RECEPTION THEORY AND THE CHRISTIAN READER: A PRELIMINARY PERSPECTIVE

In recent years there has been a significant shift in emphasis from (extcen tred criticism in literature to reader-cen tred criticism. This new field o f criticism , called Reception Theory or Reader Response Criticism , denies the im mutable nature o f the "tex t” and regards as its ob ject o f study the work o f literature that is created through the co-constituent creative and in terpre­ tive acts o f both writer and reader. Som e theoretical background is given to this approach and its significance in drama studies is indicated. In the final section an indication is given o f the application o f this approach to the Christian reader by way o f re ference to Fugard’s most recent play M aster Harold . . and the Hoys.


IN TRO D U CTIO N
Terry Fagleton, in his very recent w ork I iterary Theory (1983) says that "R e c e p tion theory exam ines the reader's role in literature, and as such is a fairly novel developm ent.Indeed, one might very roughly perio dize the history of m odern literary theory in three stages: a preoccupation w ith the author (Rom anticism and the nineteenth centu ry): and exclusive concern w ith the text (New C ritic ism ): and a m arked shift of attention to the reader over recent years.The reader has always been the most u nderprivileged of this triostrangely, since without him or her there w ould be no literary texts al all.Literary texts do not exist on bookshelves: they are processes of signification m aterialized only in the practice of reading.For literature to happen, the reader is quite as vital as the au th or" (p.74).
For the past forty years the so-called New Criticism or Formalist criticism has been regarded as the most respectable form of literary criticism by the m ore fastidious of the literary theoreticians.The object of study of the New C ritics has been largely poetry, and because of the very nature of poetry it has been possible to postulate that the object of scrutiny for the critic, the poem , has an invjolate and im m utable existence, not subject to change by other varying conditions.This is precisely the attitude that is being challenged at present in the significant upsurge or critical w ork on Reception Theory (Reception Aesthetics), a field at present led largely by the G erm an critic of Konstanz, W olfgang Iser.It is a form of literary criticism that is seen to have derived most p rom inently from phenom enology and herm eneutics, especially the Koers, 48(2) 1983 work of Husserl and Gadamer.By its very novelty the validity and the applica bility of this approach will still be open to many weaknesses and problems, but in the field of drama (studied in both its literaryandtheatrical manifestations) it does offer very valuable critical tools and insights.Some of these will be outlined and discussed briefly in the theoretical discussion before an actual discussion of a play will be provided to illustrate some of the possibilities of this approach.

SOM E THEO RETICAL CON CEPTS O F THIS APPROACH
In Reception Theory the concern is very much with three main components of the literary event: the writer, the "text" and the reader (or, in the case of the theatre, the audience -one can thus perhaps more correctly speak of the receptor).Various critics accord different degress of importance to the different components, and depending on the nature of the work in question, the relative importance of each may vary significantly.According to Marianne de Jong (Standpunte 164, p. 48) this difference in emphasis can result in many reductionist practices: the literary work might be reduced to the stature of a mere instigator, or it might be elevated to the stature of manipulator -and either the work or the reader can be degraded to the level of being empty objects to the supplemented, filledin by the other, without any dynamic co-operative work taking place.

THE A UTH OR
In any encounter which ultimately becomes literature (in Reception Theore tical terms) the first element, the instigator or initiator is the author, who becomes in the process of interaction the implied author, defined in the following terms: It is a manipulating, controlling power, the embodiment or the source of values portrayed in the work, as well as the organizer or mani pulator in the narrative process or narrative discourse aimed at reaching the implicit reader.Generally speaking, the implied author may be more clearly delineated from the position of the artefact which results from his originating work than the implied reader, which is much more variable entity.The suppo sition is that reader and author meet each other creatively.According to Steenberg (1983, p. 57) there should be sufficient similarity of cultural and value systems between the two entities to render communication possible: With reference to the novel Houd-den-Bek by André P. Brink, Steenberg feels that the following qualities should be shared by them at the very least (the implied reader should also have these qualities which are held by the author): • he should know Afrikaans thoroughly (this statement is relativized to some Combrink extent by the fact that there is also an English version of this novel translated by the author himself): * he should know the Bible and Christian values and norms well enough to be ib le to understand the nuances of falsification of Scriptural truths by the personages in the novel (this statement is relativized to some extend by ex plicit statements by the real author that he also writes for non-Christians): * he should know the racial problem in this country (this statement is rela tivized by the universality of the problem of racial tension): * he should be able to identify with the main figure in the novel -which would not be all that easy for a large number of readers in the South African context, as the attitudes held by the main figure are essentially against the political status quo.(This is also a problem in the play by Fugard to be dis cussed later, but in that case identification with the main figure is easier, because the problem under discussion does not touch on the politically over sensitive issue of miscegenation -rather it remains centred on the universal problem of love and taring, and thus evades the too sensitive issue touched upon in the Brink work.) In works of committed literature, expecially, the implied author emerges strongly as manipulator and not merely, as seen in terms of this approach to criticism, as co-structuring agent, and this manipulative action might account to some extent for the negative awareness the reader develops at times upon being subjected to a too-sustained propagandistic attack under the guise of literature, when the development of an active aversion negates any chance of a real encounter in terms of "literary experience" ,

