How Do Images Signify? Author(s): Michael Riffaterre Source: Diacritics, Vol. 24, No. 1 (Spring, 1994), pp.

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HOW

DO

IMAGES

SIGNIFY?

MICHAEL RIFFATERRE
Whetherthey focus on the literaryworks themselves or on the historyof theirreception, most criticalapproaches give muchattentionto images. Despite its long pastand its still frequentuse, the term itself has suffered from its breadth,occasionally mistaken for vagueness. Image thereforetends to look obsolete in contemporarycriticism,whether ideologically orientedor informedby theory. In such contexts, the prevailingpracticein close readings and in reader-response analyses is to reduce images to specific tropes containing representational components,whether these tropes serve to representtwo objects at once, as does metaphoror metonymy, or a fragmentof their object, as does synecdoche. Yet the very conceptof imagery,in its traditionalself-sufficient form or in its tropologicalversion, remainsinadequateto account for the impact of the imagistic componenton readers,for its semiotic role both within the text as a stylistic device and outside the text as an agent of intertextuality, ultimatelyas a factor in the evolution and of literaryforms. In the case of the tropologicalapproachto imagery,this inadequacystems from the mere fact that no necessary relationshipexists between tropes and imagery. Indeed an image may be literal ratherthan figurative,or even literal but with a symbolic value attachedto it without the intercessionof figures. It follows that the image as a form of has representation an existence of its own, independentfrom any figurativeor symbolic use to which it may be put. A literaryentity unto itself, the image works as a mimetic device, no matterwhat functionsits contextmay conferupon it. Thus, we shouldbe able to find an answerto the questionof my title in the semanticor semiotic structure call we an image beforewe begin to worryaboutthatimage's possible integrationin a rhetorical network. At this point, a definitionis called for: an image is the segment of a text or sentence thatwe perceive as a complete or fragmentary sensory representation.I keep the word or rather becauseof its generality,for two reasons: in ordernot to have to image, despite distinguishbetween a literalimage thatrefersto its own object and a figurativeone, and in orderto emphasizethe primacyof the sensoryresponse. The image is a linguisticsign or sign system, but whetherit is a word, a phrase,or a sentence, it does make us feel or imaginewe actuallyperceive the object,be it an actor,an action, or a thing:for example, "shewas standingat the curb"or "largeblack rooks were cawing in the darkfoliage," as opposed to expressions that are only about that object: for example, "I saw her on the street" "Iheardbirdsin a tree."Thelatterexpressionsaremereindicespointingtowards or objects they do not depict, telling them ratherthan showing them. I have been careful to keep this definition faithful to a normalreadingexperience, namely, to empirical perceptionsof the imagistic, followed by rationalizations. The perceptionsemphasizethe vividness and immediacyof the reader'ssuddencontactwith the reality outside the text, the kind of relief we feel when an actual, tangible example interruptsand clarifies the relatively abstractline of a story, of an explanation,of a descriptioneven, when up to that point it has been limited to the bare essentials, to generalities,to a geometryof spatialandtemporalrelations. The example seems to flesh out thatgeometry,to invite readers'participation inasmuchas thatexample makesthem recall comparableactualinstancesin theirown experience,or recognize the stereotyped pictureof a realityperhapsless realthanimaginary,less a collection of factsthana corpus diacritics / spring 1994 3

diacritics 24.1: 3-15

of receivedideasreflectingthe consensusof a social or ethniccommunityabouttheworld at large. Thus the receptionof the image, and indeed its significance,would seem to depend on testing it againstreferents,on readers'testingit againsta knowledgeacquiredthrough experienceorlanguageorboth. These readersperceivein the image a representation they recognize, or the analogs of which they already know. In order to interpretit, they actualizethe referentto complete what the text has omitted. This move from passive to readingsuggests thatall thereis to an image's impactcan be explainedby participatory To is readersbecomingawareof its referentiality.1 be sure,referentiality a constantof the but it remainsimplicitunless thereis a need to doublecheck the communication process, referent,in the case of poetic obscurity,for instance, or when a text must be translated. The image's differencefromotherliterary signs wouldthenconsistin eliciting a twofirst a dearthor an excess in the informationprovidedby the imagistic stage response: causes readersconsciously to isolate its referent;second, they set up a model apparatus of thatreferentto verify the details if these are spelled out, or to supply them if they are at missing. In short,the readingprocess identifies referentiality the level of the text and at transformsit into comparability the level of readerresponse. Comparison,of course, begets a positive or negativeevaluation,be it pleasureor rejection. This may slow down readingonly for an instant,but this response, assuming that it indeed occurs that way, basically resembles the common practice of criticism and of more technical forms of literaryanalysis:a relianceon the one-to-one correspondenceof each word of a verbal sequence to its referentas a criterionof truthor of verisimilitudeand, within certain genres, as a criterionof realism. In the first stage of image recognitionand deciphering, the mechanismof its effect would dependon the image causingan interruption, jolt in a the flow of readingcaused by the apparentimmediacy of the nonverbal,an intrusion emphasizedby the text's laterreturnto a patternonly briefly disturbed. This view, however, raises two objections. One is theoretical,the otherpragmatic. Theoretically,thereis no reasonwhy criticsandanalystsshouldassumethatliteraryunits of significance are limited to words or phrasesbecause words and phrasesare units of meaningfor the semanticist. The pragmaticobjection is thatthe plainestreadingmakes it evident thatthe literarytext stresses imagisticreferentiality only for a fleeting moment, be as if to warnreadersthatit will soon thereafter exchangedfor anothersign-system, as or to if the image hadprivilegedsensoryrealityonly as an introduction transition a subtext the functionof which is metalinguisticor symbolic. The subtextdevelops as a derivative paradigm,unfoldinga series of variationson the imagistic given. These variantsselect to fromthe given some aspectsof its referent theexclusionof others,andthis exclusionary process is soon reinforcedby the competing referentsof the words and phrases that constitutethe paradigm. This selection necessarily modifies retroactivelythe reader's of initialunderstanding the image. These changes work in the two opposite directionsof elimination.Those elementsof theimage thatarenot factualemphasisandcounterfactual retainedby the derivativeparadigmsare suppressedor downplayed,as if the image had privileged reality only as a pretext to start generating a subtext. The subtext shifts froma relationbetweenlanguageandthingsto a relationbetweenlanguage interpretation and a type of discoursevalid only for the text being read. As a result of this shift, the sensory informationconveyed by the image is not eliminated,but put to other uses. It seems to be squandered the sake of bringingabouta new focus thatthe image per se for did not necessitate, a focus now made not only possible but indeed imperativeby the recurringinsistenceon selected componentsof that image.
1. The most recent discussions of referentiality are by Anna Whiteside and Michael Issacharoff, eds., On Referring in Literature,and by Edouard Morot-Sir, The Imaginationof Reference. On thepertinence of reference to literariness,see my "Illusionref6rentielle."

