On interpretation

What is the mystery of interpretation is not that it would be impossible: we are not able to fly, nor do we have the ability of bi-location, and no-one wonders why we don’t. Nor that it would be: we breath, walk, and again we take this for granted (which does not mean that we can not investigate the actual physiology of these abilities). Regarding interpretation the real problem seems to be that it is both possible and impossible. That interpretation comes natural to us — understanding somehow happens to us without us knowing how —, and that it is an impossible task — no matter how much conscious effort we put in to it we are in the end always defeated. The otherness of the other makes us strangers to ourselves, yet our familiarity with ourselves makes us understand them. Conscious and mechanical, possible and impossible: interpretation is always all of that, but none of it completely.

Martin Stokhof
from: Interpretation
date: 05-1997