THE "TEXT'
This is perhaps the most debated entity in this framework of literary co-exis tence.O ne of the most provocative works in this context is the seminal work by Stanley Fish (1982): Is There a Text in this Classf Fish himself, in his Preface, comments on it in the following way: " The answer this book gives to its title question is 'there is and there isn't" .There isn't a text in this or any other class in one means by text what E.D. Hirsch and others mean by it, 'an entity which always remains the same from one moment to the next' (Validity in Interpreta tion, p. 46): but there is a text in this and every class if one means by text the structure of meaning that is obvious and inescapable from the perspective of whatever interpretive assumptions happen to be in force" (p.vii).There are various important points here which will be illuminated again later, notably his concept of " interpretive assumptions" , seen in the light of the fact that the sub-title of his book is The Authority o f Interpretive Communities.
Whereas some degree of variation is to be discerned among various critics on this issue, it is important to note that there is seemingly strong consensus on the fact that there is no autonomous text.The "text" does not have a closed and constant mode of existence.In the view of Iser (critically and evaluatively presented by M arianne de )ong in two consecutive issues of Standpunte [164 and 165] ), the text is seen to contain the reader, in the shape of possibilities of meaning, being in Eagleton's terms a series of cues to the reader, and the reader is then supposed to actualize this text by formulating the meanings.The "literary message" is to be seen as a "reading instruction" -it is not meaning, it is an instruction towards the formation of meaning by the reader.The reader is then co-constituent of the contexts created by the text.The text is seen as having a repertoire, and this repertoire consists of the selected elements of reality, a framework of known quantities which gives the reader access to the veiled meaning.The text is seen, expecially in the modern novel and in modern drama, to contain many points of hiatus -Iser refers to "Leerstelle" : empty spaces to be filled in by the co-constituing actions of implicit reader or receptor.In drama specifically, where in modern plays the question of "subtext" has become a most important theoretical con sideration, this has to be looked at carefully (in this respect the points of correspondence between implied author and implied reader as outlined by Steenberg should be kept in mind carefully -also with regard to the play to be discussed in the second part of this article).It is also felt that the work forces the reader to maturity in this way, for the more seemingly opaque the work of literature, the more hiatus-filled, the more independent interpreta tion is demanded of the reader, and the more he is forced to alter his horizon by filling it in with previously unmet and unabsorbed information.

THE READER (RECEPTOR)
This is at present regarded by some critics as being the most important of the elements of the literary experience.O ne is immediately confronted, how ever, with a number of very real problems, because "the reader" is at best a very contingent and tenuous concept, and to be acceptable in terms of "critical respectability" this concept has to be carefully evaluated and given shape.What cannot be denied, especially in a study of drama (both in terms of literature and of theatre) is that "reception" is a reality and should be dealt with in a purposeful manner.
The reader is seen, as has already begun to emerge, as co-creator, thus also text-implied and textually anchored.The idea is to search for a method to Combrink render the variable reader -the ordinary individual as reader, the critic or lecturer in literature as reader, the literary theoretician as reader -descrip tive together with the text.Interpretation is then to be regarded as the inter play between fixed text and variable reader.In drama there would be even more variables as there are so many purely theatrical considerations linked to the variable receptor -not one of which can really be denied significance in terms of the total experience.
The reader (for this, always read " variable reader") concretizes the literary work, which is "in itself no more than a chain of organized black marks on a page" (Eagleton, p. 76).
In order to actualize the literary work, which is seen as always being a dynamic process, " a complex movement and unfolding through time" (p.77), the reader will bring to the work certain " pre-understandings", a dim context of beliefs and expectations within which the w ork's various features will be assessed.Depending on his own horizon* the reader will select and organize its elements, ''excluding some and foregrounding others" (p.77).Eagleton persuasively argues that " reading is not a straightforward linear movement, a merely cumulative affair: our initial speculations generate a frame of refe rence within which to interpret what comes next, but what comes next may retrospectively transform our original understanding, highlighting some features of it and backgrounding others" (p.77).
This brings one to the question of the recognition of " codes" by the readerthese codes can be described as elements of reality, and their recognition, according to De Jong (164, p. 52) is accompanied by a recognition of half hidden and possibly repressed aspects by the reader within himself and his reality.Eagleton feels that the work " interrogates and transforms the implicit beliefs we bring to it, 'disconfirms' our routine habits of perception and so forces us to acknowledge them for the first time for what they are" (p.79).He feels that the valuable work of literature " violates or transgresses these normative ways of seeing, and so teaches us new codes for understanding" (p.79).(This idea is of great importance for the discussion of the Fugard play, M aster H arold . . .and the Boys, w hich will be discussed in the second half, especially when seen in conjunction with some of the overtly existentialist plays of this country.) * Th e e q u iv ale n t of the textual re p e rto ire is th e re fo re th All these considerations still revolve around the idea of the variable reader.In order to render the variable reader less amorphous, arbitrary, contingent and slippery -to name but a few of the reservations voice by antipathetic critics -one can think of the im plied reader in any literary experience as being part of a reading com m unity, as being a sharer of certain assumptions, c e r t a in f ix e d c o n v e n t io n s w it h r e g a r d to l i t e r a t u r e an d literary expectations.
Most critics go along with the idea that, because a w ork is not read, received, apprehended in a void, it im plies that readers/receptors are socially and historically positioned, and "h o w they interpret literary w orks w ill be deeply shaped by this fact" (Eagleton, p. 83).There is always the indisputable fact that a literary text is im plicitly aim ed at a certain potential audience, and is expected to be read /received /ap p rehen ded by that same audience.An author cannot really be said to w rite with a sublim e sense of ind ifferen ce to the po ssible/probable/inevitable readers of his text: the m ere fact of publication, in fact, presupposes an awareness of a receptor of w hatever nature.The responses this im plied reader w ould have w ill be shaped by the stock of socially legitim ated ways of reading w orks, by the shared assumptions, by the sharing of readerly conventions.This brings us to Fish's definitio n of the role of interpretive com m unities: Interpretive com m unities are made up of those w ho shareinterpretive strategies not for reading but for w riting texts, for constituting their properties.In other words, these strategies exist prior to the act of reading and therefore determ ine the shape of what is read rather than, as is usually assum ed, the other way around.(1982, p. 14).
The w ho le issue of the validity of the reading by one reader asopposed to the reading by another reader w ill have to be closely scrutinized w ithin the fram e w ork of this theory.It is felt that it is an academ ist delusion to see the lite rary w ork as an arena of endless and infinite possibility of interpretation.The im plied reader in each case, together w ith his stock of assumptions w hich he shares w ith other readers of his reading com m unity (w hich is not a geographi cal com m unity) w ill have to be pinpointed further.This is done in some ways in a purely em p irical fashion, through surveys of readers, w here random samples from the reading public are drawn and their responses determined by means of questionnaires and other practical strategies.This is, however, a cumbersome process, which would at this stage seem to have a confirmatory rather than any other function.

THE IMPLIED READER, IDEOLOGY AND INTERPRETATION
Eagleton, in discussing Iser's reception theory, says that it is "based on a liberal humanist ideology: a belief that in reading we should be flexible and openminded, prepared to put our beliefs into question and allow them to be trans-

Combrink
formed.Behind this case lies the influence of Gadamerian hermeneutics*, with its trust that the enriched self-knowledge which springs from an encoun ter with the unfamiliar.But Iser's liberal humanism, like most such doctrines, is less liberal than it looks at first sight.
He w rites that a reader with strong ideological commitments is likely to be an inadequate one, since he or she is less likely to be open to the transformative power of literary works.What this implies is that in order to undergo trans formation at the hands of the text, we must only hold our beliefs fairly pro visionally in the first place.The only good reader would already have to be a liberal: the act of reading produces a kind of human subject which it also pre supposes" (p.79).This is an important issue, for in dealing, for example, with the Christian reader, one would have to keep in mind that the Christian reader has an " ideological" bias in reading.
What Iser is afraid of, however, is not so much, to my mind, the ideological reader, or in this case the Christian reader, but the prejudiced reader, and prejudice, aimed at whatever issue, cannot render a good reading.It is true that the reader, when he comes to a reading or literary (interpretative) situation is already largely shaped, already has a firm and fixed personality, and as such is not really all that open to change by means of a reading interaction.What is im portant, how ever, is to keep in mind that it is not the fact that the reader might hold to specific beliefs (w hether they be religious or ideological in the M arxist sense) but that he might be so blinded by prejudice that he might be a less than open reader, only paitially re-creating then the potential literary w ork initiated by the author.

A DISCUSSION O F M A STER H A R O L D . . . A N D THE B O Y S (FUGARD)
The play w ill be discussed by way of two possible readings: first, the obvious im plied political reading by a South A frican au dience, and secondly, a reading based on a Christian lifeview .
The play, w hich has an openly confessional basis (Fugard in a program m e note tells about the painful episode in his boyhood years w hich finally prom pted th e w riting of this play) is a striking com m ent on a variety of issues.The intense shame w hich sprang from his despicable if understandable act prom pted the w riting -w hich can be seen to have been intended as a cathartic act.It also raises interesting issues about the validity of creating a play so faithfully as a confession -the interesting point is that it seems to engage the receptor even m ore closely.
B riefly, the play involves an afternoon in the lives of the main character, Hally (M aster H arold), the son of the female café ow ner in Port Elizabeth w ho employs two black m en, Sam, the w aiter, an intelligent and articulate black man w ho has becom e a father-surrogate to H ally (H ally's father is an u n re habilitated alco ho lic), and his sim pler friend, W illy, w ho cleans.H ally's father is released from hospital entirely unexpectedly and Hally is dum ped into a crisis.He does love his father, but the relationship is so am bivalent that he cannot even begin to understand it.Sam does, and tries to resolve the situa tio n, succeeding only in infuriating the tense and unhappy boy who has to come to terms with his own feeling.When Hally becomes really cornered by the situation, he turns on Sam, in what might be seen by an adult as a cry for help -and to a large extent and for a long time Sam is able to handle it in that way.Yet the actual harsh political situation intrudes.I (ally, in a final burst of anger, directed at the world but hitting Sam, indulges in a crude joke (His father's favourite) about the colour of a sensitive part of the anatomy of a black man.Sam is incredulous at this, and at this point the racial tension intrudes and Sam, in a moment unequalled for dramatic tension, drops his trousers and presents his anatomy for inspection.
He is ashamed later of his intolerence towards a child, but at the moment of the act, his behaviour seems entirely acceptable, even inevitable.
Hally's shame is com pounded many times over by this dastardly act, but he is unable to retract, and in an access of uncontrollable em otion, he spits in Sam's face, almost prompting Sam to assault him.The ending of the play is left open -Hally (who now insists on being called Master Harold, breaking the intimacy of the past) leaves but might return, Sam tries quietly to return to the dream w orld of dancing contests w hich has for so long sustained him.The openness of the ending provides all the opportunity of the w orld for interpretative creation by the receptor, and this is in fact what happens in this play and in other modern plays.
the implications for reading or viewing perception of this play are obvious.It is highly significant, in view of the authobiographical nature of the work, that Fugard should have chosen (unlike the case had been with his other works) to have had it perform ed, for the prem iêre, outside South Africa.The interpre tive com m unity in South Africa would have been, to his m ind, too "loaded" in terms of attitudes and feelings to have viewed it in a way w hich would have given him a clear indication as to the value of the w ork.H e himself says that he wanted to " validate its universality" outside the country.

Combrink THE PLAY AND ITS IMPLIED INTERPRETIVE C O M M U N ITY
T he main bids w hich w ould inevitably be held in this play is the matter of p o li tical awareness.T h e c e n tre o f th ep lay is about love -lo ve in many m anifesta tions but essentially the love betw een child and father, father-surrogate, and vice versa.Cast as it is against the unfortunate background of the racial situa tion in South Africa it gains trem endously in iro n ic potential, although the tlanger of undue m anipulation by the im plied author is there, especially in the last part of the play, follow ing the clim atic events o utlined in the synopsis of the play provided above: the author rather too explicitly "le a n s" on the receptor to m ake clear some of his ideas w hich could have been derived w ith fair accuracy by the kind of inform ed receptor w ho w ould constitute part of the fairly small and hom geneous theatre population of South A frica.Thep lay does, how ever, undoubtedly engage the receptor and sets in m otion the process by w hich the repertoire of the play beginsto interact w ith the horizon of the recep to r(s): and in the im plied audience in South Africa different plays w ill em erge.Prim arily, on the basis of inform ation about the playgoing habits of South A frican s, an assumption may be made about the main body of play goers, w ho w ill mostly be w hite South A fricans of m ore than one language group anti m ore than one political persuasion.In view of th eo ve rtly political appeal in dealing with the B la ck/W h ite issue, the author w ill engage the audience d iffe re n lly .The m inority group of Black view ers w ill probably be engaged in terms of strong identification w ith the hurt em anating from the w aiter-figure.The more " left-w ing" among the audience w ill be at o n cean d passionately (even m ilitantly) aware o f injustice and the crying need for elim i nation of restrictive legislation w hich so erodes hum an relationships.The interactive process should be less am bivalent than is the case for the more "rig h t-w in g " recepto r, leaving this latter receptor m ore scope for interaction with a view to m aturation.For the m ore p o litically conservative receptor, there is a m ore shattering involvem ent.The appeal of the play is such that one is draw n into it against preco nceived notions and p reju d ices: the m ore conservative receptor (although, let it be said, not a vio lently biased receptor, w ho w ill m erely becom e aggressive) w ill be pulled into the play violently and w ill, in terms of the Iserian m odel, be expected constantly to match his horizon (inadequate in terms of the appeal being m ade to it) to the reperto ire of the play, and to m odify his responses constantly and im aginatively, to render u ltim ately, through creative co-operation w ith the author, a "p la y " w hich w ill approxim ate that of the left-wing receptor to a greater extent than before, and w hich w ill then also m ake possible a larger area of consensus, or universal appeal.

THE CHRISTIAN READER O F THIS PLAY
W hen one comes to the Christian reader of this play (or any other play for that matter) a vexed question is raised again.The term Christian reader has not yet been satisfactorily defined.For the purposes of this brief discussion, the idea should be held that the Christian reader is the reader w ho professes to hold a C hristian w orld view , and w ho w ould then of necessity try to account for the effect of this w orld view in the interpretative actions in w hich he might in dulge.
It w ould seem at this stage as if Reception Theory might provide a valuable set of insights for the w ho le matter of the discussion of literary criticism from a C hristian point of view .W hen the reader (of w hatever persuasion) is brought into contact w ith the text (of whatever kind) the interpretative co-constituent act brings together the repertoire of the text and the horizon of the reader.W hen there is a close match between horizon and textual repertoire, the interpretation can be a com plete one and can match in all respects.In this play, for exam ple, the central ethic that is expressed, the love ethic w hich might prevail in spite of all other im pedim ents, brings about a match between the repertoire and the horizon of the C hristian recep to r, so that the receptor may easily and w ithout undue conflict assimilate this textual content.There w ill also be a match with other interpreters: the humanist w ill find this ethic as easy to identify w ith and w ill therefore as easily go along with it.There w ill be, th erefo re, a fair amount of overlap w hen it comes to the " interpretive co m m unity" at w ork here.The sm aller elem ents w hich might not be part of the overlap w ill be peripheral concerns and w ill not m aterially influ en ce the total interpretative action.Thus, w hen the strategy of the author -in this case the em ploym ent of the love ethic as a major them atic concern -forces a sim ilarity of interpretation, a larger area of consensus may be reached.
Som ething entirely d ifferent, how ever, happens w hen the Christian reader faces a play w hich professes a com pletely alien w orld view .In Beckett's W aiting fo r C o d o t, for exam ple, the existentialist w orld view is at odds with the w orld view professed by the reader w ho holds a Christian view -but the reader is still draw n into and involved in the play because it deals com pellingly w ith hum an problem s peculiar to our tim e and to our w orld.What happens now to the reader?
In a case like this, it w ou ld seem , there is even more possibility of interactive creation, for the lack of "m atch in g " between rep erto ire and horizon in this case creates a greater am ount of tension and also dem ands o f the receptor a far greater am ount of creative adaptation and adjustm ent.Fie need not e h o rizo n o f the re a d e r: his lite rary co m p e te n ce , his e xp e rie n tia l w o rld , his p o litica l attitu d es, k n o w le d g e , e tc.

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Peel van K en sb u rg , in an article on L ife v ie w o n P e rc e p tio n o f M essage in D ram a {K o e rs, 1961, 164) discusses this in del ail, co m m e n tin g illu m in atin g ly on th e issue o f h o rizo n in the p e rce p to r.