of To summarize,as a transformation the given, the paradigmplays the role of a conventional sign-system or code,2within the limits of which significance supersedes that meanings. Readerscannotnotice the existence of the code, let aloneunderstand code, until they realize that the words of a verbal sequence signify in two different ways. Separately,each of these wordssignifies in termsof its own referentandof its immediate context. But these same words togetheralso signify in termsof the one relationthey all entertain with a semioticmodelproposedby the given. Consequently,discretereferential to meaningsbecome subordinate the words' significance,thatis, theircommonreference that to thatmodel, to the invariant we can deduceonly fromthe repeatedperceptionof the writtenvariablesthatactualizeit. A code may be just a series, or the whole collection of such variables. So long as readershave not graspedthatthereis a series, its components seem to havebeen chosenarbitrarily. However,once readershave detectedthe repetition, now proclaimthatthey are the very featuresthatcausedthe componentsto look arbitrary the felicitous exemplars of stylistic aptness. As usual in literature,a fully motivated, and textualobstacle is also the key to its solution. Thus arbitrariness overdetermination connectionbeing also one more areone andthe same, the very visibility of each arbitrary determiningfactorthanksto the holdingpower andundyingfascinationof any departure from linguistic norms. In all instances, the combination of a sensory given and of a derivative subtext It the the translates concretenessof the image into an abstractinterpretation. reintegrates or into the narrative makesit the key to the cognitive contentof the diegesis. Thus, image the isolated image undergoesa process of textualization. I shall distinguish three types of textualization: (1) one image generating a hermeneuticparadigm;(2) a paradigmof synonymous images, the repetitiveness of which selects a hermeneuticconstant;(3) a paradigmof synonymousimages generating a hermeneuticidiolect. My example for the first category is Dickens's portrayalof BradleyHeadstone,the teacher, in Our Mutual Friend. It would seem that the accumulateddetails make it difficultnot to visualize the man,the moreso becausethe portrayal pitilessly underscores the fellow's mediocrity: Bradley Headstone, in his decent black coat and waistcoat, and decent white shirt, and decentformal black tie, and decent pantaloons of pepper and salt, with his decent silver watch in his pocket and its decent hair-guardround his neck, looked a thoroughlydecentyoung man of six-and-twenty. [266] Obviouslythe referencescan be verified despitethe reader'sinabilityto find, on today's streets,passers-bydressedin this manneror to recognizewhat the compoundwordhairguard might designate(it used to be a watch chainmade of a tressof naturalhair,instead of the gold we now expect for such a chain;the hair-guard could thereforebe interpreted as a cheapsubstitute,thatis, as thewatchchainof thepoorandthusa symbolof diminished circumstances). Referencescan be verified on the basis of verisimilitude(all this seems quite normal), or because of their mere precision, which presupposesthe existence of that appurtenances areworthnamingat all, or thatare presentedas typical of the person itself assumesthe functionof the referent,which boils wearingthem. The presupposition down to saying thatreferentiality works even if it is only a postulation,an index pointing
2. For a detaileddefinitionof code, see UmbertoEco,A Theoryof Semiotics[125-30]. Code, in its semioticsense, mustnot be confusedwiththepredefinedcategories describedunderthatname by RolandBarthes in S/Z. Theconcept of code as I use it in thispaper has much in commonwith T.S. Eliot's objectivecorrelative: see in his "Hamlet" [145], "aset of objects... a chain of events whichshall be theformulaof[a] particular emotion;such that whenthe externalfacts... are given [the image], the emotion is immediatelyevoked."

