SPIEL Siegener Periodicum zur Internationalen Empirischen Literaturwissenschaft

Transcription

1 SPIEL Siegener Periodicum zur Internationalen Empirischen Literaturwissenschaft

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3 SPIEL: Siegener Periodicum zur Internationalen Empirischen Literaturwissenschaft Jg. 21 (2002), Heft 1 Peter Lang Frankfurt am Main Berlin Bern Bruxelles New York Oxford Wien

4 Bibliografische Information Der Deutschen Bibliothek Die Deutsche Bibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in der Deutschen Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte bibliografische Daten sind im Internet über < abrufbar. Gedruckt auf alterungsbeständigem, säurefreiem Papier. ISSN Peter Lang GmbH Europäischer Verlag der Wissenschaften Frankfurt am Main 2004 Alle Rechte Vorbehalten. Das Werk einschließlich aller seiner Teile ist urheberrechtlich geschützt. Jede Verwertung außerhalb der engen Grenzen des Urheberrechtsgesetzes ist ohne Zustimmung des Verlages unzulässig und strafbar. Das gilt insbesondere für Vervielfältigungen, Übersetzungen, Mikroverfilmungen und die Einspeicherung und Verarbeitung in elektronischen Systemen. Printed in Germany

5 Siegener Periodicum zur Internationalen Empirischen Literaturwissenschaft SPIEL 21 (2002), H. 1 hrsg. von / ed. by Reinhold Viehoff (Halle)

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7 Siegener Periodicum zur Internationalen Empirischen Literaturwissenschaft Herausgeber dieses Heftes / Editor of this issue: Reinhold Viehoff Contents / Inhalt SPIEL 21 (2002), H. 1 Erik Lindner (Berlin) Zur Entwicklung des Axel Springer Verlags ( ) 1 Jürgen Heinrich (Dortmund) Funktion und Struktur der Medienunternehmung im Wandel von Ökonomie und Technik 13 Elisabeth Kraus (München) Liberale Publizistik in der Endphase der Weimarer Republik Ökonomie und Politik am Beispiel des Mosse-Konzems 26 Karl Führer (Hamburg) Das Rundfunksystem der Weimarer Republik. Die wirtschaftlichen Grundzüge und ihre Folgen für die Entwicklung des Mediums 41 Christiane Teetz (Hamburg) Presseunternehmen im Dritten Reich und ihre Wirtschaftsprobleme am Beispiel des Hamburger Fremdenblattes" 56 Hans Altenhein (Bickenbach) Zur Ökonomie von Buchverlagen zwischen 1945 und ***

8 Jänos Läszlö & Orsolya Vincze (Pecs) Coping with historical tasks. The role of historical novels in transmitting psychological patterns of national identity 76 Dávid Kaposi (Pecs) Narrativeless - cultural concepts and the Fateless 89 Robert Haak (Gent) Specters of the past and German identity: constructing German postwar identity within a modem or postmodern context 106 László Hälasz (Budapest) Categorical recognition vs processing through imagination in fictional (literary) and nonfictional (historiographical) text understanding 122 RUBRIC Kisŏn Kim (Seoul) Zur Rezeption deutscher Dramen in Korea 140

9 /80993_122 SPIEL 21 (2002) H. 1, László Halász (Budapest) Categorical recognition vs processing through imagination in fictional (literary) and nonfictional (historiographical) text understanding Die Studie berichtet über drei Untersuchungen zur Rezeption fiktionaler und non-fiktionaler (historiographischer) Texte. Die erste Studie zeigt deutlich, dass literarisch sozialisierte Leser die Differenz mental repräsentieren können, wobei die literarische Komplexität der Repräsentation größer ist. Die zweite Studie präsentiert Ergebnisse eine Kontrollstudie, die die Genauigkeit der Unterscheidung von fiktionalen (literarischen) und nicht fiktionalen (historiographischen) Texten in Zweifel zieht. Das wird mit der unterschiedlichen literarischen Qualität ihres prozeduralen und deklarativen Wissens erklärt. In einer dritten Studie wird die Frage geprüft, wie und wieweit sich Leser mit Hilfe ihrer Imagination (nach Davis, Marks und Guy-McCarter Skalierung) bei der Lektüre bekannter und unbekannter Texte orientieren können. Dazu haben sie zum Beispiel Skalen zur Empathie mit dem Protagonisten, ihrer Vorstellung vom Protagonisten usw. ausgeftillt. Es zeigt sich, dass - relativ zum Grad des (deklarativen) Wissens - eine relativ große Unsicherheit in Bezug auf solche zentralen Parameter des Textverstehens vorliegt, dass aber - prozedural - Imagination solche Unsicherheit reduziert. Zugespitzt kann man wahrscheinlich sagen, dass das, was eine erfolgreiche Sozialisation auf kategorialer Ebene nicht erreicht, Imagination auf einer operationaler Ebene ausgleicht. Introduction One recalls from Greek mythology that narrative literature and history (or if one prefers, historiography) are the children of identical sex of memory, but poetry, tragedy, dance, music, even science are also relatives of similar degree. The Greeks, including their historians, considered the events in Homer's epics to be for the most part real. They regarded them as authentic reports. The word "history" comes from the Greek historein which means "to see" or "to know". The Greeks supposed that when an eyewitness records historical events, he does so without "embroidery", which was, of course, rather a naive idea. Certainly the works of Herodotos or Tacitus were with regard to their eloquence and use of literary devices concerned quite close to narrative literature. Let us now take a great jump in time. Even following the professionalization, in the nineteenth century there was a close connection between history, art, science and philosophy, too (Gadamer, 1972; Gossman, 1990; White, 1978).

