There’s No Such Thing as Interpreting a Text

Positively, this chapter sets out various structural differences between literary and legal interpretation. Negatively, it criticizes views of legal and literary interpretation that attempt to derive their features from an account of interpretation-in-general. The thesis that a successful interpretation always recovers an author’s intention is specifically rejected. A “naïve” view of interpretation is defended—the one that appears when we are sunk in practical activity—as opposed to theories of interpretation (e.g., “postmodern” ones) that tend to picture it as ubiquitous and endless.