“But unlike Paul, his alternatives present him with a "double avoidance conflict"-neither is acceptable, for to hear the plain sense of both texts means to cancel the basis for heeding either, since scripture is seen not to be free of contradiction. On the other hand, to harmonize them is to admit that one employs some type of "canon-within-the-canon" since one must choose which text's plain sense is to prevail as authoritative. The other text will be harmonized into it, as if some "less obvious" sense, unavailable by exegesis of the text itself, would give a more agreeable reading.”

“Proponents of canonical hermeneutics are either unintentionally or willfully naive here-in most cases the naivete is willful. Canonical readings simply act as if the evolution of the text is irrelevant to its meaning; usually this is because it is deemed to be more expedient for the purpose of exhorting a faith community if such considerations are put aside.”

“If Hell is where nothing connects, then being in the field of English must be the key to heaven's door! We are in the business of finding connections--within texts, between texts and contexts, between texts and ourselves, between our readings and the readings of other interpreters.”

“In his Preface to the 1892 edition of Tess of the d’Urbervilles Hardy warns the reader that ‘a novel is an impression, not an argument’. However, the text offers several explanations of Tess’s tragedy; social, psychological, hereditary, and fatalistic, all of which proceed from the assumption that Hardy’s text is in some sense determined, and that the character of Tess is somehow knowable. Indeed, the tragedy of Tess is in this sense overdetermined. But it should be remembered that the character of Tess is constructed in the text from many points of observation, including that of the ambivalent narrator; constructed that is from impressions.”

“We enter into a relationship with any text we hear or read, like the relationship with a friend, a lover, or an enemy. A relationship is the ultimate meaning of the text.”

“There are books in which the footnotes, or the comments scrawled by some reader's hand in the margin, are more interesting than the text. The world is one of those books.”