diacritics / spring 1994

to where a referentmight be. But the question is whetherthese images accountfor the effect of the portrait.Whatmakes us go beyond the conclusion thatBradley Headstone cannotaffordbetterclothes on a headmaster'smeagersalary? Is it because we are made to picture his outer appearancethat we deduce from it his inner mediocrity? Is this meannessin him symbolized by the narrowlimits of his sartorialachievements? does not owe its psychological significance to Clearly,the answeris thatthe portrait of descriptivedetails,but to the repetitionof decent, as if it were the only the recitation adjective the characterdeserves. Thus significance depends on the saturationof the imagistic sequence by one markeronly. Observe that the adjective itself excludes visualization,and that it is indeed no more than a marker,as if the headmasterwere a clotheshorsedisplayingan abstractentity: the conventional,and thereforehis own lack of imagination. Each of the sequential images, irrespectiveof the specific object it to represents,is subordinate a humoristiccode. Elsewherein the same novel we encountera numberof rather offensive, new-money amongthem,a whole family is satiricallysingled out by the repetition people. Prominent of the adjective brand-newto depict every piece of their furniture,a repetitionmade palpablyslantedand evaluative ratherthanaccurateand mimetic when it extends to the which is baby,which is literallytrueif comical (the babyis new), and to the grandfather, The family's name, the Veneerings, clinches the significance by clearly parodic. suggesting thatthese people's fortunehas put a thin veneer indeed on their unpolished selves. The repetitionof brand-newand the emblematicsurnameorganizethe images so that theirsignificanceis due not to theirseparatemimeticvalues, but to theircumulative effect as a type of discourse ratherthan as a lexicon. Indeed the ungrammaticalnonreferentialimage of a recent grandfatheris the clincher, the sign that the paradigmhas reached its paradoxicalclimax. In Bradley Headstone'scase, theclincheris thathe is decentnotbecausehe owns a watchbutbecause roundhis neck")andbecausethe shift the watchseems to own him ("itsdecenthair-guard reducesthe man to his paltrylooks. In short, of decentfrom outergarmentsto character as thereader "getsthepicture," thephrasegoes, preciselynotfromthepicturesthemselves transformation a matrix.That of butfromthefact thatthewhole sequenceis a periphrastic matrixis none other than the ironical proverb: clothes make the man. The images are practicallyerased as pictures and signify instead because of two factors: the comical undertoneof an insistentadjective, resultingin the implied reductionof moral decency to decent clothes, and the substitutionof synecdoches for the whole character,with a furtherimplied reductionfrom soul to body. and In the next sentence, however, physical appearance moral portrayalare reconciled and seem to refocus significance on an actualimage. This image seems to testify to the kind of keen observationthat critics like to salute as evidence of an author's sagacity: He was neverseen in any otherdress, andyet therewas a certain stiffnessin his mannerof wearing this, as if there were a wantof adaptationbetweenhim and it, recalling some mechanics in their holiday clothes. [266] has A keen observation,and yet the representation hardlybeen sketched when its function radicallychanges: its meaning as an image is hardlyallowed to linger in our minds,or does so only long enoughto implantfirmlyin reality(or rather,in the readers' perceptionof reality) a long playful derivationfrom the noun mechanics: He had acquiredmechanicallya great store of teacher's knowledge. He could do mental arithmeticmechanically,sing at sight mechanically, even play the great churchorgan mechanically. From his early childhood up, his mindhad 6

been a place of mechanical stowage. The arrangement of his wholesale warehouse, so that it might be always ready to meet the demands of retail dealers-history here, geography there, astronomy to the right, political economyto the left-natural history,thephysical sciences, figures, music, the lower mathematics,and what not, all in their several places-this care had impartedto his countenancea look of care. [266-67] The derivationdoes not issue directly from the mimetic content of the mechanic image. Despite the negative or condescending connotationsof the noun, it does not normallyentail the idea thata mechanicacts mechanically,but only thathe is a passive tool, the lowest rungof the proletariat.Adjectives andadverbshere are not relatedto the noun's meaningbutto the noun's shape,generatedas they arethroughparonomasia.The visual aspects of mechanic are canceled out, and only the behavior or the attitude attributableto mechanics is represented. Such is the effect of the pun: phonetic for similaritiesreplacereferentiality, a puninvolves two referentsandcannotmakesense their mutual incompatibility is altogether removed [see Culler]. Thus the unless significance resultshere from a retrospectiverereadingof the adverbialderivationfrom the pun, all the way back to its startingpoint, to the paronomastic whose functionis key solely to make the portraitsatirical. To be sure, the mechanicalstowage metaphordoes invite imagininga process, a sense of longshoremenat work, thus closing the circle by implying, I suppose, thata warehouseis mannedby mechanics. But this rationalization remainssecondaryto the comical impactof a fanciful code depictingthe teacher'smind as a mentalwarehousewhere knowledge lies fallow, unproductive,and unimaginative. That the rule for this code depends now on wordplay ratherthan on referentsis on demonstrated the antanaclasis3 the word care, thatis, on its being used twice, but by the secondtime with a meaningdifferentfromthe first. In any case, we have moved from the descriptiveto the evaluative,fromimagesto psychologicalanalysis. New imageswill conventionsfor the narrator's follow, buttheywill henceforthbe abstract insightsinto the (in the Freudiansense), of a character'smind: complexes Therewas a kind of settled trouble in theface. It was theface belonging to a naturallyslow or inattentiveintellectthathad toiledhardto get whatit had won, and that had to hold it now that it was gotten. He always seemed to be uneasy lest anythingshould be missingfrom his mentalwarehouse,and takingstock to assure himself. [267] A superficialcritic might feel thatpunningis a simplistic choice on Dickens's part, of whenhe hadto depictthecomplexitythatwe perceiveas thehallmark truthin a fictional The a character. enormous expansionthatgenerates wholecode froma single paronomastic given (not the word mechanic, but the syllepsis developed from it) makes up throughits we repetitiveproductivityfor the flimsy arbitrariness might be temptedto dismiss in a single pun. While referenceremainsan effective gesturetowardstruth,the referentsare not things, manners,or people outside language,but verbalcommonplaces. and The remotivation, overdetermination, convincingpower of the pun continuesto be felt down to the closure, where it spreadsfrom care to care, for the first care fits the mechanics at their level of unskilled hands, soon to be replacedby machines. And the second care inheritsthe discomfortof the maladjustedmechanics. We arenow in a position fully to perceive the basic oppositionbetween mechanical of and humanthatfunctions to motivatethe character Headstoneand the whole subplot
3. The antanaclasisis a close relation to theparonomasia or to the syllepsis: instead of two meaningsin one word as in syllepsis, theplay on meaningsis distributedbetweentwo homonyms.

