Many famous antique texts are misunderstood and many others have been completely dismissed, all because the literary style in which they were written is unfamiliar today. So argues Mary Douglas in this controversial study of ring composition, a technique which places the meaning of a text in the middle, framed by a beginning and ending in parallel. To read a ring composition in the modern linear fashion is to misinterpret it, Douglas contends, and today’s scholars must reevaluate important antique texts from around the world.Found in the Bible and in writings from as far afield as Egypt, China, Indonesia, Greece, and Russia, ring composition is too widespread to have come from a single source. Does it perhaps derive from the way the brain works? What is its function in social contexts? The author examines ring composition, its principles and functions, in a cross-cultural way. She focuses on ring composition in Homer’s Iliad, the Bible’s book of Numbers, and, for a challenging modern example, Laurence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy, developing a persuasive argument for reconstruing famous books and rereading neglected ones. (20090210)
Author(s): Mary Douglas
Series: The Terry Lectures Series
Publisher: Yale University Press
Year: 2007
Language: English
Pages: 186
CONTENTS......Page 8
Preface......Page 10
1 Ancient Rings Worldwide......Page 18
2 Modes and Genres......Page 34
3 How to Construct and Recognize a Ring......Page 48
4 Alternating Bands: Numbers......Page 60
5 The Central Place: Numbers......Page 75
6 Modern, Not-Quite Rings......Page 89
7 Tristram Shandy: Testing for Ring Shape......Page 102
8 Two Central Places, Two Rings: The Iliad......Page 118
9 Alternating Nights and Days: The Iliad......Page 132
10 The Ending: How to Complete a Ring......Page 141
11 The Latch: Jakobson’s Conundrum......Page 156
Notes......Page 166
Index......Page 178
