

information

theory,

in which

a

widely

held naive view

sees the

salvationary

science

that, however,

seeks

to

solve the

most

complicated

problems

of human communication in the

simplest

of

ways.

Since

communication-contrary

to the

contemporary

tendency

of

broadening

it,

as a modish

concept

and

universally

applicable

catch

phrase,

beyond

recognition-has

up

till now

existed

in the

scientific

formation of

theory

only

in

methodological

attempts,

for

the

most

part

isolated

from

one

another,

the

general

theory

of

communication

that

is to be

promoted

is

today

still

far,

from

being

an established

foundational

discipline

for the

historical, social,

and

(to

some

extent)

natural

sciences.

To

develop

this

theory

cooperatively

seems

to

me-and not

just

to me-to be the most

important

task

of the

near

future,

and

to take

part

in

this task

would be an

opportunity

for

literary

studies.

IV

Q:

Is

there a

correspondence

between

the

aesthetics of

reception

and

recent

developments

in

contemporary

German literature-

comparable,

say,

to the

correspondence

between Russian

formalism

and

Russian futurism?

A:

With

this

question you

touch

upon

one of

the most

interesting

and still

little-discussed

aspects

of the

contemporary

situation.

In

my

opinion,

there

was

no

correspondence

in

literary

praxis

to the

forma-

tion

of

theory

in

German

literary

studies

in

the

sixties such as was the

case in

the

twenties

between

Russian

formalism and

Russian futurism.

In

Germany

the

aesthetics

of

reception

in

particular

was even con-

sidered to be in

contradiction to the aesthetic theory of negativity (in

Adorno's

sense)

and

the

manifestations of

avant-garde

literature

and

art

which,

for

the

most

part,

are

in

accord with

it. The

theory

of

reception

was

interested

in

winning

back

the

communicative func-

tions

of

literature

and

art,

while

Adorno's

aesthetic

theory-

symptomatic

of this

time-associated all

communicative behavior to-

87


7/14

NEW

LITERARY

HISTORY

ward art with

the tabooed aesthetic

pleasure,

and

proclaimed

a

new

puritanism

which seemed to be the

only

answer to the

so-called

cul-

ture

industry.

Most

recently,

an

interesting

development

has dis-

played

itself

in

the

German

literary

scene

(and,

in

fact,

on both

sides

of

the

Elbe)

in

which one can

see

a

correspondence

to

the theories of

reception

and effect.

I

mean

the

peculiar

and-in this

form-unique

reappropriation

of classical texts

(as,

for

example,

in

Plenzdorfs

The

New

Sorrows

of

Young

Werther,

r

in

Hildesheimer's

Mary

Stuart)

n

which

the

integral

form of

sacrosanct

masterpieces

is shattered

in

order to

disclose to the

present,

in

its

repossession through

means of alien-

ation,

the

experiential

content

in new

and

mostly

critical

ways.

En-

gland

is also

taking part

in this

development

with a new wave of

Shakespeare

reception,

while

in

France

the

process

of a

critical

reap-

propriation

of the classics is still

significantly

absent.

V

Q:

In

your

opinion,

has the rather boisterous discussion

taking

place

between

literary

scholars from

the German Federal

Republic

and the

German Democratic

Republic

in

the last few

years

contrib-

uted

to a

real further

development

of the

aesthetics

of

reception?

A:

This

debate

has been

carried

out

as

a-perhaps

typical-

German

argument

between an

ostensibly

idealist and an

ostensibly

materialist

theory

of

literature

in which

both

camps

at

times seek

to

surpass

one another

in

their

orthodoxy.

In

retrospect,

I

scarcely

need

to return

any

longer

to the

orthodoxy

of the

bourgeois philological

camp-from

which the Constance school

disengaged

itself. But on the

other

hand, something

must first still be said about

what

was charac-

terized as orthodox

in

the Marxist

theory

of literature of ten

years

ago.

The

Marxist

orthodoxy

can be indicated

by

three

points:

the

theory

of

reflection

[Wiederspiegelung]

n

Georg

Lukacs's

sense;

an

undialectical

understanding

of the

relationship

of materialism and

idealism;

and the

absolute

priority

of the

productive

side

in

aesthetics.

In

opposition

to

this, then,

the so-called

bourgeois

literary

studies

could be considered orthodox

in

their

way

so

long

as

they

remained

contented with intrinsic

[werkimmanenter]

nterpretation

and

with

an

isolated

consideration of the

sequence

of

literary texts,

and

did not

take

seriously

the

question

of the

social

function of literature.

From

my

perspective-with

which I

count

myself

among

neither

the

prophets

of the left nor those of

the

right-this dialogue

of

the

last

decade became fruitful

especially

there where

in

the

argument,

however

passionately

carried

out,

both sides

stepped

beyond

the

or-

88


8/14

AN

INTERVIEW

WITH

HANS ROBERT

JAUSS

thodox

starting points

and new

problems

were

formulated.

Today's

progressive

Marxist

theory

of

literature,

as

well

as the

newly

formulated

literary theory

of the

bourgeois

camp,

has

begun

to

understand

the

relationship

of materialism and idealism

no

longer

as

opposition

but rather as a

process

of dialectical mediation:

wherever

a

literary

work

surpasses

mere

ideological

utility

and

takes on an active

social

function,

it

contains an

idealist-in

other

words,

a class-

transcending-kernel;

while

inversely

the aesthetic

significance

of

even

an

apparently

timeless,

ideal classic can be

recognized

only

when

placed against

the material

conditioning

horizon

[Bedingungshorizont]

of

society

to which it

responds.

At

the

center of

literary theory

such as

it is

practiced

today

by

Manfred

Naumann,

Robert

Weimann,

and

others of the Berlin

Academy

of

Sciences,

there stands

therefore

no

longer

the reflection

model,

but rather

Marx's circulation

model

from

the

Introduction

to

a

Critique

of

Political

Economy,

which

demands

and

legitimates

the

analysis

of

the

literary

process

as

a mediation

among

production, consumption,

and

distribution or

exchange.

Thus

the

progressive

tendencies of

literary

theory

in both

camps

today

converge

in

the

attempt

to

make the

focus

of

interest

the communica-

tive and

thereby socially

formative function

of

literature,

over and

above its

representational

dimension.

VI

Q:

When

you

think

of

the

further

development

of the aesthetics

of

reception,

which

tasks

appear

to

you

to be

urgent?

One of its tasks

would

naturally

be

the

writing

of

a

history

of

reception.

How is

this

possible methodologically?

An

important problem

is

certainly

the lack

of

reader-reactions

from certain

periods.

More

precisely,

how can

one

reconstruct

the horizon

of

expectations

for

a

period

from which

few,

if

any,

reader-reactions

have been

handed down

without

falling

back

into

the old model

of

Geistesgeschichte?

A:

I

see

the

first need of the

contemporary

situation

to be

the

working

out of a

literary

hermeneutics

which would

establish

its

aes-

thetic

premises

(as

against

theological

as

well

as

juridical

hermeneu-

tics)

and

would

seek

to build a

bridge

to

structural,

text-linguistic,

and

semiotic methods.

Of course there are

also worthwhile

tasks

in

the

field

of the

history

of

reception,

and

numerous

histories

of

reception

must

be

worked out:

of individual

works, authors,

genres,

and also

of

normative

periods,

but,

to

be

sure,

in

some

other

way

than

according

to the

old

substantialistic

recipe

of

La

fortune

de

.

.

or The

In-

89


9/14

NEW LITERARY

HISTORY

fluence of....

But

with

this the

larger problem

is still

unsolved,

namely,

how such

histories

of

receptions

are

to

be fitted

into

a

new

literary

history.

Here

I

would

like

to

recall that

there is at

least

one

thing

that

we

learned-or can

learn-from

the

Marxist

debate:

the

history

of an art

or

literature

can

no

longer

be written

as an

autono-

mous

history,

but

only

as a

part

of the

social

process.

Before

one can

enter

upon

this

large

task,

a

series of

preliminary

studies

must

be

accomplished.

To

these

belong

the

investigation

of

the

changing

function

of

literature,

respectively,

of

literary

fiction

and the

correla-

tive

formation of the

literary

canon

(i.e.,

the

appropriation

and dis-

missal

of

past

literature

in

the

educational

institutions)

as well

as

a

history

of

aesthetic

experience-such

as

I

myself

began

with

my

latest

book,

Asthetische

Erfahrung

und

Literarische

Hermeneutik. If

the

new

literary

history

is to

be more than

the

mere

reflection of

social

history

or

the

ostensibly

autonomous

dialogue

between

creative

spirits,

then

the

contribution of

literature

in

its manifold

functions must first

be

worked out

historically

and

systematically.

The

step

from a

history

of

works and

artistic

genres

to a

history

of

aesthetic

experience,

i.e.,

the

producing,

receiving,

and

com-

municating

aesthetic

activity

of

man,

is

also

indispensable because,

to

formulate it

hermeneutically,

it

presents

the

communicative

bridge

to

an

unfamiliar

past.