10 Categorical recognition vs processing 123 It is worth recalling that at the end of the nineteenth century Mtinsterberg, a professor of psychology at Harvard University devoted his presidential address to the American Psychological Association, precisely to clarifying the relationship between psychology, history and poetry. If life is told as someone feeling it as personal experience, then it is poetry and not history. At the same time, if were to concentrate on the perceptions, ideas and emotions which Socrates might have had when he was in prison, it would be a psychological description. If we say that Socrates remained in prison because he decided to be obedient to the laws of Athens, we give a historical interpretation and appreciation of a will-attitude. The language of the historian is similar to that of the poet because the material itself, the subjective acts, are common. "Where the psychologist encourages the reader to take the attitude of the objectively perceiving observer, the poet and the historian speak of facts which can be understood only by interpretation and inner limitation (...) the poet and historian may use the same methods of suggestion to reinforce in the reader the subjectifying attitude which is the presupposition for the understanding of the isolated will-acts in the work of poetry and the connected will-acts in the work of history, while the psychologist has to adopt even his style and his presentation to the service of his objectifying aim" (Mtinsterberg, 1899/1994:235). Bracketing psychology for the moment, from our point of view the fundamental question is how naive readers represent the relationship between narration and history, or between poetry and history, more precisely how their socialization is successful to recognize and/or process fictional (literary) vs. nonfictional (historiographical) texts as such? Procedure Study 1 I made an exploratory study, the purpose of which was to obtain data on how literary and historiographical texts as such are represented. The task of the subjects was to consider and outline all the criteria and characteristics they customarily used when categorizing a text as LITERATURE or HISTORIOGRAPHY. Subjects 21 well-motivated secondary-school students before their matriculation examination, average age 17 and 24 undergraduates in fine arts, average age 22 took part in. Half of the subjects in both groups responded first to literature and the other half first to historiography. Results The contents of the responses concerning LITERATURE referred to author, reader and text. Who is the writer? I f I know I can have some ideas: if the author is a well-known writer it is a literary work in all likelihood (fine arts undergraduate, female 20). There is only one criterion: whether it makes the reader think or influence his/her emotional world (secondary-school student, male, 17).

11 124 Laszlo Halasz The text is connected to reality but it is not bound by it. Its language is not an everyday one; it is another sphere which is not, however, far away from us (fine arts undergraduate, female, 20). It is well-arranged and coherent (secondary-school student, female, 17). A literary genre can be identified, as we have learnt in school (fine arts undergraduate, female, 19). There is no criterion o f a literary work in abstracto. Even Double Dutch may become literature (secondary-school student, male, 17). For the sake of comparison, let s recall Garcia-Berio s suggestion (1992: 76), the most modest and therefore the most complete, definition: (...) literary reality is (...) product of a double system of options, cultural and linguistic. Table 1 shows that the majority of the responses referred to the textual variables as the most relevant information on whether a text was literary or not. In the opinion of the undergraduates deviance from everyday communication was the most important characteristic; in that of the secondary-school students formal traits in general were the most important. The average number of the criteria (items) with undergraduates were higher than with secondary-school students. Table 1. The frequencies (in percentages of all responses) o f the major criteria o f LITERATURE Categories Secondary-school students Undergraduates in fine arts Author 3 10 (familiar or not) Reader (his/her education, emotional effect) Text itself Deviance from everyday language (style, power of imagination and fiction) Formal traits in general (coherence, according to the rules of literary communication) Rejection any clear criterion of literariness as such Note: Number of secondary-school students=21, total number of their responses=58, mean=2,76. Number of undergraduates=24, total number of their responses=91, mean=3,79. The criteria formed different individual patterns depending on the relationship between them. It was quite clear that the mental representation of the undergraduates was more complex than that of the secondary-school students, as the former gave a higher number

12 Categorical recognition vs processing 125 of items and usually took into consideration a number of different criteria simultaneously. While there were only three secondary-school students who enumerated three different criteria (one or two textual criteria and one or two from among author, reader and rejection criteria), nine undergraduates did so, and another four listed four criteria simultaneously. The content of responses on HISTORIOGRAPHY referred to objectivity, subjectivity and formal traits in general. It is an objective, precise description o f historical facts; it relies upon documentary sources (secondary school students, male, 17). The historian is not free from his/her beliefs, attitudes and cannot discover facts objectively. So we have to conclude that historiography contains fiction as well (undergraduate, male, 22). It is only said to be history when it is about history (secondary-school student, male, 17). Table 2 shows that half of the responses emphasized the role of objectivity, a little one-tenth of them that of subjectivity, and about a quarter of them the role of formal traits in general. Table 2. The frequencies (in percentages o f all responses) of the major criteria o f HISTORY Categories Secondary school students Undergraduates in fine arts Objectivity (precise description, rational analysis of facts, free from subjectivity) Imbued with subjectivity and fictive elements Formal traits in general (historical theme, age, personality) Others Note: Number of secondary school students= 21, total number of their responses^ 53, mean= 2,52. Number of undergraduates=24, total number of their responses=80, mean= 3,33. A considerable number of the undergraduates linked the first two criteria, but only a few of the secondary-school students did so. In other words, for the undergraduates the objectivity of a historiographical text and objectivity as such were more problematic than they were for the secondary-school students. Independently of the subjects'educational level, rejection of clear criteria was more frequent with Literature than with Historiography. Of the Literature criteria (as opposed to the Historiography ones) extratextual criteria (referring to authors and readers) were

13 126 Ldszlo Halasz more significant. Subjectivity-personal quality was presented as an appropriate element of deviance from everyday language in the case of Literature, but there was seen as a basic source of error (i.e. as a lack of objectivity) in the case of Historiography. On the whole, the individual patterns with Literature were more varied than with Historiography, and consisted of several different criteria than with Historiography. Thus, we can say that the subjects'mental representation concerning Literature was usually more complex than about Historiography. By all means, if we should rely upon only these findings, we should think that the subjects were socialized to make clear distinctions between fictional (literary) and nonfictional (historiographical) texts when reading them. Procedure Study 2 In the next exploratory study I was interested in that following the reading of literary and historiographical texts how the subjects'responses could be characterized. (The subjects, of course, knew nothing about Study 1). One group of subjects read four texts of approximately words in length about a topic distant from their lives: the Battle of Borodino and Napoleon, and the other group (closer to their own time) four texts about the Hungarian communist leader Matyas Rakosi and his system. In each case, two of the texts were from novels, and two from historical monographs, in random order respectively. In the Napoleon group the texts were from novels by Mereskovsky and Tolstoy, and from monographs by Lefebvre and Tarle respectively; in the Rakosi group the texts were from two highly-appreciated contemporary Hungarian novels and from two monographs by Hungarian historian-joumalists. First the subjects were asked to read the texts. They knew only that the texts were published in four separate books and that the aim of the study was to obtain information on how people understand texts. When they had finished the thorough readings, they were asked to outline the similarities and differences in the texts themselves and in their effects. (Each text was marked with a letter.) Subjects Two groups take part in; well-motivated secondary school students before their matriculation examinations in each group. Results Text D (=Lefebvre), read first, was not easily comprehensible in the way a history book is. This was an objective description which required rather serious attention. In the next text A (=Mereskovsky) I could realize what the topic was only after reading certain passages. I liked the quotations from Napoleon which showed me his ways o f thinking. I liked the next two texts much more. The best was A (=Tolstoy) which seemed to me a novel I could read it easily, I could imagine the events and get to know Napoleon (secondary-school student, female, 17). In the Napoleon group the common topic was the main point for comparison of the texts. In the case of one text (Mereskovsky's) only a very few subjects tried to outline the similarities and differences by specifying the genre, but in the three other cases half did it.

14 Categorical recognition vs processing 127 Although there was no instruction to do so, each second subject identified Tolstoy s text as a part of a novel and Lefebvre's text as a part of a historiographical monograph. Each fourth subject identified Tarle's text as a part of a historiographical monograph while some expressed the view that it was a part of a novel. The topic o f all the four texts is connected with the same political system. But the system is not predetermined. People direct people. I f someone is antipathetic, he is watched (B= one o f the novels), if one is not reliable, he is shadowed (D=the other novel). The system is built on personal relations despite its high-sounding slogans. The individual career is the goal (A = one o f the historical monographs). In vain do you know your activity is immoral if you can't abandon it (secondary-school student, male, 18). In the Rdkosi group the responses were full of value judgments about the topic itself. Directly or indirectly the texts aroused personally involved reflections as the subjects had been affected by the lot of their parents and grandparents. Thus, they were less interested in the textual features. It was as though the limited number of the subjects (about onesixth of them) who specified the genre of the texts as literary or historiographical were suggesting implicitly: After all, it was just the same, wasn t it?" However, the manner of discourse and the style of the literary texts were more sharply separated from the historiographical ones than in the Napoleon group. As a matter of fact, the next part of the study is rather instructive. Following their responses, the subjects were informed of the genre of each text and were asked to reconsider the similarities and differences between literary and historiographical text. In the two historiographical texts together you can find the authentic explanation o f the Battle o f Borodino. Certainly, the two literary texts do not have too much reality value. Obviously, there is truth in their story but literature has embellished it (secondaryschool student, male, 17, Napoleon group). The texts from novels are much more subjective, much more humane. One prefers reading these even if one knows that historical truth may be different (secondary school student, female, 17, Rdkosi group). Although the main criteria were basically similar to those of the first exploratory study, there was a remarkable difference. The secondary-school students displayed a more complex pattern consisting of several criteria concerning Literature and Historiography when outlining them in general than were based on interpretation of the given texts. In the latter cases, the subjects were mostly content with one of the most easily accessible features of the related schema. These drew a sharp line between literary and historiographical text. But the frequency of general declaration of these features was much greater than that of their identification in given cases. When the subjects relied upon the texts themselves, and when topic, length and form were not instructive in this, it was not important or evident for them that the text was literary or historiographical. That is, based on the findings of this study it was questionable that the subjects really could make clear distinctions between fictional (literary) and nonfictional (historiographical) texts when reading them. May be the successful socialization of their declarative knowledge was not in accordance with that of their procedural knowedge? As a typical case it was possible, but the most refined responses showed the problem complicated because the failure of clear distinction was stemmed not necessarily from any

15 128 Laszlo Halasz deficiency in the readers, but rather from traits determining how literary and historiographical texts were processed. Novels are like essays and essays are like novels. The only difference between literature and historiography is the ratio o f the objective and subjective elements. When I wrote this sentence I realized that this was not so simple. Our objectivity or subjectivity is determined by the reality value o f the starting point. This is, however, essentially subjective (secondary-school student, male, 17, Napoleon group). I f these four texts had described an unfamiliar theme for me, the effect o f literature would have been obviously greater than that o f historical events presented step by step. But these texts had similar meanings as all o f them presented a special situation. Here everybody knows what we must feel behind the facts and recognize in the mirror o f our emotions (secondary-school student, female, 18, Rakosi group). The well-known use of well-known criteria was revised by both discussions. One questioned the two sorts of texts and their effects by means of rigid contradistinctions. And the other took the view that if the reader's emotional memory network was quickly reached by a given text, historiographical text processing resembled literary text processing. But in the subject's opinion this could only happen if the reader was stimulated by the familiarity and importance of the topic of the text. However, the other subject had serious doubts about the self-evidence of objectivity and subjectivity, of nonfictionality and fictionality. Beyond the generic kinship between literary and historiographical texts referred in our introduction, some other considerations also reinforce our subject s doubts. History and phantasy (fiction) are the two poles of narrative spectrum (Scholes and Kellogg, 1969:87). And one never forgets that Fact comes from facere - to make or do. Fiction comes from fingere - to make or shape... Fact still means for us quite literally a thing done and fiction has never lost its meaning of a thing made. Fact in order to survive, must become fiction. Seen in this way, fiction is not the opposite of fact, but its complement. It gives a more lasting shape to the vanishing deeds of men (Scholes, Klaus and Silverman, 1978:101). Man is a story-telling animal. As a child or an adult, alone or in society, waking and dreaming we speak of narratives (cf. Hillis Miller, 1990). In this way, we learn to organize and reorganize our everyday experiences. And Hillis Miller adds: we can study, perhaps invent the meaning of human life using fictions. From this point of view the extent to which the story is fictional is of no importance. Literature, history or any other texts are formed by similar operations of construction, so the (hermeneutic) principles of interpretation are basically also similar. This shows the relativity of distinction, in accordance with the way genres are blurred nowadays -- as Geertz (1983) points out. Philosophical analyses remind us of criticisms of art, scientific explanations appear as short literary texts, stories are full of equations and tables, documents give the impression of confessions, theoretical works are fashioned as travelers' guide books, and methodological problems are presented as personal memoirs. Narrative, expository and descriptive texts are mixed. One bestseller of the 1990s is a novel about the history of philosophy (Sofie s World). There is a non-documentary film the story of which is based on the French archives from the 16th century and which in opinion of

