Discussing art, Trevelyan Micah's friend, Diane, says:
"Meaning is the induced state of the percipient..." (CHAPTER IV, p. 26)
No, it isn't. Meaning is the relationship between a set of images or symbols and whatever they express, represent or refer to and meaning as apprehended by the percipient is conscious cognition as opposed to any induced state which could be merely bodily or unconscious. Communication is cognitive interactions within a linguistic community, not atomic individuals inducing states in each other. I have never commented on this passage during any previous reading of The Peregrine.
2 comments:
Nothing has inherent meaning; that’s a state which exists only in human minds. What’s the ‘meaning’ of Stonehenge? One thing to the people who built it, many other things in the 4000 years since, something else again to our descendants.
Gentlemen,
The mind of the observer, contemplating a work of art, is what finds meaning in that painting, sculpture, or book.
Ad astra! Sean
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