In

contrast

with

pragmatic history,

which

must

reconstruct

the life

of the

past

from

largely

mute

evidence or

from

ideologically

distorted

statements,

the

history

of

the arts has

the ad-

vantage

of

being

formed from

works that are still

accessible

to

us

today-or

can become

so

again-in

aesthetic

pleasure

and

under-

standing.

Art

therefore

fosters,

as

aesthetic

experience,

the

removal

of

the

contemporary

horizon of

expectations

from

that

of

the

past,

a

removal

indispensable

for

historical as well

as

art-historical

research.

By

returning

to the

social

functions of

aesthetic

experience,

a

horizon

of

expectations

can

then

be

tentatively

reconstructed

even when

no,

or

scarcely any,

reader-reactions have

been handed

down.

For we

ourselves are and

always

remain

possible

readers of

past

texts. In

order to

reconstruct

not

only

its

aesthetic

character,

but also its

alter-

ity,

we

have various

methods at

our

disposal.

Where historical

her-

meneutics

is

insufficient,

one

can

attempt

a

systematic

approach

with,

for

example,

the

instruments of

communications

systems

such

as

the

theory

of

literary

and

artistic

genres

has

prepared

them. In

my book,

Alteritit

und Modernitit

der

mittelalterlichen

iteratur

(1977),

I

attempted

to

show

how,

for

example,

the

communications

system

of

the

small

literary

genres

or the

simple

forms of

exemplary

discourse

of a

distant

period

can

be

reconstructed,

whereby

I

demonstrated the

hermeneutic

instrument

of

question

and

answer in

practice.

90


10/14

AN

INTERVIEW

WITH HANS

ROBERT

JAUSS

VII

Q:

Research

in

the

aesthetics of

reception

is

by

definition interdis-

ciplinary,

and in

a

double sense

(cooperative

work

among

different

philologies,

as well

as

among

different

disciplines;

for

example,

liter-

ary

studies,

sociology, psychology,

history,

and

philosophy).

The

old,

traditional

university

structure with its

capsulated

departments

stands

by

experience against

interdisciplinary

work. Now

the

University

of

Constance

has

evidently

tried a new structure that

promises

to

renew

Humboldt's

concept of teaching

from research

in

a

cooperative

and

interdisciplinary way.

Could

you

elaborate for outsiders

upon

the

sit-

uation

and

history

of this

new

institution,

its

reforms,

and

especially

its

new

literary

studies?

A:

The

tension between tradition and

reform,

between an ostensi-

bly

dismissed

past,

a

pressing present,

and an

ostensibly

predictable

future,

was at first

played

out without disturbance at the little

Har-

vard on

the Bodensee -for so

did

the German

press quickly

baptize

the new

institution at

Constance-during

the heroic decade

of

the

West German

university

crisis,

1966-76,

and this under the state's

dispensation

for

a

university

with

a

mandate

for reform.

The

tension,

however,

was also discussed

in

its fundamentals and

transposed

into

new

concepts,

just

like

anywhere

else.

But

since

1972,

it

is

exactly

here

that the

already

quite

successful

process

of reforms-on the three

levels of a

democratization

of the

institution,

a

balancing

of academic

education and vocational

training,

and a revision of

the

scientific-

theoretical

self-understanding-has

been arrested more

sharply

than

elsewhere,

through

a basic

regulation

approved

by

the same

state,

and

sacrificed to

a

new unification

(critics

speak

of

a

technocratic counter-

reform).

The

volume

Gebremste

Reform:

Ein

Kapitel

deutscher

Univer-

sitdtsgeschichte,1

n

which

the

founding

Constance

generation

has col-

lected

its

experiences

of

the

first

decade,

is available for

anyone

who

comes to

Constance as a

guest

and is interested

in

this

university's

claim to be a

forerunner of ideas of reform

in

the last

decade;

in

the

fact that

the new institutions

of

self-government,

research,

and

in-

struction,

built

upon

the

basis

of a

participation

by

all

the

constitutive

ranks and tried out

here,

were

widely

discussed

elsewhere,

be it

as

exemplar

or as

scandal;

and

in

what still remains alive

in this univer-

sity's

current

form

despite

the crisis and the

general repression

of

the

earlier

elan of

reform.