diacritics / spring 1994

of which he is the protagonistfor 500 more pages, until his drowning. On the model providedby the stereotypeaboutmechanicsin theirholiday clothes, thereis a Mr.Hyde of imprisonedin this unappealingforerunner Dr. Jekyll: Suppressionof so muchto makeroomfor so much,had given hima constrained manner,over and above. Yettherewas enoughof whatwas animal,and of what was fiery (thoughsmoldering)still visible in him.... [267] The spelling out, animal versus mechanical, is the clausula correspondingto the stereotypewhich formedthe incipit of the passage and the given of the code. It is also consistent with dictionarydefinitions of mechanical applied to humans: they are like inanimaterobots. And so it will come to pass thatthis imprisonment soul rendersthe of headmaster his capableof love butunableto persuadethewomanhe desiresto return love, his capableof teachingbut incapableof humancontact. Hence his frustration, attempted murder of a rival, and his violent death, which fulfills the destiny heralded by the emblematicheadstoneof his surname.Hence the code's self-sufficient,evocativepower that no isolated image could display. The code's efficiency manifests itself more strikingly still in the second type of textualization,thatis, when the paradigmgeneratedby an imagistic given is comprised' of images synonymouswith the initialone. Eachmemberof the paradigm seems to revert to the given and thereforeto the sensory aspect of the phenomenon. And yet this aspect is notenhanced,as we wouldexpect,by a seriesof variationson thesamephysicalfeatures illustrated againandagain. Significanceresultsnot fromsuch cumulativesimilaritiesbut froma single set of analogiesthatwe extractby inductionfromdifferentimages. Equally artificialandunconvincingas mimetictropes,they arecompellingas symbols of thesame not function,an abstract property.Itis on thisproperty, on the questionableverisimilitude of their diverse representations, theirtruthis founded. that is My example is from TheGuermantesWay. Proust'snarrator describingthe first of his beloved grandmother's fatal illness. A decisive telltale symptom-a minor signs but persistent fever-reveals that there is more to the grandmother'stroubles than occasional momentsof discomfort. The passage contains an odd assertionthateach of us is chainedto an alien being fromwhom we can expect no pity when sickness strikes, no understanding, a clue to what is wrong with us. This being is our own body. We not do find relief from our ailmentsby enlisting the help of otherbeings more ancientthan those animals called "bodies." These powerful intercessors are none other than the of unlikelypersonifications substancesthatcontrolfever, like quinineand,moreunlikely "whichthe humanmind has learnedto ask questions still, the mercuryin a thermometer in orderto understand whatthe body is telling us, just as when a foreigneranswersus we from the same country"[2: 594]. I dwell on this idiosyncratic look for an interpreter the better to demonstratehow bizarre and unconvincing it remains as a mythology representation. Therefollows a derivationin five stages, each of which representsan oralthermometer, or rather,the mercurycontainedwithin it, runningthe gamut of figures from mere simile to full-fledged personification. The first is a metaphor: a thermometer acquired. Thegraduatedglass tube was emptyof mercury was for almost itsfull length. Wecould hardlysee the silver salamanderlurkingat the bottomof its little den. It lookeddead. [On alla chercherun thermometre. Danspresque toutesa hauteurle tubeetait vide de mercure. A peine si l'on distinguait,tapie au fond de sa petite cuve, la salamandred'argent. Elle semblaitmorte.] [2: 595] 8

The metaphoris not as farfetchedas one might think, since the motility of mercury makes it look like a borderline form of life, halfway between the animate and the inanimate. In effect, the animalmetaphoris overdetermined the alchemicaltermfor by mercury,now a poetic word in French,vif-argent ("quicksilver,"with quick in its old sense of "alive"). From here to salamanderthe transitionis easy, since it was believed thatthis animalcould live in the midst of fire, and fever is a live fire. There is a logic to these fancies. The link between the salamander its successive metamorphosesinto a witch, a and a prophetess,andfinally, one of the Parcae,may seem moretenuous. Thereis quite sibyl, a gap between plain animation,changinga metal into an animal, and attributing that to metal supernatural the power of seeing the future. Forwhile the personificaproperties, tions vacillate from one culturalcontext to the next (the prophetessfrom the Bible, the sibyl from Vergil, the witch from Michelet),a steady progressionrises from the tokento the class, from the type to the category,generalizingsibyl intoprophetess. The clausula to bringsthe series to its end by reverting a merecomparison,butits symbolic rangebelies the simplicity of its form, for now the dropof mercurylooks like a cross between two of the Fates,Clotho,who spins the thread life, and Lachesis,who measuresout its length. of Thus the instrumentno longer registersfever: it now portendsthe fatal issue the fever foreshadows.Further thethermometer's on, goblin, notcontentto tell thefuture,becomes the agent that makes it happen: Weshook down the thermometer erase thefateful sign, as if we could lower to thefever as we did the level indicatedon the instrument. [Nous secouames bien fort le thermometre pour effacer le signe fatidique, comme si nous avions pu par la abaisser la fievre en meme temps que la temperaturemarquee.] [2: 596] Finally, mythological discourse broadens from a succession of walk-on characters crossing the stage to a fully developed tableau vivant in which Quinine holds Fever underfoot,like a crusheddragon. The dragon'sname,Python,evokes the whole Delphic scene, complete with the Pythiaor Pythonessherself, sitting on her thronecoveredwith the skin of the foul beast. This confirmsthe fatal symbolism of the figures, but it also worsens theirdissonancewith a soberawarenessof mortality,especially as the overtones of euphuismreachthe point of self-parodywith a dialogue ending on a defiantreply of Mercuryto Quinine. Now a warderwatchingfromhertoweringbastion,the gradedtube, when Quininegrows Mercuryyields to the magic power of the drugbut swears to return tired of the contest. All this does seem the height of artifice, harking back to the mannerismsof Baroquepoetry and blendingtogethera crediblepoetic appropriation of the epic and verbal humor. Humor,however,betraysa formalconflict: none of the emblemslendsitself to actual visualization. Visualization demands there should be at least a minimal similarity between the comparedand the comparing. This is not the case. There is nothingin the that mercuryof a thermometer couldevoke the shapeof the Pythiain herpropheticshrine. Even if we were willing to go along because the corpus of traditionalpersonifications entities(Faith,Hope, andso on), the first encouragesgiving bodily shapeeven to abstract emblem, the salamander,seems to preclude the shift to humanpersonificationsof the same shapeless dropof quicksilver,or ratherthis jump from reptileto humanform tells us thatwhile shapesareirrelevant, transformation relevant. In short,mercuryhas to be is a sign for the magical, andthe magicalconsists in telling the future. Even within human and shapes,the sibyl, thewitch, theprophetess, Fateatherspinningwheel aretoo different in theirtraditional and representations, indeedin theways they actualizetheirrelationship diacritics / spring 1994 9

to the future,for any common sensory identificationto take hold. The following detail suggests that referenceis almost entirelyerased. Proustspecifies "littlesibyl devoid of reason." The sentence literallywithdrawsthe image as quickly as it is offered-within the same syntagm. Clearlythe sibyl is but a turnof speech alludingto the mercury,and thereforeno more of an image than Dickens's mechanic. It is a conceit referringto a of property the metal,thechemicalconnotationsof which makeit hardto reconcileit with those of conventionalpoetic imagery, especially in the frameworkof a contraptionas for decidedly prosaic as an instrument measuringtemperatures.Nothing tangibleis left from this filtering out of each successive representation. Something is being repeated fromone mythologicalfigureto the other,yet this somethingis not physicalor moralbut a conventional personification translatinginto a code of the supernaturala logical oxymoron or adynaton,the effect of which is the imaginaryrealizationof the impossible-to know the unknowable. If we do notcounttheonly image thatis nota humanshapeandthatI see as a transition from the factual mercury to a live entity making motion a sign of life, all symbolic characters into which the transitional salamander metamorphosed is have in common an to predictthe future---"the little sybil," "the little prophetess,"and the Fate with ability her "silver distaff." Only the word "witch"does not per se refer to the future, but a correctsthis failureby specifying that her witchcraftconsists in descriptiveperiphrasis fortune-telling. There is no more referentiality this thanin the puns we have observedin the first to as paronomasia a formal,abstractstructure, is effective as such, without type: paradox need for a physical representation. The personificationsdo not add credibility: any credibilityis unnecessaryin the first place; theironly pertinenceis the need to insertthe code intoa storywithoutcancelingout theminimalrequirement a narrative that musthave charactersand a setting. The sensory natureof the images does not weaken the thematicmessage: Proust a literaturethat confers powerfully appropriates dramaticmotif of nineteenth-century to such mundaneincidentsas medicalconsultations. The nineteenthcenturydoes pathos not expect, as we would, a diagnosis from doctors, but a prognosis. Whereas our civilization prefers to avoid the shock of a revealed future, and even hides diagnosis behindlaboratory analysesandscannerpictureswhose decodingis not usuallywithin the reach of the patient, nineteenth-century medicine provides literary narrativeswith a hyperbolicformof suspense,a favoriteinstanceof explicit prolepsis,wheredoctorsat the patient'sbedside are describedas "oracles." Balzac calls a very pedestriansurgeon"a terrifyingharuspex"[Pierrette776] or stages melodramathat a moder readermay be hardput to takeseriously: "Thesesupremejudges were aboutto decide on a sentenceof life or death. To know the last word of humanscience, he [the protagonist]had brought togetherthe oracles of modem medicine"[Lapeau de chagrin 211]. Proust,in another context, resortsto self-deprecatinghumor,and in effect one could take the passage in questionas a good matrixfor the given of the derivationwe are now discussing: "I was expecting from my physicianthat, thanksto his art, the laws of which escaped me, he would renderan oracular aboutmy healthby consultingmy innards" [1: pronouncement 561]. The last fourwordshilariouslyreferto ancientaugurs'practiceof readingthe future in the entrailsof a victim sacrificed on the altar. a into Obviously, no single image would suffice to transform modest thermometer a substitutefor medical authority,a synecdoche for the scientific man. Nor would it be explicit enough to move its usage from diagnosis to prognosis, from observation to is prognostication.Thewhole synonymicparadigm neededto achieve thetransformation of the daily measuringof vital signs (as a modern nurse would say) into an oracular, of supernatural dialoguewith Fate. The cumulativeparadigm propheticwomenproposes variousimages, thatis, a succession of sememes. Eachis a bundleof semes, fromamong 10

which only two each time will be found in the next sememe as they were in the previous one, only two thereforerepeatedand drilled into the readers' consciousness. One is mythological, the other prophesizing. The mythological silhouettes vanish, but the mythologicaltag remains as an index of a literarygenre, the exemplum(but the fable come from would do just as well). I do not mean to say thatProust'ssibylline characters such genres but that they partakeof their ethos, which is to impartlessons, and of their technique,which is to offer patentlyfictional storieswith the promisethey are nevertheless true. The paradigmI have just analyzedis thereforeimagistic only inasmuchas a lure is the neededto attract notice of readers.The mimeticingredientsarekeptjust long enough to help readersrecognizethatthe whole stringof examplesboils down to rehearsingtwo semes. It is thereforea convention that says: this is not real, and yet it is true;and this message is aboutthe latentpresenceof Fate, at times glimpsed at, a message here given in mock mythologicalcode. Fully developed images, treatedfor their own sake, would jar with the dramaof impendingDeath. The code merely emphasizes thatTime has for Proust anotherdimension, metaphysicalperhaps,undoubtedlya concretizationof the principleof the narrative,since the substanceof this foretoldfutureis suspense itself. Itremainsforus to explorehow coding transforms meaningnot only of the images the from which it derives, but of the words the coding involves, carryingthem along in its featureof the text, and stream,thus generatingan idiolect thatbecomes a characteristic of the author's style. We must also try to understandhow this idiolect can eventually as insurecommunication effectively as the sociolect does. This is the thirdtype of image textualization. I shall startfrom an establishedcode: a chronotopein Woolf's Mrs.Dalloway. The of chronotopemay be a representation space in time code, or the reverse.4 In Woolf's one novel, thetime code represents time in several spaces,one time experiencedtherefore by several characterssimultaneously,albeit from their own distinct perspectives. The functionof such a structure to solve a problempeculiarto the narrative, problemof is the anddifferenceswithinsimultaneity.Descriptivetexts do not require variety representing narratives make do with some metalinguistic, simultaneity. Nonliteraryor paraliterary marginal,extradiegeticcomment, not unlike parenthetical stage directions,such as the almost parodicphrase"meanwhileback at the ranch"in comic strips. The single time, common to all charactersbut diversely used by them (which diversity-call it subjectivized duration-generates significance) this single time is that by represented the bells of the clocks of London. Heardby two differentcharacters nothing else has yet broughttogether, they at the very least invite moral comparisons betweentheirrespectiveattitudesaboutlife. Sooneror later,these comparisonsactually guide readersprolepticallytowardendings thataresymbolicbecause they come in pairs. For instance,the code posits, between the protagonist,an idle socialite, and an unhappy and indeed suicidal proletarian,a parallelism;they are colisteners of the same bell, suggesting thatthe protagonist'sown snobbishennui is just as depressingas the acedia thatails the poor helpless misfit. This parallelismdictatesthe telos of the story,andthe telos of course is preciselythe differencethatdistinguishesthe narrative diegesis froma mere description. In short,the repeatedchronotopeis a hermeneuticindex, even thoughit is in itself open or empty, as would be the title "A Day in the Life of a LondonHousewife." It symbolizes all it does by pointingto its teleological motivation. Coding (here, the fact that the bells constitute the sensory sign of a chronotope) valorizesthe code word bell, makingit first a conspicuoussignal, second a summarizing
4. Bakhtindefines the chronotopeas "the intrinsic connectednessof temporaland spatial relationshipsthat are artistically expressed in literature"[84].

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sign. The sign summarizesin two ways: its mere appearancefirst summons up the situationsit has organizedchronologically,andit conveys in recollectionof the narrative a nutshelleitherthe significanceof theirpast simultaneity,the moral,psychological, or dramaticand narrativeimplicationsof their chronologicalcoincidence; or the actantial featuresof the actorsinvolved in the multifoldsequence of events. The lattercharacterizationis powerfulenoughto createmeaningsout of formsthatcarriednone in linguistic usage. These meaningsdo reachimagisticlevel in the eyes of the reader,butthisapparent mimesis is actually the semioticizationof oppositionalor contrastingfeaturesbetween these oppositionscreatingtheconditionsfor significancewhereno events andcharacters, was offered by the lexicon or syntax. The contrast,for instance, that such possibility doomed the early love between ClarissaDalloway and Peter, a formerflame of hers, is representedthroughthe actualizationof morphologicalfeaturespreviously dormantin language. They had lain unexploited,until the valorizationof bells occurred. the Clarissa,we know, neverwas ableto shedherprimsense of propriety, self-control that defines her social persona and that early shaped her now frustratingdestiny as a married womanandas a symbolof the conventionsandpompandpageantof highsociety. This is expressedliterallyandimagisticallyby the parallelismbetweenherpreoccupation with being on time, hersense of duty,andheruse of this disciplineas a protectionagainst passion and the dangerof letting loose. Her inabilityto let go will always keep her and Peterapartdespitethe love andnostalgia. He, on the otherhand,remainsunconventional as he returnsto England: an adventurer,reckless,he thought,swift, daring indeed (landedas he was last nightfrom India) a romanticbuccaneer, careless of all these damnedproprieties, yellow dressing-gowns. . . and respectabilityand evening parties and spruce old men wearing white slips beneath their waistcoats. [80] The gap of alienationbetween this romanticman and the woman he loves has just been made presentagain, tested as unbridgeableby the only words she could find afterthey meet again, when he leaves her house, suddenlyrealizingthathis returnto Englandhas not servedany purpose,thatit was naiveteon his partto have hopedshe would be moved: "Peter! Peter!" cried Clarissa,following him out on the landing. "Myparty to-night!Remembermyparty to-night!"she cried, and... overwhelmedby the trafficand the sound of all the clocks striking,her voice ... soundedfrail and thin and veryfar away as Peter Walshshut the door. Remembermyparty, remembermyparty, said Peter Walshas he stepped down the street, speaking to himself rhythmically,in time with the flow of the soundofBigBen strikingthehalf-hour. (Theleaden sound,thedirectdownright circles dissolved in the air.) Oh theseparties, he thought;Clarissa's parties. Whydoes she give theseparties, he thought. [72] It is quiteclear thatthe primacyof social engagementsexemplifies the alienationof the romanticfrom the socialite. It is equally clear that Peter's monologue is bitterand ironical,and thatits bitternessis symbolized by the fact thatthe monologue is utteredin time with the bell's toll. We do have an image, althoughthe image is not a mimetic metaphordirectly based on verisimilitude,on reference to a presumedreality, but on reference to an abstractanalogy: the clock's bell is to Peter's ironical repetitionof but Clarissa'swords what her punctualityis to his freedom. Reality is represented, at a second remove. Fromimage to coding, one moretransitionis necessary: the image worksfromwhat it refersto in its literal acceptationto what it substitutesfor figuratively(the socialite is 12

