Original Analects Supplement
Appendix 5Pages: [None at present]
General. Appendix 5 arose from considering the wishes of those who preferred to see our translation appear in the standard text order. We felt, on reflectgion, that this would bury the main point of our findings, which was that the Analects was written at different times, and that a true understanding of it is only possible if it is read in chronological order, against the changing context of Lu politics and other new developments. In Appendix 5, we attempt to demonstrate how powerful is the device or preposing text, in shaping a reader's perception of the meaning of the whole set of texts.
The basic principle is that prople remember best what they read first, and tend to make all subsequent impressions conform to that initial one. Appendix 5 is an extended exploration of how those later impressions (beginning with the atypical LY 1) are imposed on the reader who takes the material in traditional order.
Adding new material to the end of previous text is undoubtedly the most "natural" procedure. Why would somebody exceptionally put a new segment at the beginning rather than the end? Most plausibly, to make a statement more emphatic, or even to intentionally change the tone of the text as a whole. For suggestions as to what may have motivated the compilers in particular cases, see TOA and this Supplement for general notes on the three chapters in question (LY 1-3).
Examples of accretion, and of head and tail "framing" statements added to texts in several languages, can now [2007] be had at the Text Typology section, in the Philology portion of this site.
This Supplement is Copyright © 2001- by E Bruce and A Taeko Brooks
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