16 Categorical recognition vs processing 129 historians it portrays the epoch more authentically than historical texts. Faction is the name of this new genre which is neither fact literature nor fiction (Crowther, 1984). This does not, however, mean that despite the family resemblance (Wittgenstein, 1956), fictional and nonfictional texts were the same, and likewise does not mean that even the naive reader s text understanding mostly were the same, supposing that we are able to study its adequate indices under quantitatively comparable circumstances. I think that from that point of view it is decisive that a fictional (literary) text has a greater degree of freedom than a nonfictional (historiographical) one and the reader s imagination of a fiction is highly challenged by filling in the empty places (see Ingarden, 1933, 1968; Iser, 1978, 1993). That is, it is decisive as to whether one concentrates on a really occurred story (a nonfictional narrative) as a figure against a background of phantasy or on phantasy (a fictional narrative) as a figure against a background of a really occurred story. Procedure Study 3 Our aim was to measure and compare the fundamental variables of imagination in everyday situations and during text processing. Material The protagonist of the nonfictional and fictional texts is alike Stalin. The nonfictional text corpus is from I. Deutscher s historical biography Stalin, the fictional one is from A. Ribakov s novel Arbat s Children. The former text (1495 words) is told by the omniscient historiographer-narrator. The text covers a number of decades; some remarkable events, Khruschev s revealing stories of Stalin and the narrator's portrayal are interwoven. Internal narration is dominant. Interaction between Stalin and his closest comrades happens three times. Forty-seven personality traits and psychological states are denominated, 23 refer directly to Stalin. The extract from the novel (1589 words) presents an episode, in which Stalin develops a toothache at his resort holiday home on the Black Sea. The episode consists of a series of dialogues between Stalin and his dentist. The dialogues twice change into an internal and external monologue in which Stalin thinks of and speaks of himself in the third person singular. Direct speech act is dominant. The time narrated is only a few days. Fifty personality traits and psychological states are denominated, divided approximately equally between the two characters. Scales The fundamental individual variables of imagination are the empathetic imagination, i.e. imagination of Active situations (for instance 1 really get involved with the feelings of characters in a novel ), manipulation of visual images (for instance Imagine the front of the shop where you often go. Consider the picture that comes before your mind s eye. Now imagine the overall appearance of the shop from the opposite side of the road ), and emotive imagery (for instance Imagine yourself at a party which you are enjoying ). The phantasy scale of the Davis Interpersonal Reactivity Index (7 items), the Marks Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire (12 items) and the Guy Emotive Imagery Scale (15

17 130 Laszlo Halasz items) were adapted (Davis, 1994; Marks, 1973; Guy and McCarter 1978). The extent of the vividness of each item could be judged on a five-point scale, the direction of which was at random. For reliability and validity, correlations with non-introspectively operationalized, objective measures of imagination, and resistance in the scales against social desirability see Davis (1994:), Marks (1983, 1986), McKelvie (1995), Guy and McCarter (1978). The peculiarity of our study was that the scales were also adapted in a text- (protagonist) specific form, too: for instance Imagine yourself in the place of Stalin, Imagine Stalin s face, shoulder and body, Imagine Stalin at a party he is enjoying. Subjects Eighty-six subjects (half of them males, the other half females, average age 17.5) took part in the study. They were well-motivated secondary-school students with no education in psychology. Their previous knowledge of Stalin was, rather uniformly, limited. They were divided into two groups at random. Procedure The subjects were told that the aim of the study was to get to know how people s imagination worked when understanding texts. First the subjects filled in the scales of the individual variables of imagination (34 items in all), then they read one of the completely unfamiliar texts without information about its author or the book from which it comes, and following this they filled in additional relevant scales such as empathy with the protagonists, visual imagination of the protagonists (4-4 items per protagonist summarised), emotive imagination of protagonists (6-6 items per protagonist summarised), distributional and situational attribution of protagonists acts, fictionality of protagonists, literariness of text, and historicalness of text. Results The three individual variables of imagination were quite similar on average in both groups. Thus, the differences between the two groups depended only on processing the given textual properties. Deutscher text was more clearly judged to be a work of historiography than was Ribakov s, but from the point of view of literariness, and of the quality of style of writing there was obvious similarity (Table 3). Also the degree of empathy with the position of the protagonists also was quite similar between the nonfictional and fictional texts. Stalin s role in the shaping of the events was thought to be decisive; the role of Stalin s closest comrades and of the dentist was considered less important, while the role of the circumstances was judged insignificant in both texts. Ribakov s Stalin appeared as a phantasy figure more than Deutscher s. The visual imagination of both Stalins was similar; again the emotive imagination of Ribakov s Stalin was much more vivid than that of Deutscher s, and that of the dentist was more vivid than that of the party comrades.