Here

I

can

indicate

only

several

high points

of

this

reform. First of

all,

the new

University

of Constance

converted

the

old

departmental

autonomy

into the

cooperative

structure

of

subject

areas

[Fachbereiche].

t

developed

new forms

of

cooperative

work and

independent

control

with

its

interdisciplinary

committees

91


11/14

NEW

LITERARY HISTORY

(for

research,

teaching,

promoting

new

personnel,

and

for

exams).

It

tried out modern

pedagogic

forms

in

small

groups

and interdisci-

plinary

work

in

research and

teaching.

And it manifested a

series

of

reformed

curricular models

(including

an

integrated

basic

study

of

the

social

sciences)

and new

curricular

plans.

Constance's

literary

studies

earned

special

attention

and

even,

from

abroad,

the

epithet

of the

Constance

school. Their establishment

was the

idea

of

five

professors

from

English,

German, Classics,

Ro-

mance

languages,

and

Slavic

languages,

who

gave up

the direction of

large

departments

in

1966

in

order

to

work

together

with the

Con-

stance

reform.

Wolfgang

Iser,

Wolfgang

Preisendanz,

Manfred

Fuhrmann,

Hans Robert

Jauss,

and

Jurij

Striedter

constituted

them-

selves as a

group;

they

snatched at the

chance

for

the

development

of

a new

concept

of

literary

studies,

for which at this time there was still

no

model,

neither

domestically

nor

abroad. This

concept

aimed at

converting

the

received curricular

plans

of national

philologies

into

the

new,

interdisciplinary

unity

of a

literary

studies

which was to

be

grounded

in

the

general

development

of

theory,

and thus

not in the

merely

comparative

consideration of

literature. The

development

of

theory

demanded an

opening up

of

philological-historical praxis

to

scientific

requirements,

something

which new

movements

abroad

(Russian

formalism,

Prague

structuralism,

New

Criticism

in

the

United

States,

Nouvelle

Critique

in

France)

had

already

paradigmati-

cally

accepted

but which

had remained

a

gross

deficiency

in

the lan-

guage

and

literature

departments

of

postwar

Germany.

In the

carry-

ing

out of this

methodological

prescription,

the Constance

literary

critics have

from the

beginning developed

a

particular concept,

the

so-called

theories

of

literary

reception

and

effect.

In

the

following

years they

continued on to the science

of

texts,

and

finally enlarged

upon

a

concept

of

communications science which

brings

with it

close

collaboration with

such

neighboring

disciplines

as text

linguistics,

sociology,

and

philosophic

hermeneutics.

VIII

Q:

The

future of the

universities

is

very

uncertain,

especially

in

countries where they have always prospered (in Germany and

Hol-

land,

for

example).

It

seems as

if

the

university

is

going

to come off as

the

odd

man

out

in the mediocre

situation

of

the world

economy:

an

enormous increase

in

students

versus

an

increasing

rationalization

of

financial means. This

will

quickly

become noticeable

in

teaching

and

research.

Students

learn

only

what is

most

needed;

as

ajunior faculty

92


12/14

AN

INTERVIEW WITH

HANS ROBERT

JAUSS

member

or

a

full

professor,

one can do

one's own

research

only

on

weekends,

after

correcting

countless

papers

or

exams. How can one

resist the

danger

that

threatens to

make the

university

into a

pre-

professional

school

[Fachhochschule]?

Must one

see the

postgraduate

program

of

your

subject

area,

scheduled to

begin

in

the

spring

of

1979,

in this

light?

A:

Looking

at West

Germany,

one can

only

agree

with

your

de-

scription

of the

situation.

The situation

here

may

become still worse:

for the

universities,

through

governmental

restrictions under the

password

of

educational

efficiency,

and for

the

students,

through

increasing resignation

in view of the

disappearing job opportunities,

strong pressure

to

achieve,

and the so-called

radicals

ordinance,

aimed

at terrorists but

in

practice

functioning

to

render

suspect

every

nonconformist

political

engagement.

Thus the

ancient

humanist com-

plaint,florebat

olim

studium,

nunc

vertitur

n

taedium,

thereby

once

again

is

in

evidence

everywhere.

Whatever

one does

besides

merely

to

com-

plain,

must be addressed

to

the

politicians

and to

the

bureaucracy

which

plans things.

It

is

admittedly

not

easy

to

unsettle

their wide-

spread

faith in that technocratic

educational

ideal

which

did

away

with

the ancient humanistic

guidelines

of a

philological-i.e.,

histori-

cal and

aesthetic-education

from

which,

above

all,

our

discipline

still

gains

nourishment,

even

in

its

reforms.

