When We Read a Text
 
When we read a text, we are either read by the text or we are in
the text. Either we tame a text, we ride on it, we roll over it,
or we are swallowed up by it, as by whale. There are tbousands of
possible relations to a text, and if we are in a nondefensive,
nonresisting relationship, we are carried off by the text. This
is mainly the way it goes. But then, in order to read, we need to
get out of the text.  We have to shuttle back and forth
incessantly. We have to try all possible relations with a text.
At some point, we have to disengage ourselves from the text as a
living ensemble, in order to study its construction, its
techniques, and its texture (3).
 
Cixous, Helene.  Reading with Clarice Lispector.  Trans. Verena
        Andermatt Conley.  U of Minnesota P, 1990.  3.