Dialogue on Time in Language and Literature

Author(s): Roman Jakobson, Krystyna Pomorska and Benjamin Hrushovski

Source: Poetics Today , Autumn, 1980, Vol. 2, No. 1a, Roman Jakobson: Language and
Poetry (Autumn, 1980), pp. 15-27
Published by: Duke University Press

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/1772348

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms

Duke University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to
Poetics Today

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 DIALOGUE ON TIME
IN LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE*

ROMAN JAKOBSON
Harvard & MIT

KRYSTYNA POMORSKA
Humanities, MIT

K.P. - In one of your recent synoptic surveys discussing the tasks of the
science of language among other contemporary sciences, in Scientific American
1972, you made a brief outline of the history of linguistics and touched upon
the doctrine of the Young Grammarians. Their methodology actually amount-
ed to nothing more than a history of language. Overcoming the Young Gram-
marian doctrine, which had been prevalent for some time, was one of
de Saussure's achievements. However, in his Cours de linguistique gdnerale he
again reduced the task of studying the language and system to one aspect only,
that of static synchrony. Both approaches - the historicism of the Young
Grammarians and the static program of de Saussure - were evidently one-
sided. How could one overcome this limitation?

R.J. - Time as such was and, I think, still remains a vital theme of our time.
In the Moscow newspaper "Art" (Iskusstvo), which appeared for several
months in 1919, I wrote in an article on Futurism: "The elimination of statics,
expelling the absolute - this is the chief pathos of the new time, the topical
theme of the day."
The immediate influence on our thoughts on time came from the then
widespread discussion of the theory of relativity, with its refusal to accept time
as an absolute and its insistence on linking the problems of time and space.
Another facet of the same influence was Futurism, with the shock slogans of its

* This is a chapter from the Dialogues, presenting in retrospect an autobiography of Jakobson's

major scientific ideas on language and literature. Translated from the original Russian by Benjamin
Hrushovski, by permission of MIT Press. A French translation of the book has been published by
Flammarion, Paris 1980.

o Poetics Today, Vol. 2:1a (1980), 15 -27

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
16 JAKOBSON & POMORSKA

manifestoes and its experiments in painti

was my response in the same article to
dissect movement into a series of separ
Such were the preconditions for my firs
on the antinomy between the state of a la
language, i.e. diachrony. It was immedi
realm of speech phenomena coexisting
identified by Saussure - both theore
statics, which was, in turn, opposed to
In my criterion of this conception I turn
film perception. To a question of a syn
moment on the screen? an observer wi
but by no means a static answer. He see
are running, the clown does a somersau
short, the identification of two real oppo
dynamics, is fictitious. In synchrony w
synchronic approach has to take them
namic. On the other hand, language diachrony, i.e. the observation and
confrontation of various stages of a language in the course of a long period of
time, cannot and should not be confined to the dynamics of language changes:
one has to take into account static facts as well. The question as to what has
changed and what has remained unchanged in the French language in the
course of many centuries of its development, or even: what has remained
unchanged in various Indo-European languages through thousands of years of
their variegated perpetia since their proto-linguistic unity - requires a de-
tailed and thoughtful investigation. Saussure, and in this his merit is consider-
able, gave priority to the study of the language system as a whole, accounting
for the relations between all its constituent parts. On the other hand, however -
and in this his theory had categorically to be overcome - he tried to abolish
the links between the language system and its changes, considering the system
to be an exclusive property of synchrony and relegating all changes to the
sphere of diachrony. However, as the development of various social sciences
has shown, the concepts of system and change are not merely compatible with
each other, but inextricably linked. Any attempt to divorce changes from
synchrony contradicts profoundly all our linguistic experience. One cannot
think of changes which could have been realized suddenly and totally, from one
day to the next, in a language community. The initial and the final points of a
change always coexist for a longer or shorter period of time and are perceived
as coexisting in a given community. The distribution of the initial and the final
form may vary in character: the older form may belong to an older, and the
younger to a younger generation, or both forms may be characterized initially
as pertaining to two different language styles, various sub-codes of one com-
mon code, and in this case the same members of the community may be
competent not only in perceiving but also in actively selecting between the two
variants. In other words, I repeat, coexistence and change not only don't

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 TIME IN LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE 17

exclude each other, but turn out, on the contrary

And since both the initial and the final stage belo
common code of a language system, the question
the significance of the static components of the syst
current changes in status nascendi, in the light of the
these changes. The Saussurean idea of changes w
tal" ("aveugles et fortuits") from the point of v
grounding. Every change occurs at first on a
becomes a component of the system, whereas diac
results of such changes.
Saussurean ideology excluded the coexistence of
simultaneity and succession. The result was, on th
dynamics from the analysis of a system, and on the
the signifier to pure linearity. Such reductionism
understanding the phoneme as a bundle of simult
These two mutually exclusive theses, one forgoing su
other overlooking the coexistence of elements, ea
aspects of time. We have still to dwell on the pre
impoverishment of the reality to be analyzed in ling
has not outlived the dangers of such illegitimate
analysis of language.
One must stress that both of these limiting m
investigators contradict the nature of the behavi
guage community. The language community tend
directly in the range of perceived language facto
language system are conceived as archaisms, and i
the dernier cri di la mode. This can be observed in th
and the lexical planes of language life. Time evalu
be interpreted as a meta-linguistic fact. As telling
unconsciously active attitude which a language com
distinctive features and their combinations, we
processes of the so-called vowel harmony (harmon
the unity of a certain vowel feature to all vowel
example, is the attitude towards the opposition of
Ugro-Finnish and Turkic languages, or to the op
vowels in many African languages.
I am more and more convinced that a purposeful
the process of language change helps one avoid m
standings in establishing and interpreting changes, i
of a language system. I saw it with special clarity
what seemed to be a labyrinth of prosodic relation
period of the disintegration of the proto-Slavic langu
languages. Precisely the facts of initial coexisten
development made sense and made it possible to
confusion of phenomena and to chart a picture of th

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
18 JAKOBSON & POMORSKA

the relations between quantitative and st

languages at the dawn of this existence. C
the works on Slavic historical accentology
(1900-1977) and Jerzy Kurylowicz (1895-
preted in the light of a combination of
successivity and simultaneity.

K.P. - It is paradoxical that your new att

misunderstood by some polemical critics.
method is the approach that it shows a st
of linguistic and artistic phenomena, as
standing, which is usually identified with
in the 1930's in the Soviet Union this was
by the official functionaries in literature. T
involves dividing the chain of facts into p
and present ones, in which, for some re
Thus time, too, is grasped as something w
"dynamic time," i.e. time which had pas
moment. It seems that such critics lack t
we experience time. For some reason the
unity of time, i.e. time as permanently
according to which correspondingly, phen
moment appear in their whole and mutua
out the untenability of the concept of "hist
which were especially selected and made c
such as wars and the social and politic
selection was contrasted with the rest o
occurred there. By the way, the relativity
understanding of language changes leads
concepts, according to the principle of bina
without the past, or the future without t
A similar preoccupation with problems o
teristic of creative artists in the circles o
closer to you - Malevich, Majakovskij, K
them, especially Majakovskij, drew from
conclusion, typical for the avant-garde:
overcome its unshaken movement. Ther
Possessed, Majakovskij believed that in t
guish in consciousness," i.e. will not be p
From all that has been said about the ev
to what extent problems served as a basis

* OPOJAZ-Society for the Study of Poetic Lan

Formalists established by Roman Jakobson and his

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 TIME IN LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE 19

the OPOJAZ study of literature in those years. Tynjanov

important article "On Literary Evolution," where he work
assumptions in his discussion of changes in literature, its
diachronical aspect. His article was preceded by the declara
wrote with him, "Problems in the Study of Language and
lished in 1928 in the New LEF. What led to the writing of
R.J. - It is interesting to note that the theme of a histor
attracted general interest in the science of the late 20's. I felt t
of such an approach to various spheres of human existenc
should be formulated and presented for wider discussion i
densed declarations. My proposals to the First International
guists, convened in the Hague in 1928, were devoted to
phonological systems and their historical changes. I formulated
the Fall of 1927. Having obtained the blessings and the sig
Trubetskoj and S.I. Karcevskij (1884-1955), the two linguist
personally as well as scientifically, I sent it to the Committee o
must confess that both Trubetskoj and myself were amaze
attitude of the Congress and of the famous representative f
generation of linguists, W. Meier-Liibcke (1861-1936), who
plenary meeting, which conducted a sympathetic discussion of
our proposal. And we were especially happy with the unan
behind the scenes - of the international avant-garde of our
proposals. It was this success that inspired the declaration on
Study of Language and Literature," which I formulated towards
year, in close collaboration with Jurij Tynjanov (1894-1
theoretician of literature who at that time visited Prague. Th
which Tynjanov had published upon his return home to Le
Futurist journal New LEF [Novyj LEF], evoked a number of
on matters of principle, by members of the famous Societ
of Poetic Language (OPOJAZ). Detailed information on this d
cently been made available in the commentaries to the volu
papers on literary history, published in 1977, but not one of th
published in its time, because of the official repercussions again
ent theoretical positions of OPOJAZ, which started at that
to its complete liquidation.
The problem of the immanent character of literary change
relation to a system of literary values confronted us - accor
laration - with the task of co-ordinating literary synchron
"The opposition between synchrony and diachrony was an o
the concept of system and the concept of evolution"; "it loses it
principle as soon as we recognize that every system necess
evolution, whereas, on the other hand, evolution is inescapa
nature."

Our declaration remained for half a century buried in silence in Russia; on

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
20 JAKOBSON & POMORSKA

now has it been reproduced in the Ty

cussed in the West, translated into m
international discussion. The comparat
in our declaration was important not onl
in both fields, but also in its timely
literature (and also language) and vari
context. This correlation demanded a
framework of the new and fruitful conc
explanation of the mutual relation of
ble without recourse to the confusing
dence.
It may be interesting to recall that soon after the establishment of the Prague
Linguistic Circle in October 1926, i.e. after a transition from individual thoughts
to vivid friendly debates, I wrote a long excited letter to Trubetskoj, asking him
for his opinion on my then ripened conclusion on the systematic and goal-
oriented nature of language changes and on the far-from-accidental, teleologi-
cal fusion of language evolution with the development of the other socio-
cultural systems. Half a century later, I still vividly remember my tension in
awaiting the answer of this linguist and ally, whom I admired more than anyone
else. On December 22 Trubetskoj answered in one of his most remarkable
letters: "With your general conclusions I agree fully. In the history of language
many things seem accidental, but history has no right to rest there. Any
perspective and logical consideration will reveal the general lines of the history
of language always to be non-accidental - hence even isolated details must be
non-accidental; the whole point is to discover the significance. The meaningful-
ness of language evolution springs directly from the fact that language is a
system." Trubetskoj wrote that "if de Saussure did not resolve to draw the
logical conclusion from his own thesis, that language is a system, it is to a large
extent because this conclusion would have contradicted not only the commonly
accepted view of language history, but the commonly accepted views on history
in general. Isn't it true that the only sense which one allows in history is the
famous 'progress,' i.e. a fictive, contradictory concept, which reduces 'sense' to
'nonsense'?" Trubetskoj agreed that "other aspects of culture and national life
undergo evolution as well, with their own inner logic and their own special
laws, which have nothing to do with 'progress.' This is why ethnography (and
anthropology) does not want to investigate these laws. [...] Now in the history
of literature, the Formalists have embarked, at long last, on the road of
investigating literature-internal laws: this makes it possible to see the sense and
the internal logic of the development of literature. All evolutionary sciences
are so neglected in their methodologies, that now the 'task of the day' is
directing the method of each of them separately. The time for synthesis has not
yet arrived. At the same time, however, there can be no doubt that some kind
of parallelism in the evolution of various facets of culture exists - and hence
there exists some law-governed regularity which provides the conditions for
this parallelism."

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 TIME IN LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE 21

K.P. - The commentary to the Tynjanov volume w

shows indeed what a wide response and animation
among the members of the then disintegrating O
quote some passages from preserved letters by one
people, Victor Shklovskij, responding to the call o
enlivening revision of OPOJAZ positions. Among
responses to the declaration the commentators men
and mathematician Boris Tomashevskij, the prosod
Bernstein, the prosodist and statistical researcher
literary scholar and theoretician Boris Eikhenbaum
and o'rientalist E.D. Polivanov. One would like
lines of your remark that in the late 1920's the progre
people's minds. This is true not only for scientists, but
at that time closely connected with science. The f
Pasternak. In the second half of the 1920's he turned t
which he pursued to the end of his life. To Pasternak's
["Aerial Ways," 1926], one could apply the words of Tr
tween various aspects of culture in their evolution. Past
the immanent forces of history, which are determined
the "personal" and the "general." Furthermore, he
of causal connection into which others have tried
life; for him, life relentlessly breaks out of that schem
and narrow vessel. Instead of the causal chain of
promotes the rule of coincidence whereby the his
moments overlap in their functions: both alike disa
enforced, arbitrary scheme of causality. The "histor
nak not at all a progressive, ascending line of caus
dences flowing outside of man, on "aerial ways."
It seems that it was no accident that your declarat
"On the Problem of Demarcation between Folklore
ture," was written at almost the same time as your
literature (with J. Tynjanov), in 1928-1929. Oral f
between linguistic and literary phenomena, properly
organizational and methodological activity.

R.J. - After the proposals to the Linguistic Congr

Problem of the Study of Literature and Language,"
in the late 1920's together with Petr Bogatyrev: "On
tion between Folklore and the Study of Literatu
formulated at the same time as our article "Folk
Creativity," published as a discussion paper in the P
Lud Stowiariski in 1931. We posed the problem of t
concepts "the existence of a work of folklore" and "
literature," and hence between the meanings of the
tion" and "folkloristic tradition." We juxtaposed the

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
22 JAKOBSON & POMORSKA

folklore with the broken line of the sys

The old idea of "perpetual satellites
perpetual meetings and partings. Long-
in the course of evolutions of artistic ta
system of literary values of a given mom
In short, we posed the problem of int
time, i.e. the possibility of returning to
repertoire of artistic values previously
posthumously rehabilitated and resurr
literature shed light on the nature of
languages, in particular on the distin
permits the absorption and restoratio
which does not.

K.P. - When evaluating, from the perspective of all these years, your own
ideas on folklore and literature you stress as an important element the problem
of values. One might even say that a certain shift has occurred in your thinking:
a transposition of the concept of evolution into the concept of value, which
perfectly legitimate. At the same period similar problems preoccupied Tru
betskoj. In his collection of articles On Russian Self-Awareness, he tried to
determine the social mechanism of the creation and exchange of values. Societ
in pre-revolutionary Russia was composed of two layers: an upper and a low
one. The upper layer determined and fixed the hierarchy of values; the "lowe
one" accepted it. There was a certain "flow" of the concept of values between
the upper and lower layers: a certain value which was highly thought of toda
in the upper layer could descend tomorrow into the lower layers of society,
only to return to the upper layers after having been transformed. Your declara-
tions, no doubt, touched upon the problem of the flow of values. The socia
mechanism of creating values, as suggested by Trubetskoj, of course does no
obtain today. Neither in the East nor in the West does there exist a structure of
society which could lead to such a creation of values and such a mechanism o
movement of values. Things are different and more complex. But the very
principle of such a mechanism may be useful when applied to the new circum
stances.

When, in connection with literature, one deals with tradition in

reversibility, i.e. with temporal reversals of artistic values, once
question which has been posed regarding Saussure's theory arises: t
of the coexistence of language phenomena. It appears that the fac
works in language in a remarkable variety of ways. Couldn't
precisely in this variety the creative force of language is expressed? I
that in your lectures you have often stressed that the main strength
and therefore the privilege of the speaker, lies in its ability to tr
time and space.
R.J. - It would be difficult to find an area in which the idea of
successivity would be so intertwined with the idea of coexistence a

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 TIME IN LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE 23

life of language and in verbal art. A few examples

in the perception of real speech. Speech flows ra
hearer that he perceive, if not all the elements n
what has been said, then at least a considerabl
understands words, composed of units which ha
and have passed by, and phrases, composed of wo
tion to the flow speech is contemporaneous with
synthesis," which are necessary for the understandin
neurologist and psychologist I.M. Sechonov (1829
Thinking, recognized one hundred years ago. This
elements which have already disappeared from
belong to the short-term memory. These elem
units - sounds into words, words into phrases, ph
The role of memory, both short-term and long-term
central problems of general linguistics and psycho
much has to be revised and rethought more pre
variety of findings. Louis Aragon, in one of his la
an idea which a few linguists voiced at the end of th
idea of alternation between memory and forgetfu
language, and the historical role of forgetfulness
language creativity.
The science of language has more than once thro
the question of ellipses in speech, which appear
syntax, narrative. One should admit that thes
elaborated only episodically and fragmentarily. But u
has been devoted to elliptical perception, the techniq
of omissions, again on all language levels. We hav
subjectivism of the hearer, who fills in creatively
lies the kernel of the problem which has been mu
science of language: the problem of decoding amb
An important role in all these issues is played by
written and oral language. Oral language has a pu
while written language links time with space. Wh
fleeting sounds, in reading we usually see fixed l
written flow of words is for us reversible: we c
glance ahead. The hearer's subjective anticipation
reader: he can read the end of a letter or novel b
Whereas understanding "the signifier" is closely
the relationship between phonemes and distinctive
cal plane the so-called "sound accords" (Baudowin
clusters of simultaneous senses, cumuls des signi
Saussure's disciple Charles Bally. An elementary ex
Latin amo which signifies concurrently the perso
verb, conveying a cluster of coexisting phenomena b
the flow of speech. Cumuls des signifids is typica

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
24 JAKOBSON & POMORSKA

languages, whereas languages of an agg

on the contrary allow each suffix o
thereby turn such actually coexistent
suffixes. Whereas in Latin a multitud
suffix, in Turkish, by contrast, the co
temporal chain. The combination and in
and basically opposed factors, i.e. coex
successivity on the other, are, one might
idea of time in the structure and life o
Various conflicts occur between the
the time of presentation (le temps de l
presented time (le temps &nonce). The
is especially prominent in verbal art.
speech is unfolded in time, people have
verbal art to overcome this uninterrup
guishes poetry from the static nature o
whether movement in painting is pos
poetry is legitimate. Can one convey by
tion of an armed knight riding a horse, o
such a scene be presented as a story o
sitting on his horse? The German clas
for this latter view, and suggested substi
tence in space in poetic description. Bu
J.G. Herder (1744- 1808), answered by
ry, which enable poetry to overcome t
The impossibility of combining in langu
fact that various actions exist simultan
Homer's epic tradition. As the Polish c
(1869-1944) observed, in the Iliad the a
entails the simultaneous disappearance
ters. Other poetic devices, on the contr
presentation of simultaneous actions o
time is reversible. A story may have reco
with a denouement and flash back into
may assign to the fictional reality itse
brilliantly exemplified by the most sig
Velimir Khlebnikov. In his work the ch
from the end of their life to its beginnin
about past and future in a normal, non
Easter drama, which combines a myst
conventional parodic characters, forces up
on the one hand they participate in th
resurrection of Christ, and on the other
of Easter. Thus evangelical events appea
distant past and as a repeated yearly phen

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 TIME IN LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE 25

temporal cycle. In short, presented time in speech, esp

may be either linear or multilinear, straightforward or re
interrupted, or may even combine, as in the last e
circularity. It would be hard, I think, to find an examp
more pointed expression of time.
I am convinced that the most effective experience of
verse. This is equally true of oral, folkloric verse and
because verse, both strictly metrical and vers libre, c
verbal time, time of presentation and presented time. V
acoustic, immediately-experienced speech activity, yet
structure is experienced by us in close association - w
conflict - with the semantics of the poetic text, and th
the unfolding action. It would be difficult to imagine
temporal flow which would be simpler yet at the sam
more concrete yet more abstract.

K.P. - It is revealing how the most prominent poets of

century grapsed the time factor in verse. Such very diffe
Majakovskij both considered the time element the dete
creative act of writing verse. Rhythm for them was prim
dary. Majakovskij, in his famous pamphlet, How to Ma
beginnings of his work on any new poem:
I am walking along, swinging my arms, and mooing still wi
shortening my steps in order not to disturb the mooing, som
match my pace. Thus rhythm is planed and shaped - rh
poetic thing and that which goes roaring through it. Little by
start drawing out individual words [. . . .] Where this basi
unknown. For me, it is every repetition within me of soun
any repetition of any phenomenon, which I articulate in s

As for Blok, in his article "The Poetry of Incantation

how the creative force of rhythm "lifts the word on the
and the rhythmical word is sharpened like an arrow flyin

R.J. - As the etymology of the Latin term versus sugg

idea of regular return, in contradistinction to prose, t
Latin term prosa (provorsa) suggests a forward-direct
perience of verse always includes the unmediated sensa
backward glance at the impulse of the preceding verse
tion of the verse to follow. These three intertwined ex
living interplay of invariant and variance, i.e., they s
reader, performer, and listener a constant of verse m
embellished by diversions and deviations.
Profoundly connected with the development of langua
the experience of time in the child. Recently, researche
acquisition have observed that a child often remembers

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
26 JAKOBSON & POMORSKA

language acquisition. A child enjoys ta

guistic operations are an essential too
"When I was little, I said so-and-so, b
Furthermore, whether in play or in o
affection from adults, he sometimes und
"baby-talk." An enormous role in chi
by what the profound Dutch analyst
has christened "shifters."
Shifters have long appeared to me to be one of the cornerstones of linguistics,
underestimated in the past and in need of much more careful research. The
general meaning of the grammatical form called "shifter" is distinguished by its
containing a reference to the specific speech-act in which the form appears. For
example, past tense is a shifter because its literal meaning is a designation of an
event anterior to the given speech-act. The first person of a verb, or a first-
person pronoun, are shifters because their general meaning contains a refer-
ence to the author of the given speech-act; similarly, a second-person pronoun
contains a reference to the addressee to whom this speech-act is addressed. If
addressors and addressees of a dialogue change, then the material meanings of
the forms "I" and "you" shift. The value of introducing grammatical tense into
a child's language behavior appears early, in that stage of his mastery of his first
language when the beginner at verbal activity is no longer content with immedi-
ate verbal reaction to what is happening, at a given moment, directly in his field
of observation. In his speech there appears, for the first time, a phrase with a
subject and predicate, which enables him to ascribe to one subject various
predicates and to relate each predicated to various subjects. This innovation
liberates the child, cancels his dependency on the hic et nunc, i.e., on the
immediately-given circumstances of time and space. From now on he can speak
about what is happening at a temporal and spatial remove from himself. With
the distinction of points in time and space he also learns the idea of alternating
participants in verbal communication. Into the speech of the child there enters
the idea of time, as well as the idea of greater proximity or distance in space: I
and You, here and there.

K.P. - From all you have said it follows that every speech-act and every
language phenomenon - from the phoneme to works of verbal art - inevita-
bly enter into two kinds of temporal frames: on the one hand, linear successivi-
ty; one the other, simultaneity. In this fact lies both the strength and the
relative limitation of language as a means of expression, as the classic argument
of Lessing and Herder demonstrated.
It seems that the struggle to overcome these frames, or, contrariwise, their
use for ever newer effects, determines in large part the pursuit of new kinds of
art. One of its most contemporary forms, film, strives most vividly to combine
simultaneity with linearity, which is all the more characteristic because film
combines word and image. Perhaps the most daring attempt of this kind was
made by Alain Resnais in Last Year at Marienbad. In it, images belonging to

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 TIME IN LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE 27

the past follow hard on the heels of images belon

purely technical, cinematographically literal sense. Th
signified is achieved, since the story is built upon
past and present in the perception of the characte
direction are the efforts of certain contemporary
overcome the static nature of their medium and have
means narrative-symbolic series, reflecting the flo

This content downloaded from

196.1.114.254 on Fri, 03 Sep 2021 08:50:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms