Terry Eagleton

"Towards a science of the text"

K. M. Newton

pp. 171-176

in: K. M. Newton (ed), Twentieth-century literary theory, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 1997

Abstract

The literary text is not the "expression" of ideology, nor is ideology the "expression" of social class. The text, rather, is a certain production of ideology, for which the analogy of a dramatic production is in some ways appropriate. A dramatic production does not "express", "reflect", or "reproduce" the dramatic text on which it is based; it "produces' the text, transforming it into a unique and irreducible entity. … The relation between text and production is a relation of labour, the theatrical instruments (staging, acting skills and so on) transform the "raw materials' of the text into a specific product, which cannot be mechanically extrapolated from an inspection of the text itself. …

Cited authors

Eagleton Terry