Were there ever two words in the English language more fraught with ambiguity than these two? And not just ambiguity. No, that would be far too straightforward. Here we are dealing with polysemy - a multiplicity of meanings. And where there is a multiplicity of meanings there is often, indeed perhaps always, something wriggling away deep below the surface.
As writers, words and their meanings are our tools. And as with any other craftsperson with any other set of tools, we need to take care of them, sharpen them, oil them, hone them, and generally make sure that we use them just so, in order to achieve the outcome we are looking for - or at least go as far as we can.
So, ‘sensible beings’. On the surface, at least, this seems an unproblematic phrase, which might be unpicked to denote those beings who behave sensibly (clearly not human beings, then). But both ‘sensible’ and ‘being’ come freighted with lorry-loads of alternative definitions and resonances. There is an utterly marvellous book, to which I will no doubt refer to again and again in these essays and articles, as it is definitely on the way to becoming my new best friend. It is the Dictionary of Untranslatables, first published in English in 2014, as it was, of course, initially conceived of, written, and published in French. This hefty tome, running out at just over 1,300 closely printed pages, tackles with extraordinary clarity - and occasional mind-bending linguistic precision - definitions of all contemporary philosophical terms.
The clue to the whole endeavour is, of course, in the title of the work - these are terms which are ‘untranslatable’. They mean different things in different contexts at different times according to different philosophers. This may be seen as something of a gift to the writer. But, as with all gifts (‘timeo danaos et dona ferentes’ - I fear the Greeks and the gifts they bring), this comes with any number of stings in the tail. The multiplicity of meanings, connotations, echoes, developments and variations can, to slightly shift the metaphor, easily come back to bite the unwary.
Of course, you can simply juggle and play with the words, splicing and dicing them in all sorts of unexpected and occasionally impenetrable patterns, like Jacques Derrida - but, while that may be fun for the writer, it can be pretty beastly for the reader. Or, right at the other end of the spectrum, you can be like a writer who shall be nameless, for reasons that will become obvious, whose book I was sent for review, and who had steamrollered over all the words in their book so that they were as flat and unappetising as really poorly made pancakes. It made for a pretty indigestible reading experience…
Meanwhile, back at ‘sensible’ and ‘being’. There is a surprising shift in meaning for the word ‘sensible’ quite early on in its travel through the minds and tongues of people. On the one hand it can mean something you can sense - something you can apprehend with your senses. On the other hand, even as early as Aristotle, we find a ‘sixth sense’ - something which is ‘common’ to all the senses. And from there came the gradual deployment of an additional meaning of ‘common sense’ or ‘good sense’, and thence to ‘sensible’ as an attribute of someone with good sense. All this without even dipping our toes into those definitions of ‘sense’ to do with ‘meaning’ itself. That will have to be for another time, as I am keen to take a brief look at ‘being’.
According to the nineteenth-century translator and philologist Friedrich Schleiermacher, “To be is the first verb.” Which sounds pretty authoritative and solid, but doesn’t take us very far. So a brief quotation from Untranslatables, to see if that gets us any further:
The different senses of ‘Being’
We generally distinguish four main senses of being: existence, copula, veridical, identity. These senses involve several cross-cutting and complex divisions: essence/existence (quiddity/quoddity), object/subject, truth/falsehood/ fiction.
So ‘being’ comes trailing clouds of, if not glory, at the very least knotty and multi-layered complexity. And this is where we come back to the wriggling things that can exist below the surface of our writing, sometimes tugging the reader under, but sometimes, on a good day, providing a host of different flavours and resonances just below the level of our awareness. And those flavours, that resonance, is surely something it is sensible for a writer to work towards. What do you think?
As ever the elegance of the writing encourages me to explore further the topic of the week. My bookshelves, already bulging, if not yet bending, may not survive!