18 Categorical recognition vs processing 131 Table 3. The means o f the variables and the differences between the Deutscher and the Ribakov groups Deutscher group Ribakov group p* Literary work n.s. Historiographical work Quality of manner of writing n.s. Imagination of fictive situations n.s. Empathy with the position of Stalin n.s. Empathy with the position of Stalin s comrades vs dentist n.s. Role of Stalin s traits n.s. Role of Stalin s comrades vs dentist n.s. Role of the circumstances n.s. Stalin is a fictive figure from phantasy Dentist is a fictive figure from phantasy 2.50 Vividness of visual imagination n.s. Vividness of Stalin s visual Imagination n.s.. Vividness of comrades' vs. dentist's visual imagination 2.89 Vividness of emotive imagination n.s. Vividness of Stalin's emotive imagination Vividness of comrades' vs. dentist's emotive imagination * based on two-tailed t test in the further tables as well According to the factor analysis (by principal component method) (Table 4), in the Deutscher group the factor of the greatest percentage of the explained variance was loaded by the three individual variables of imagination. Emotive imagination of Stalin s comrades and of Stalin himself and the role of Stalin s traits were decisive in Factor 2, empathy with the position of Stalin and his comrades in Factor 3. Finally, the role of the comrades traits, Stalin s visual imagination and of Stalin as a nonfictive, real figure were separated into Factor 4. In the Ribakov group the strikingly strongest factor was loaded by the visual and emotive imagination of Stalin and the dentist, the role of Stalin s traits, and the visual imagination, and imagination of fictive situations. This factor explained the greater percentage of the variance than the three other factors together. In these empathy with the position of the two protagonists, emotive imagination; phantasy origin of the protagonists; and the role of the dentist were decisive.

19 132 László Halàsz Table 4. Main data o f rotatedfactoranalysis Deutscher group Factor 1 (26%) load Factor 3 (14%) load Emotive imagination.84 Empathy with the position of Stalin.87 Visual imagination.82 Empathy with the position of the comrades.79 Imagination of fictive situations.71 Factor 4 (12%) Factor 2 (15%) Role of the comrades' traits.82 Comrades' emotive imagination.83 Stalin's visual imagination.69 Role of Stalin's traits.64 Stalin is a fictive figure from Stalin's emotive imagination.50 phantasy -.54 Ribakov group Factor 1 (39%) Visual imagination.84 Stalin's visual imagination.62 Dentist's emotive Imagination of fictive situations.61 imagination.82 Role of Stalin's traits.58 Dentist's visual Stalin's emotive imagination.56 imagination 70 Factor 2 (14%) Factor 3 (10%) Empathy with the position Stalin is a fictive figure of Stalin.87 from phantasy 88. Emotive imagination.65 Dentist is a fictive figure Empathy with the position from phantasy.75 of the dentist.68 Factor 4 (9%) Role of dentist's traits.93 As the categorizations of the text (literary, historiographical) showed significant correlations with th variables only exceptionally, these two variables were left out of the factor analysis Based on the individual variables of imagination, the subjects who belonged to the upper quartile were separated from those who belonged to the lower quartile. Our question was, when processing a text, how empathy with the protagonists, visual and emotive imagination of protagonists, and, as a frame of reference genre categorization differed depending on a given variable of imagination.

20 Categorical recognition vs processing 133 Those who could imagine Active situations were mostly able to imagine themselves in the position of Ribakov s Stalin and that of the dentist to a greater extent; their emotive imagination of Deutscher s Stalin and his closest comrades, their visual and emotive imagination of Ribakov s Stalin and of the dentist was obviously more vivid than that of those who could imagine fictive situations significantly less (Table 5). These differences were striking with the protagonists of the fictional text, as the summarised data showed, but the tendency was similar, although weaker, with the protagonists of the nonfictional historiographical text, too. In opposition to this, the genre categorization (the extent to which a text was literary or historiographical) did not depend on the imagination of fictive situations at all. Table 5. Means o f empathy with the position o f the protagonists, o f the protagonists' visual and emotional imagination, and categorization o f the text depending on high and low scores in imagination o f fictive situations Deutscher group P Ribakov group P Empathy with the position of Stalin 2.1/1.8 n.s. 3.0/ Empathy with the position of the comrades vs dentist 3.1/2.6 n.s 4.0/ Stalin's visual imagination 3.1 / 2.8 n.s 3.9/ Comrades' vs dentist's visual imagination 3.6/ Stalin's ermotive imagination 3.2/ / Comrades' vs dentist's emotive imagination 4.0/ / Summarised 3.1/ / Literary work 2.2/2.0 n.s. 2.7/2.5 n.s. Historiographical work 3.8/3.7 n.s. 2.4/2.7 n.s. For those whose visual imagination was more vivid, the emotive imagination of Deutscher s Stalin, and of Ribakov s dentist, along with the visual imagination of Stalin and that of the dentist also, was more vivid than for those whose visual imagination was less vivid (Table 6). But the tendency was basically similar to all the other non-significant differences referring to any protagonist, too. The summarised means showed that the subjects with more vivid visual imagination were able to imagine the protagonists of both texts more vividly than the subjects with less vivid visual imagination, although the difference was significant only with the Ribakov text. At the same time, genre categorization did not depend on the visual imagination at all.

