Landy: Philsophy as Fiction [7: metaphor]

[this is a somewhat artificial topic separation; much of this will fit into subjectivity stuff]

Landy sets out to (in section 3 of ch1):
“ explain (a) how imagery can serve to disclose a point of view on reality, (b) what Marcel’s metaphors specifically say about his point of view, and (c) whether we can defend the theory against a number of critical objects.” (59)

(a) Imagery can convey perspective because, “perspective, just like metaphor, is a matter of combination.” (59)

in footnote 17, p.187, Landy nicely states the difference between the analysis of common metaphors and metaphoric structures within common language, and the analysis of new, or indiosyncratic metphors, “in the extensive literature on metaphor...much is said about the vehicle shedding light on the tenor (Moran 110), or, more generally, betraying something about the workings of language (de Man), and the structure of thought (Lakoff and Johnson). (I borrow the terms tenor and vehicle from Richards 96.) Relatively little, by contrast, is said about idiosyncratic coinages that have no ambition of becoming standard.” (187n17)

do Marcel’s metaphors reveal something about their objects, that is, do they show us aspects of reality that were previously hidden from our view by habitual language (Landy says that this is the view of Genette and Bersani; 193-4n38), or do they, as Landy argues, simply reveal aspects of the perceiver’s worldview? (Alternately, Landy also cites Waring in the same note as saying they reveal something of the reader’s.)

treatment of metonyphors (called “diegetic metaphors by Genette), metaphors based not on some deep, underlying analogy between two commonly disparate elements, but simply on the contiguity of the two elements (69)

Landy cites two important passages from Genette in which Genette argues that Proust essentially fails in his project to give access to “essences” because the means he uses are too subjective and contigent (metonymy).

Marcel as aware of the metonymic basis of some of his own metaphors (73)

“...the aim of metaphor can be—and in Marcel’s description quite explicitly is—to convey not an objective but a subjective connection between two impressions or ideas, and that this subjective connection can possess a type of local inescapability. Marcel, in other words, locates an intermediate position between the two de Manian extremes of thorough contigency and absolute necessity, and indeed considers his intermediate position the most interesting thing there is to say about metaphor.” (73)
• As Landy argues, this runs counter to de Man’s argument that all metaphors are metonymic.

Landy writes, “at least some of Marcel’s metaphors indicate features of his perspective, and are to that extent necessary within his subjective world; and that we should not hold the images in the novel to standards of objective truth, since these are not the standards they set themselves,” (73-4) I agree in part. It is not clear to me that such metaphors are necessary. In what world are they necessary? It can only be in Marcel’s own world, and this is indeed Landy’s point. However, the question remains as to whether they are necessary because of some essential (and unchanging) aspect of Marcel’s mind, or whether they are necessary given Marcel’s previous experience. It is not so easy to extricate the two, and in fact to do so completely would be to miss the point. Is it perhaps possible to see through the Recherche the emergence of contigency from necessity. Any given metaphor (of this type) of Marcel’s is necessary, but only given Marcel’s previous experiences. Simply, his accrued life-experience determines how he sees the world.