Literary Theory

Lecture Four:
Deconstruction
 Deconstruction: Main Figures
• Jacques Derrida (1930-2004)
 Jacques Derrida is a French philosopher and literary critic.
 He wrote extensively that texts need to be deconstructed, or
torn apart, like a dissection to determine their underlying
flaws in logic and structure.
 According to him, traditional assumptions can be challenged
by unravelling the ideas that ground those traditions.
 He adds that life is multifaceted and includes many
viewpoints to exist.

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 Deconstruction
• Deconstruction is initiated by French philosopher and critic
Jacques Derrida
• It is the particular method of textual analysis and philosophical
argument involving the close reading of works in literature,
philosophy, psychoanalysis, linguistics, and anthropology.
• It attempts to reveal logical or rhetorical incompatibilities between
the explicit and implicit planes of discourse in a text.
• It demonstrates by means of a range of critical techniques how
these incompatibilities are disguised and assimilated by the text.

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 Deconstruction: Main Assumptions
• Différance:
 Jacques Derrida’s “Structure, Sign, and Play” is delivered
as a conference paper at the height of the Structuralism.
 This paper contains Derrida’s deconstruction of Saussure’s
theory of the sign.
 It announces the death of structuralism.
 Poststructuralist theory denies the distinction between
signifier and signified.
 Derrida follows Saussure in describing language as a series
of supplements and substitutions.
 But, he argues that the theory of the sign as a self-sufficient
union of signifier and signified is itself an instance of
logocentrism.
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 Deconstruction: Main Assumptions
• Différance:
 To indicate this shift in theory , Derrida introduces the
important term "différance.
 It demonstrate that language and meaning have no point of
origin and no end;
 The meaning is always the product of the "difference"
between signs, and it is always "deferred" by a temporal
structural that never comes to an end.
 For Derrida, all texts exhibit "différance“.
 He thinks that the literary works keeps its meaning
changeable and indefinite under the spatial difference and
temporal deferment;

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 Deconstruction: Main Assumptions
• Différance:
 All texts have ambiguity;
 This ambiguity denies the possibility of a final and complete
interpretation.
 Deconstruction is, therefore, regarded as a New-New
Criticism in textual ambiguities.

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 Deconstruction: Main Assumptions
• Iterability:
 Derrida puts forward the theory of "iterability alters“.
 Based on différance, Iterability is the ability of a sign to be
repeated again in a new context.
 It refers to repeated sign in a new context which stands for
new set of literary meanings.
 These new meanings are both similar to and different from
the previous.
 Repetition in text consequently creates the possibility of a
divergence or opposition within a unity of meaning.

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 Deconstruction: Main Assumptions
• The Dissolution of the Binary Opposition:
 Derrida says that the history of western thought is always
built on binary oppositions.
 Binary oppositions are pairs in which one part of that pair is
always more important than the other such as light/ dark,
masculine/ feminine, right/ left.
 The first part of the binary is "marked" as positive and
privileged over the other part which is inferior and negative;
 Derrida called such kind of system of philosophy that has
structure and centre on structure Logocentrism.

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 Deconstruction: Main Assumptions
• The Dissolution of the Binary Opposition:
 A deconstructive reading challenges the explanatory value of the
binary oppositions.
 It focuses on binary oppositions within a text.
 This method has three steps:
 The first step is to reveal an asymmetry in the binary opposition,
suggesting an implied hierarchy; The world follows a binary, or oppositional
structure: good/evil, rich/poor, male/female, smart/stupid, etc.
 The second step is to overturn the hierarchy temporarily, as if to make the
text say the opposite of what it appeared to say initially; Reversal of values
approved by society and Unravelling of Traditional Beliefs.
 The third step is to displace one of the terms of the opposition, often in the
form of a new and expanded definition. Multifaceted Viewpoints.

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 Deconstruction: Main Assumptions
• The Dissolution of the Binary Opposition:
 In this way , Deconstructive arguments try to recover the
subordinated or forgotten elements in literary works.
 Each of the critic techniques of Deconstruction is variation
on the basic idea of reversing conceptual hierarchies.
 Deconstruction critics always endeavour to make the
dissolution of the binary opposition in logocentrism.
 Deconstructionist criticism makes the meaning of a text
entirely up to the reader.

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 Deconstruction: Main Assumptions
• Rhetoric of Literary Works:
 Another technique focusing on the rhetoric, studies the
stylistics and word choices in literary works.
 More often the rhetorical features of a text undermine or
contradict the theme made by the text: What the text means
is often in tension with what it says.
 Deconstructionists can also look for unexpected relationships
between seemingly unconnected parts of a text.
 They can use the marginal elements of a text as an uncertain
commentary on elements which appear to be central.

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 Deconstruction: Main Assumptions
• Rhetoric of Literary Works:
 Deconstructionists also can play with the multiple meanings
or the etymology of key words in the text to figure out
possible conflicts or ambiguities.
 Puns are often used to show interesting connections and
unexpected tensions between different parts of the text.

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 Deconstruction vs. Structuralism
• Deconstruction rejects Structuralism for various reasons yet still
defines itself in relation to Structuralism .
• Derrida argues against the structuralist position taken by Saussure.
• They share many ideas: Similarities
 Both views try to find something outside literature by looking for patterns in
the literary texts.
 They have no particular interest in the declared intention of a work.
 They believe that abstract ordering principles are the only essential subject
matter.
 Their essential ideas about a texts reading and comprehension are of mutual
complement and their common purpose is to seek the deep meaning of
works of art.

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 Deconstruction vs. Structuralism
• Structuralism and Deconstruction outweigh the similarities:
Dissimilarities
 Firstly, Structuralism regards works of art as closed system. On the
contrary, Deconstruction takes it as open system.
 Secondly, Structuralism pays more attention to deep structure, but
Deconstruction exposes the instability of meaning and ambiguity of
language.
 Thirdly, for Structuralists, the text is static to some extent. By contrast, for
Deconstructionists, the text is more like an extending net, and element in
text keeps changing and recycling.

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 Deconstruction: Limitations
• In some respects, Derrida’s alternative to the stability of
"structure" is inappropriate.
• The concept of "free play" is controversial with the carefulness of
his reading of texts.
• It has also been liable to relativism and subjectivism.
• It is criticized as being entirely subjective, allowing no way for
others to investigate the objective standard of the literary critique.
• Despite the various critiques of Deconstruction, it has a strong
impact on other critical schools, such as New Historicism and
Feminist Criticism, which change our mode of thinking and form
a new angle of view of appreciating literary works.

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 A Deconstructive Reading of Cinderella
• From a deconstructive point of view, Cinderella is traditionally read as a story
about a young woman who suffers a lot from a mean family consisting of a
stepmother and two stepsisters.
• She is treated like a servant in a house where she believes to be her home.
• The character is a role model of a typical woman who embraces simplicity,
humility and beauty.
• Cinderella is a woman who sacrifices one’s happiness in the hope of receiving
benefits of greater value in return.
• The deconstructive reader, however, believe that Cinderella is a lame duck who
depends primarily upon what others can do (the Fairy Godmother).
• She lacks the courage to assert herself.
• She could have stopped the “harassment” of the mean family at an early stage
and have her dignity emerge by bringing about change through her
assertiveness.
• A typical woman in the old world is not likely to survive in this challenging
modern generation with such cowardice.

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 A Deconstructive Reading of Cinderella
• The fairy-tale is a food that feeds a hungry mind.
• It entertains, but does not encourage readers to climb to greater heights of
appreciating challenges and struggles in real life.
• It provides a moral lesson that the simple, humble, and beautiful will be
rewarded in the end.
• For the Deconstructionist, it does not lead readers to a direction where this
lesson can be transformed into real action.
• Cinderella is truly a story that carries a happy ending.
– However, does real life necessarily lead to a happy conclusion?
– Are there princes for every ‘enslaved’ woman?
– Do we have fairy godmothers who are at the rescue any time we need them?

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 A Deconstructive Reading of Cinderella
• The story is indeed about a character who maintains a “helpless” personality.
• Cinderella resorts to manipulations that are not within her control:
– Letting the mean family enslave her;
– Waiting for her ideal prince to come;
– Allowing the fairy godmother to let her enjoy a temporary “perfect world” that will vanish
at midnight.
• In the real world, justice means punishing who deserve to be punished.
– The wicked stepmother and the mean stepsisters have not received any similar penalty that
anyone like them deserves.
– On the contrary, in the human world, forgiveness is of moral significance.
– In the story, the humble Cinderella has not shown any sense of forgiveness nor has
subjected her perpetrators into severe penalty.

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 A Deconstructive Reading of Cinderella
• The story of Cinderella could be a chapter of a novel.
– “And they lived happily ever after” could be the chapter’s last line;
– However, this statement would not put an end to a real-life story.
– What happens to Cinderella a few years from the time of her marriage to the prince may
have been different from what happened on the night they first saw each other.
• Summing up,
– it is clear that a deconstructive reading of the story of Cinderella can enrich the
perspectives of the story.
– Such a reading undermines any sense of a specific interpretation.
– The story is read in a new way that sometimes subverts and contradicts any previous
reading.

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