21 134 Läszlö Haläsz Table 6. Means o f empathy with the position of the protagonists, o f the protagonists' visual and emotional imagination, and categorization o f the text depending on high and low scores in visual imagination Deutscher's group p Ribakov's group p Empathy with the position of Stalin 2.1/2.2 n.s. 2.3/2.0 n.s. Empathy with the position of the comrades vs dentist 2.7/3.0 n.s. 3.3/2.3 n.s. Stalin's visual imagination 3.2/2.7 n.s. 3.6/ Comrades' vs dentist's visual imagination 3.6/ Stalin's emotive imagination 3.0/ /3.0 n.s. Comrades' vs dentist's emotive Imagination 3.2/3.1 n.s 3.8/ Summarised 2.8/2.2 n.s. 3.3/ Literary work 2.7/2.0 n.s 2.8/2.6 n.s Historiographical work 4.1/4.0 n.s 3.4/3.4 n.s. Table 7. Means o f empathy with the position o f the protagonists, o f the protagon visual and emotional imagination, and categorization o f the text depending on high low scores in emotional imagination Deutscher group p Ribakov group P Empathy with the position of Stalin 2.3/2.0 n.s. 2.8/ Empathy with the position of the comrades vs dentist 3.8/3.0 n.s 3.5/ Stalin's visual imagination 3.0/2.5 n.s. 3.5/ Comrades' vs dentist's 3.6/ visual imagination Stalin's emotive imagination 3.0/ / Comrades' vs dentist's 3.7/3.1 n.s. 3.7/ emotive imagination Summarised 3.2/ / Literary work 2.3/2.4 n.s. 2.4/2.3 n.s. Historiographical work 3.9/3.8 n.s 3.2/2.7 n.s.

22 Categorical recognition vs processing 135 Those whose emotive imagination was more vivid, had stronger empathy with the position of Ribakov s Stalin and with that of the dentist, emotive imagination of Deutscher s Stalin and Ribakov s dentist, and visual imagination of Ribakov s Stalin and the dentist, was more vivid than those whose emotive imagination was less vivid (Table 7). But the tendency was basically similar to all the other non-significant differences referring to any protagonist, at all. The summarised means showed that the subjects with more vivid emotive imagination were able to imagine Ribakov's protagonists visually more vividly than Deutscher's protagonists. At the same time, the genre categorization did not depend on the emotive imagination at all. Discussion The nonfictional historiographical text was judged to a greater extent historiographical than literary by its readers, which did not happen to the fictional literary text. At the same time both texts were judged to be moderately literary and of a middling quality of style of writing by their readers. That is, the subjects categorical judgments differed between the texts along the dimension of historicalness, but not at all of literariness and quality. The subjects could recognise the genre more certainly when processing a historiographical than a literary text, which is in accordance with the fact that the not-easily-recognisable cues for high esteem decisively belong to latter one. We should remember that when categorising a text as it was literary or not, the name of (the well-known) author (of high prestige) proved to be an essential point even in the subjects opinion based on the first exploratory study. As a matter of fact, owing to the usual conditions of socialization it is much more difficult to learn how to recognise the genre (and the quality) of an unfamiliar text merely by relying upon its inner features than by relying upon the frame of reference given by a familiar and famous writer. That is, the knowledge of the name of the author in a given case causes simple declarative knowledge to appear though it were a real procedural knowledge. By eliminating this factor in our study, we can be sure that the text processing through imagination is aroused by the text, itself. Thus, it is remarkable that the fictional text on the whole received a higher, albeit not strikingly higher, average score of imagination than the nonfictional one. Besides, the imagination of the protagonists interwoven with the individual variables of imagination - the latter were organised into a separate factor with the nonfictional text-readers - formed an exceptionally strong factor with the fictional text-readers. At the same time, the protagonists of the fictional text had identical signs, while the protagonist of the nonfictional text had an opposite sign, referring to the different direction of the phantasy origin. Focusing on the subjects with higher average scores in any individual variable of imagination, it is clear that they imagined the protagonists of both texts more vividly than did the subjects with lover average scores, a result that seems to be a mere banality or tautology. Although the genre categorization did not depend on the success of imagination of fictive situation, or that of emotive imagination, the difference between the sub-

23 136 László Halász jects with high and low average scores for these kinds of imagination was especially significant with regard to the imagining of the protagonists of the fictional text. This was observed more moderately between the subjects with more and less vivid visual imagination. These results, however, are not banal or tautological at all. Fiction, literature, nonfiction however much these are not clear categories, however much the naive subjects categorical genre judgments are uncertain in the absence of any external information, and however much their procedural knowledge is not in accordance with their declarative one in that respect, fiction-nonfiction dimension is fundamental according to their really working imagination comprehending protagonists of a text. The two poles of this dimension actualise a consistently different pattern as to the vividness of variables of imagination during text processing, as to the organisation of these variables, and as to the subjects traits of imagination existing (even) independently of any text. Sharpening the phenomenon, we may say that what socialization is not able to reach on a categorical level, imagination realises on an operational level. Imagination, especially the intentional and subjective mental imagery of quasiperceptual characteristics such as vividness, makes it possible to control the mental simulation of sequences of actions without any great energy investment or risk. One can evaluate possible outcomes and consequences of alternative future actions, one can acquire competence without the constraint of making actions physically. Thus the imager "enables to generate a continuous sequence of interacting processes consisting of goals, schemata, actions, objects and affects. Marks (1999:579) compares these processes - perhaps with a reasonable exaggeration - to "those of the scientist establishing theories and hypotheses and tested them using controlled investigation (...) the conscious mental imagery serves a basic adaptive function on enabling each person to prepare, rehearse and perfect his or her actions. Reading a narrative text is par excellence a situation in which the receiver is not pushed by the constraint of action; his/her information processing is not pressed by any direct practical consequences, and in this suspended state his/her cognitive activity leaves a greater freedom for the play of imagination than is usual under everyday circumstances (for some other aspects see Halasz, 2001). It not only permits the imagination to soar, but also requires its intentional effort (adaptive function), because grasping the meaning is interwoven with the imaginary (re)construction of protagonists - within the frame of a united narrative mode with fictional narratives even more markedly than with nonfictional ones. References Crowther, Bruce, Hollywood Faction: Reality and Myth in the Movies. Columbus: London. Davis, H. Mark, Empathy. Madison, Brown and Benchmark, Gadamer, Hans Georg, Wahrheit und Methode: Grundzüge einer philosophischen Hermeneutik. 3rd. ed. Tübingen:Mohr. Garcia-Berio, Antonio, A Theory o f Literary Text. Berlin-New York: Gruyter.

24 Categorical recognition vs processing 137 Geertz, Clifford, "Blurred Genres: The Refiguration of Social Thought." in: Geertz, C Local Knowledge: Further Essays in Interpretive Anthropology. New York: Basic Books: Gossman, Lionel, Between History and Literature. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Guy, E. Mary, & Robert E. McCarter, "A scale to measure emotive imagery." Perceptual and Motor Skills, 46: Halasz, Läszlö, 2001.Psychological differences of reception between literary (fictive) and historiographical (nonfictive) texts. Journal o f Literary S e m a n tic s, Hillis Miller, Joseph, "Narrative". In: Lentricchia, F. and Th. McLaughlin, (eds.), Critical Terms for Literary Study. Chicago - London: University of Chicago Press. Ingarden, Roman, Das Literarische Kunstwerk. Tübingen: Niemeyer. Ingarden, Roman, 1968.Von Erkennen das Literarischen Kunstwerks. Tübingen: Niemeyer. Iser, Wolfgang, The Act o f Reading: A Theory o f Aesthetic Response. London, Routledge and Kegan Paul. Iser, Wolfgang, The Fictive and the Imaginary: Charting Literary Anthropology. Baltimore-London, John Hopkins University. Marks, F. David, "Visual imagery differences in the recall of pictures". British Journal o f Psychology, 64, 1, Marks, F, David, "In defense of imaginary questionnaires." Scandinavian Journal o f Psychology, 24, Marks, F. David, "Toward a new structural theory of image formation." In: Marks, D.E (ed.), Theories o f Image Formation, New York, Brandon, Marks, F. David, "Consciousness, mental imagery and action." British Journal o f Psychology, 90, McKelvie, J. Stuart, "The VVIQ as a psychometric test of individual differences in visual imagery vividness. A critical quantitative review and plea direction." Journal o f Mental Imagery, 18, Münsterberg, Hans, 1899/1994 Psychology and History. Psychological Review, 101: Scholes, Robert & Robert, Kellogg, The Nature o f Narrative. Oxford-New York: Oxford University Press. Scholes, Robert, Carl, H. Klaus and Michael, Silverman, Elements o f Literature. New York: Oxford. White, Hayden, Tropics and Discourse: Essays in Cultural Historicism. Baltimore: John Hopkins University. Wittgenstein, Ludwig, Philosophical Investigations. New York: Macmillan. The present study has been financially supported by the Hungarian National Research Foundation (No T and T ).

25 138 Laszlo Halasz author s address: Laszlo Halasz Research Institute for Psychology o f the Hungarian Academy o f Sciences Box Budapest halasz@mtapi.hu