"Against Interpretation":a Study On Susan Sontag’s Critical Theory

Susan Sontag, along with Simon Povova and Hanna Ahrendtare known as the three most influential contemporary western female intellectuals. Susan Sontag has many titles, like writer, director, social activist, etc., while it is the identity as critical theorist that brings her international reputation. Sontag’s criticism involves multiple subjects (to name a few, literature, photography, disease, art and culture).This paper mainly studies her Against Interpretation criticism of literature and art.This paper consists of three chapters. The first chapter focuses on the origin of the Against Interpretation theory. It researches from three aspects:philosophy basis, aesthetics origin and social historical context so as to discover the thought foundation and social background which breed the theory. This research method contributes to gain a comprehensive understanding of the development of the Against Interpretation theory and grasp the ideological essence of Against Interpretation theory with an objective and correct view. The second chapter clarifies the ideological essence and core substances of the Against Interpretation theory. Sontag’s Against Interpretation theory was misunderstood by many people due to her assertive and fierce diction from the very beginning. Many people wrongly interpreted that Against Interpretation mean top position to interpret everything and literature and art were indescribable, which was resulted from vague cognition to the essence of the theory.To clear up this prevailed misunderstanding, the second chapter emphasizes on illustrating the ideological essence of Against Interpretation theory and explicitly points out that Against Interpretation is essentially Sontag’s moral and didactic conceptive interpretation and her firm criticism against the traditional criticism mode of binary opposition. Then the second chapter clarifies two core elements of the theory:’new sensibility’ and ’artistic eroticism’.’New sensibility’ advocates for multiple ways to treat cultures and arts, and it emphasizes on the attention on artistic aesthetics and pleasure particularly.’Artistic eroticism’ treats the text as a sexy body, attaching importance to the position where physical desire and sensibility play in aesthetics, trying to redeem language by silent formalism.’New sensibility’ and ’artistic eroticism’, as the core elements of Sontag’s Against Interpretation theory, represent Against Interpretation criticism from different angles and levels. Chapter two focuses on how Sontag uses’new sensibility’ and ’artistic eroticism’ to achieve the purpose of Against Interpretation. The third chapter discloses that Sontag is not so much an advocator as a real practitioner of the Against Interpretation theory. Her critics and practices contain her unique critical thoughts. Chapter three mainly studies and analyzes Sontag’s critic essays from her classical collection On Photography and Against Interpretation with a purpose toga in a more comprehensive and deeper understanding of Against Interpretation theory.This paper pays high attention to the development and the transformation of the Against Interpretation theory and analyzes the criticism of Against Interpretation from synchronic and diachronic aspects as well as internal and external aspects. By combining the contemporary Chinese cultural context, the paper also investigates the significance that Sontag’s Against Interpretation criticism played in China’s current literature criticism construction and intellectual personality with an expectation to find the realistic value of Against Interpretation criticism.