punctualas clockwork),whereasthe code can reversethe orderof reference(clockwork can be describedas time-conscious,or as accurateas a dutifulsocialite, mindfulof what she owes her guests). In otherterms,this reversalcannotbe taken seriously, as true,but as a parody,or a witty or quaintmannerism,as a personification,arbitrary inasmuchas it is trueas a referencewhile false as a referent:this again defines a code because its selfevidence is not a matterof experiencebut a decision of evaluating in terms of an as if hypothesis, in terms of a preliminaryagreementto a suspension of disbelief. But as a or result, whatever has to be demonstrated illustrated(here, punctualityor mechanical subservienceto a principlethat may be paralyzingor negative as indeed it is in a love situation) has shifted from the comparedto the comparing, from the sign slot to the referentslot, from the spot where what has to be proven is to the spot where the proof is supposedto be (it is now the conceptof a hostess thatproves in an ostensiblyjocularway, as a game, that clockwork is a reliable measureof time; and in so doing the hostess is presentedas an exemplarof self-consciousness,as the model of an unfeeling, unbending character,unfit for the disorderof passion). Here is the clock of St. Margaret's,whose bells ring to exemplify the mechanical in the human: "the skeleton of habit,""time flap[ping] on the mast," "feeling hollowed out, utterly empty within," or again "like somethingalive which wants ... to be ... at rest"(these sketches end on a premonitory vision of Clarissa"comingdown the stairson the strokeof the hourin white"to be felled by her heartattack"whereshe stood, in her drawing-room"): Ah, said St. Margaret's, like a hostess who comes into her drawingroomon the very strokeof the hour andfinds her guests there already. I am not late. No, it is precisely half-past eleven, she says. Yet, though she is perfectly right, her voice, being the voice of the hostess, is reluctantto inflict its individuality. [74] hereis Peterseeing herfor the firsttime Forminganantithesisto Clarissa'spropriety, afteryears in India,meeting also herdaughter, vivid reminderthatshe is anotherman's a wife: "Tellme, "he said, seizing herby theshoulders. "Areyouhappy,Clarissa? Does Richard-" The door opened. "Here is my Elizabeth," said Clarissa, emotionally, histrionically, perhaps. "Howd'y do?" said Elizabethcomingforward. The sound of Big Ben strikingthe half-hourstruckout between them with extraordinary vigour,as ifa youngman,strong,indifferent,inconsiderate,were swinging dumb-bellsthis way and that. [71] The semioticizationaffects the first syllable of dumb-bells. It cannotbe missed: so long as a bell code has been developed, it must have a term to express the opposite of Clarissa'sfrigidprimness. Hence, herlover, a manstill young andwho acts his youththe way she never did, is much alive and quite improperon her own territory(the drawing room), but in a way that can be describedin bell code as well. He thereforeis not just gesticulating,but gesticulatingwith equipmentalien to a formaldrawingroom, andsuch that,as an isolatedimage, would be totallyimplausible. The only possible reasonfor this cocky young man to use dumbbells in these surroundings,or for Woolf to risk so farfetchedan example, is the presence of the bell code, and the basic rule for any sign system, that it exhibit a complete set of polaropposites. Hence dumbbells,because the derivationfromthe narrative given andthe need to contrastthese bells with the ones that

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ring the hour combine to select a semiotic node: they are the bells thatdo not ring, and they symbolize the dumbbehaviorof a passionatemanwho will always disturbdecorum. The psychologicalsymbolismis evident,the pictureas vivid as it is improbable, and an for once the device is unquestionably image. And yet no readerwill take it seriously as a representation,for coding has underminedthe mimesis by making the referent irrelevantto the literarinessof the device. While the word still refers to weights, quite normally,andwhile the swinging motion requiredwhen exercisingwith them broadens the referentialbase and is consistentwith the pictureof a young athlete,thereis no way the representation hold its own despitethe pun. But again,the punby itself wouldbe can silly, if it were not thatthe code hadmadethe ringingof bells, normallya sign for telling time, into a sign for an orderlylife, for self-control, for a sense of propriety,and so on. Therefore, just as languageopposes orderanddisorder,the code opposes (ringing)bells to dumbbells. Consequentlythe pun is twice motivated,while it should be in itself a climax of since it is overdetermined the combinationof a coding constantand of arbitrariness, by phonetichappenstance.This coincidenceintroducesa new factorin the model I propose: segmentation. Segmentationis an operationperformedby linguists,critics,andordinary readersalike, more or less intuitively. It consists of discoveringwhat the minimalsigns are that convey meaning in the verbal sequence. As we saw before, language users unthinkinglyconfuse such signs with words, if only because spelling keeps them apart. Morphemeslike prefixesandsingular,plural,anddeclensionorconjugationendingshave similarsemanticautonomy,as linguistsknow. But readersusuallyperceivethis technical fact only when a writtenpair of opposites spells out their separateness,or when some phonetic prop like rhymeunderscoresit. This is precisely what is happeninghere: the promotionof ringing bells to coding abilityhas carvedout a slot of significancereadyto be filled outby anyprefix-likelexeme thatmight actualizethe opposition. We may now say that,withoutthe code, dumbbell would be a vulgarpun and thatwithin the code it is integratedin the significancesystem thatorganizesthe whole plot, andthereforewe arewitnessingthe birthof literariness.Or else, we arereachingthe pointat which we perceivethathomonymy,againwithina code, is a powerful generatorof literarysignificance. I shallconcludein threepoints. Thefirstis thatthe erasedordiminishedreferentiality fromthe reader'sawarenessoranyreductive of images does notentailtheirdisappearance into conveying significance instead on the partof the critic. Images railroaded strategy of theirown meaningsbecause they areembeddedin a code, andharnessed,so to speak, in the service of a common cause, are indeed no more reducedto the structure they now standfor thanthey are impoverishedby concretizingonly one or two semes insteadof a whole sememe. The reasonis thattheyareonly refocused,whichmeansthatthoseof their sensory aspects that are now irrelevantmove from a denotativeto a connotativestatus (that would be the case, for instance, for the hellenism or classicism of the sibyllic personaein Proust). Similarly,sensorymemoriesmay still lingeraboutthem in the mind or of a readerfamiliarwith theirhistoricalplace or role in a tradition in a genre. But both now reversetheirfunctions:instead of connotationsandremnants previousactualizations and of sustainingrepresentation enrichingthe image, they forma screen,motivatingand strengtheningreaders' expectations of the familiar. As a screen, their role is now to mislead readers,or to slow down theirperceptionof the code-inducedsignificance. The images are thus made more difficult, and as a result they impose themselves more far effectively onto readers'attention. The loss of referentiality, fromwasting the text's is abilityto represent, but a formof imagisticentropywhose consequenceis an increased one performanceof the readers,a more conscious, more thoroughreader-response, that is more faithfulto the letter of the text.

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from My secondpointis thatsignificanceresultingfroma code differsfundamentally thatderivedfromtropesandfigures. These cannotbe perceivedand decipheredwithout involving the principleof substitutability:no figurativeexpressionis accessible as such if somehow, explicitly or not, readersdo not have in mind a literalhomologue, or just a simpler, plainersynonym for which the figurativeword or phraseis substituted. This termfor termsubstitutionhas facilitatedmany a reductionistreading. Readers run no such risk with codes, since the coded figural components have by definition severed theirties with theirindividualliteralhomologues, and since the foci selected by the code's repetitivenesscan neverbe "seen"fromany isolatedmemberof the paradigm. Thiswas, I think,obviousin the cases of themechanics,thesibyls, andthebells. Whatever substitution mightimaginewould be impossible,eitherbecausethe significanceis not we to the sum of the meanings,orbecausethe code signifies not in termsof the distance equal betweena literalanda figurativehomologuebut in termsof an abstract configuration (for example, order vs. disorderin Mrs.Dalloway). We arethereforedealingwith a mode of thana word,a sentence,or a trope. expressionwhose basic unitis likely to be a text, rather I submit, opens up a broad avenue towards a rethinkingof literaturein terms of This, and in literariness, of literariness termsof universals.The firstsuch universalsthatcomes to mind as likely to be pertinentto codes are artifice and textuality. is My thirdpoint, which I venturewith understandable trepidation, thatthe concept of code might lead to favorablereappraisal the usefulness of aesthetic evaluation in of literaryanalysis. Aesthetic featurestend today to be dismissed as historicalvariablesor as suspect vestiges of the styles and reading practices of the embattled canon. The of sequentialnature and the overdetermination the paradigmsuggest it is time for us to that aesthetic(and semiotic) unity is pertinentto literariness. recognize WORKS CITED Bakhtin, M. M. The Dialogic Imagination. Ed. Michael Holquist. Trans. Gary Saul Morson and CarylEmerson. Austin: U of Texas P, 1981. Balzac, Honor6. La peau de chagrin. Vol. 9 of Oeuvres. Ed. MarcelBouteron. Paris: Gallimard,1955. . Pierrette. Vol. 3 of Oeuvres. Ed. MarcelBouteron. Paris:Gallimard,1952. Culler,Jonathan."TheCallof the Phonemes."OnPuns: TheFoundationofLetters. Ed. JonathanCuller. Oxford:Basil Blackwell, 1988. 1-16. Dickens, Charles. OurMutualFriend. 1865. Book 2, chapter1. Ed. StephenGill. New York: Penguin, 1971. Eco, Umberto. A Theoryof Semiotics. Bloomington:IndianaUP, 1976. 125-30. Eliot, T. S. "Hamlet."1919. SelectedEssays, 1917-1932. New York:Harcourt, Brace, 1932. Morot-Sir,Edouard. TheImaginationof Reference. Gainesville: UP of Florida, 1993. Proust,Marcel.A la recherchedu tempsperdu.Ed. J.-Y. Tadi. 4 vols. Paris:Gallimard, 1987-89. Translationsare mine, with occasional borrowingsfrom Moncrieff and Kilmartin. Michael. "L'illusionreferentielle." Litterature etrealite. Ed. RolandBarthes, Riffaterre, Leo Bersani,PhilippeHamon,MichaelRiffaterre,and IanWatt. Paris:Seuil, 1982. eds. OnReferring inLiterature.Bloomington: Whiteside,Anna,andMichaelIssacharoff, IndianaUP, 1987. Woolf, Virginia. Mrs. Dalloway. New York: Harcourt,Brace, Jovanovich, 1925.

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