Manfred Frank

Manfred Frank begins "The Interpretation of a Text [Textausle-
gung, 1974]" by supporting a premise that he attributes to Schleiermacher:
"Nothing is perfectly clear, everything demands the work of interpreta-
tion." The interpreter, moreover, looks for rules: rules "that determine the
grammar of a given text," grammar being "the totality of an epoch's socio-
cultural codes"; and rules by which the text is a unique expression of that
grammar.

But what is a text? Frank answers that it is "a discourse [Rede] that is
fixed in writing, cohesive [zusammenhängende], and for the most part lit-
erary." And because it is written it has qualities that distinguish it from a
speech-act. The latter "reveals a certain aspect of the world" in which it
takes place, whereas the former has no such limitations, and can refer to
any world, even one that has vanished. Understanding the latter leads to the
intentions of the speaker, but a written text is "in a certain sense indepen-
dent of the intentions of its creator."

With this distinction in view, Frank criticizes the interpretation the-
ory of E. D. Hirsch, Jr., because of the central position it accords authorial
intention. According to Frank, "writing detaches that which is written from
the meaning [Sinn] that [the author] gives his words." It is, he maintains,
"in the understanding of its readers that the text, even the biographical text,
gains a reference [ Bedeutung] that surpasses the memory of its origin." In
this way, interpretation is "creative reading": it imputes meaning.

Frank argues that there is generally more to a text than the fact that it
is written: it has aesthetic qualities; interpretation is often and "rightly as-
sociated with the interpretation of poetic (or sacred) texts." To understand
such a text "entails enjoying it as a work of art." In this connection, Frank
presents Derrida's objection to a hermeneutics like Ricouer's that "takes

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