THE MEANING OF CLICHÉS

• Published in: Diacritics Vol. 44; no. 4; pp. 90 - 113
• Main Author: GRIMWOOD, TOM
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Baltimore Johns Hopkins University Press 01.01.2016
• Subjects: Adorno, Theodor Wiesengrund (1903-1969); Ambiguity; Archetypes (Psychology); Authenticity; Bibliographic literature; British & Irish literature; Cultural identity; Dictionaries; English literature; Etymology; European literature; Exegesis & hermeneutics; Flaubert, Gustave (1821-1880); French literature; Identity; Literary canon; Literary criticism; Literary devices; Literary influences; Literary translation; Literature; Mead, George Herbert (1863-1931); Meaning; Middle Ages; Misogyny; Narrative techniques; Orwell, George (Eric Blair) (1903-1950); Pedagogy; Printing machinery; Rhetoric; Self concept; Source materials; Stereotypes; New York; United States > US
• ISSN: 0300-7162; 1080-6539; 1080-6539
• DOI: 10.1353/dia.2016.0021

[...]it is not only that the new is constantly under threat of becoming old; it is that the vehicles of such a transformation are also rendered suspect. [...]any attempt to locate any kind of original meaning is increasingly subverted with the development of particular modern printing and archival practices that give rise to redrawn boundaries between meaning, value, and significance. [...]as Groys notes, Benjamin's particular distinction between original and copy is formed largely by a presupposition that the space in which mechanical copies circulate is "universal, neutral and homogenous"; as a result, Groys continues, Benjamin "insists upon the visual recognisability, on the self-identity of a copy as it circulates in our contemporary culture. [...]Curtius suggests, contradicting Kennedy, "they become clichés, which can be used in any form of literature, . . . [and] spread to all spheres of life with which literature deals and gives form" (European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages, 70).