interpretation – Creative Reading

When I took American history in eighth grade, my teacher split us into groups to teach us about the Boston Massacre. She gave us each an eyewitness account, which she told us to read and discuss as a group. (Oh, the censorship of 18th century writing: “g-d damn it!”) We went on our merry way for a few minutes, then she called on each group and asked the members to describe what happened on March 5, 1770. Each group had a different explanation for who started it, who reacted, and what exactly happened. We students wondered how this could be, but not my teacher. She explained, “I gave each group a different account: some of you got the Patriots’ perspective, and some of you got the British soldiers’ perspective.” It was especially thought-provoking for me, who learned the colonists were the poor unfortunate victims and the Redcoats were the perpetrators, to read a report from one of the wicked Redcoats himself. He described angry colonists yelling at him and cursing the soldiers out, not exactly the innocent and helpless victims of a massacre. Clever, Miss Fleming.

I never forgot that lesson, and I wonder how history class would be different if everything was taught that way. It would make a more cumbersome history class, but perhaps more enlightening and engaging. Can we ever factor in and represent every possible perspective? I think not, though my perspective as a writer in the ongoing diversity push comes into play here. With intersectionality, there are so many groups and perspectives that I don’t think it’s possible or at least practical to include every one. Further, not every historical event involves every group, and not every group is accessible to us now. For instance, the Chinese weren’t very involved in the Boston Massacre, and we know of the existence of Amazon tribes who are still uncontacted. We won’t be hearing their perspective on World War II or the Watergate scandal.

Miss Fleming’s method follows the New Historical ideas of interpretation and subjectivity. If a class were to go by this system, some may ask, “Well, if it’s all subjective, how can students ever learn facts about history?” Really, it’s not all subjective: dates, most locations, and names, for instance, are generally undisputable. But as Miss Fleming showed us, subjectivity isn’t just limited to who was right or wrong. Psychology class shows us the unreliability and variability of eyewitness accounts, which is how most history is learned at the root. It’s very deconstructive, looking at it that way: a fractal of interpretations and meanings. And like deconstruction, a more varied perspective can help remake our identity as Americans and people.

The first tenant of New Historicism and Cultural Criticism that Lois Tyson gives us in Critical Theory Today is that “the writing of history is a matter of interpretation, not facts” (275). This means that when we interact with history – in a literary context or otherwise – must acknowledge that there is likely more than one way to take all the pieces of that New Historicists use to view a time, from the discourse to personal identity to events, to commentary on those events. But Tyson also warns that interpretation doesn’t mean that we have free reign to say whatever we want (275). This seems especially poignant in Cultural Criticism, where politics become much more important. So, this week I’m interested in the tension between interpretation and accurate political analysis in Cultural Criticism.

The key aspect of Cultural Criticism (and New Historicism) that I think will be most helpful to do this is the concept that everything happening in a moment is in conversation with everything else that is happening. This means we must draw from a large base of primary sources, some of which may conflict, and contextual information, such as the structure, conventions, and discussions happening in a particular area at a particular time, all of which probably conflict or complicate each other. With this in mind, it seems more likely that we could throw away “bad” interpretations with more ease than we could come to a cohesive and comprehensive “good” one. But, ever the optimist, I believe we can do better than that. These two theories have another important facet; they’re interested in giving equal voice to marginalized groups. Without delving into more specific theories, this is a jumping-off point for the direction Cultural Criticism should take. When we lift the voices of oppressed groups and give their experiences the weight that has been previously absent, then there is a way to begin tackling this constant, dynamic process we call “culture.”

To look at these broad concepts in the context of a specific text, I looked to Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables. Set in 19^th century France, largely in Paris, it would be easy to fall into an “old” historicism line of thinking with this book. I’m sure in the past, scholars have made lists of key dates and important political figures and the like to try to parse out an analysis to this vast book. But Les Misérables is a piece in conversation with what is going on real-world France at the time, not simply a summary projected onto fictional characters. In fact, the characters themselves and their actions are reflective of Hugo’s interpretation of the tension between the people of France and the power structures that have put them in such terrible situations. Jean Valjean spends nineteen years in prison over bread, Fantine has to become a prostitute, Cosette is treated poorly by the Thénardiers, Gavroche has no home but the streets, Les Amis de l’ABC rise up in rebellion later in the book – all these things are different facets of commentary on the situation in France that could be looked at alone or in correlation with “facts” but say something much more important in connection with each other. That is, that something is wrong with the way those in power exist outside of such misery. But even so, this is just a facet of the larger cultural exchange going on at the time, and to truly, properly derive some understanding from Les Misérables would require a vast number of texts from the same place and period, because one book is only one small piece of the culture it comes from.

Works Cited

Hugo, Victor. Les Misérables. 1862. Translated by Isabel F. Hapgood, Canterbury Classics, 2015.

Tyson, Lois. Critical Theory Today. 3^rded., Routledge, 2015.