To some, this imperative to discern

To some, this imperative to discern the diversity inherent in the experience of reading literature will sound achingly familiar, a reprise of the condition that animates any of a number of approaches that insist upon the indeterminacy of meaning. Certainly, acknowledging pluralism is an important step in understanding the interpretive process. In fact, as I have already noted, the idea of multiplicity has itself become a critical commonplace. Unfortunately, despite the ambitious aims for inclusiveness and diversity expressed by many contemporary interpretive approaches, they by and large remain tied to a linear system of analysis that ensures that some measure of exclusion will always inform their conclusions. Indeed, no matter what jargon is invoked to occlude the process, cause-and-effect thinking has insistently dominated interpretive perceptions for nearly four centuries through its methodical ability to eliminate alternatives in order to arrive at a definitive point of view.