Perhaps

the

following argu-

ments for the

legitimation

of

our

future

work

within the

university

and for its social

significance

could

be of use.

The

technocratic educational

ideal

leads

to

a

knowledge

of

things

that

gains

its

strength

from the

capacity

and

power

to do

things,

not

however

from an

understanding

of other

men,

without

which

all

so-

cial action must

decay

into

the

egoism

of

power

and

profit.

As a

counterweight

to this

seemingly unstoppable process

of

alienation,

the hermeneutic sciences

can-especially

today-take up

a

new edu-

cational task

insofar

as

they

begin

to become

practical

or,

in

my

ter-

minology,

bring

together

understanding,

interpretation,

and

applica-

tion

in

order to win back for

self-experience

the

knowledge

of that

which

has

become

alien,

the

past

as

well as interhuman

life.

In

our

day,

as

industrialization

has

bumped up against

the

limits of

growth,

the

rapid

social rationalization

has also led

to

many

persons

finding

the center

of their

existence

not

in the

daily

work

of

their alienated

labor, but in the spaces for play such as

the

weekend,

the

vacation,

and

free time. So

the

question

of

how these

spaces

for

play

can be

meaningfully

filled has become

a

social

and

political

problem

of the

first order.

The

technocratic

ideal of

education

certainly

cannot

solve

this

problem,

but aesthetic education-to

be

acquired through

in-

teraction

with

literature and

art-can.

It makes

possible

today,

as

it

93


13/14

NEW

LITERARY HISTORY

has

already

made

possible

in the

secular

tradition,

man's

putting

his

free

play

in

opposition

to the

compulsions

of

work.

Perhaps

it

will

also

reveal how work must

once

again

be constituted

in

order to

approach

the freedom

of

play.

The

latest

program

of

the

Constance

literary

school

about

which

you

ask

can,

naturally,

only

indirectly

touch

upon

such

considerations

of

an

appropriate

theory

and

praxis

of free time

in

which

one could

foresee a new chance for aesthetic education. Here

the

concern

is

the

attempt

to

bring

ten

years

of

experience

in research and

teaching

into

a

postgraduate program

that is

to

be

formulated

for

the

area

of

the

theory

of literatureand communicationand is to

begin

in

the

spring

of

1979.

The

program imagines regularly

recurring

basic

courses,

as

well as

interdisciplinary

seminars

and

research

colloquia,

in

the

fol-

lowing

four fields:

The

hermeneutics,

history,

and

theory

of

reception

of

literature.

Literary-

critical

hermeneutics and

theory

of

interpretation

(especially

con-

cerning

their

specifics

vis-a-vis other

hermeneutics);

history

of the

writing

of

literary

history;

formation

of the

literary

canon

(also

in

the

context of

other

arts);

analysis

of

the

processes

of

reception

in their

historical

context

(also

between national

literatures); history

of

aes-

thetic

experience

(in

the functions of

poiesis,

aisthesis,

and

catharsis).

The

aesthetics

nd

theories

of thefunction

and

effect

of

literature.Aesthetic

theory

and

philosophy

of

art

(especially

in the

relationship

of

litera-

ture

to other

arts);

aesthetics

of

effect

and

theory

of

literary

fiction

(including

phenomenological

and

psychoanalytic

methods);

literary

and

aesthetic

experience

in

interaction

with

reality-models

as well as

in

the context of other

functions of human

activity

(the

relationship

of

the aesthetic attitude

or world

of

meaning

in

relationship

with the

theoretical, religious, political, etc.).

The semiotics

of

the text and

of

culture.

Literary-critical

semiotics

(espe-

cially

in

its

specifics

vis-a-vis

linguistic

and

general

theories

of

signs

and

systems);

function of the

text and

of

intertextuality

in cultural

and

social contexts

(including

literary

sociology);

analysis

of texts

and

symbolic

actions from the

point

of view of communications science

(ranging

from the

empirical protocols

for

the

reception

of contem-

porary

and

past

texts to the

analysis

of

the

directing

of communica-

tion,

reception,

and

the formation of

judgment according

to

the

pro-

cedures

of

modern mass

media).

The

technique,

normativity,

nd

empirical

analysisof

communicativemedia.

Changes

in

the function of rhetoric and

literary

communication;

theory

of

types

of art

and

literary

genres

as communicative

media;

social

psychology

of literature and

psychohistory

of

literature;

analysis

of

the

techniques

of

transmission

of

the

news

media,

the

94


14/14

hans robert jauss interview

Documents