Author: Julia Rosenbaum

A prominent theme throughout “My Name is Red” is representation vs. mimesis in the creation of art. When visiting one of the apprentices who he worked with named “Butterfly”, Black listens to his three parables that expand on this conflict. The third story combines those of the first and second to conclude, “that ‘signature’ and ‘style’ are but means of being brazenly and stupidly self-congratulatory about flawed work” (66). By this logic, to sign one’s work after imitating another’s style through one’s own interpretation is to reveal a flaw.  This concept around one’s signature even used when the murderer worries that he has left traces of his own style on the dead body.

If we compare this sinful association with style to a Western philosophy of art, especially in periods of the Renaissance and Baroque, we find a direct conflict. It is a common practice within the study of art history to train your eye to recognize distinguishable qualities in paintings that allow you to identify their artists.  For example, in the painting below by Caravaggio, The Inspiration of Saint Matthew, one can identify his style in his use of chiaroscuro, the balance between light and dark that provides the illusion of volume, and tenebroso, shadowy and murky light.  As one looks at Caravaggio’s paintings over time, one can begin to recognize the typical attributions of his figures.

The ability to create something distinguishable and to recognize styles of others are two qualities that are esteemed in the Western art world.  As illustrated in the novel, this difference partly stems from religion. I wonder what Western art during these periods would look like if concepts of representation for God and Jesus were the same as those for Allah?

During our class in the 24 hour reading room, one of the books we looked at was Denis Diderot’s “Encylopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers”. Published in France between 1751 and 1752, it was a general encyclopedia that also gave instruction on how to perform almost any task. We studied a long excerpt from this text in my French Literature class, and found that certain entries were infused with specific philosophy instead of simply unbiased disseminations of information.

This Encyclopedia provided thoughts that were considered to be controversial at the time, reflecting theories of the Enlightenment. According to Diderot, its aim was to “change the way people think.” The excerpt from my French class argued a concept that was widely debated at the time and still is today: if animals have souls. It also explicated René Descartes’s theory of animals being machines due to the way in which they live their lives by ‘mindlessly’ performing actions to sustain their survival – actions that could be dictated to a machine in steps.

Looking at one of the volumes in class today, I was fascinated by the versatile nature of this text. Not only do its in-depth instructions for certain tasks give us a window into what was valued at the time, but the philosophy also provides us with the emerging schools of thought. These, at the time, were all provided in an encyclopedia, which probably wouldn’t have been considered a cultural artifact. It raises the question of how or in what ways could our modern encyclopedia be deemed as antiquated in another 200 years from now?

Paratext, as we discussed in class, consists of contents other than the main text created by editors, printers, and publishers.  Each example of cover art for Homer’s “The Iliad” gave editions a certain context and would presumably appeal to different audiences.

Each story itself, without its paratext, has an authorial audience, or a group of people who the author intends the story to be read by. A narrator intentionally constructs the lens through which they tell their story, and a writer’s perception of their audience dictates the content that he or she includes.

For example, the book, “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time” by Mark Haddon, is told through the lens of Christopher, a boy who has an autistic spectrum disorder. He is self-conscious about the pre-existing beliefs and biases that people have about those with special needs. His introspection and elucidation of his experiences, two skills usually not attributed to autistic individuals, disproves peoples’ expectations of him as unintelligent, unobservant, or insensitive. His audience, therefore, becomes  people who are uninformed about and biased towards his disorder. The intention of the author thereby is to educate them.

With this authorial audience intentionally imbedded in the text, I imagine that it would be incredibly frustrating for an author if the cover art wasn’t an appropriate representation. I wonder if the wrong cover could undo the carefully constructed intended audience due to the fact that we are so affected by the visual quality of something. Below is the cover art for “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time”: