Reviving the commentary as a philosophical genre

When I was in my final school years and reading lots of Goethe, my German teacher recommended I read some commentaries by Erich Trunz. This was an amazing discovery: Trunz explained the texts on various levels and, above all, he left out none of the difficult passages that seemed impossible to grasp. When I began reading philosophy at Bochum university I found like-mined approaches, especially in medieval studies. But especially the so-called secondary literature on modern philosophy was often disappointing: True, the interpretations were often quite elegant, but they mostly bypassed the dark passages that clearly required a professional interpretation to make any sense whatsoever. The often fleeting remarks on Wittgenstein’s Tractatus and its numbering system, for instance, left me in despair. Was I not seeing the obvious or were the interpretations I consulted just not geared towards explaining the text? Only much later it dawned on me that the commentary was a philosophical genre in its own right and, outside more philologically inclined circles, a rather rare treat. These days, this is especially perplexing, given that the “diversification of the canon” requires reading unfamiliar material and thus a lot of detailed commentary. But apart from a couple of good examples (especially in classics and medieval studies), one can’t say that the commentary is exactly fashionable again. (See Barry Smith on the neglect of this genre.) Students are often entirely unfamiliar with the genre and sometimes seem to conflate it with what is known as an “opinion piece” in newspapers. After some sketchy remarks here and there, it is high time, then, to say more clearly why a revival of this genre is overdue.

So what is a commentary? – My rule of thump is that commentaries focus on explaining given texts, the linguistic forms of utterances themselves, rather than merely on ideas and arguments. Commentators do not solely attempt to say what a text is saying and what it means or has meant, but also why it is expressed in the way it is expessed. This means that the structure of the commentary follows the text and not the interpretive ideas or goals of the commentator. The beginning of a commentary is thus marked by a quotation of a word or passage from the text itself. Commentaries are often provided along with critical editions or translations of primary texts. They range from occasional annotations to “dark” passages or unfamiliar terminology to full-blown interpretations, giving background information on related texts or tracing unacknowledged sources. That said, a commentary can of course also be a part of a larger interpretation and typically occurs when a specific text passage or term forms the point of contact between different interpretations of a text. In fact, many introductions or guidebooks are commentaries in disguise. But besides critical editions of ancient and medieval texts, it’s mainly Wittgenstein’s work that seems to have invited the genre of commentary.

Why bother? – Do you know Beethoven’s 5^th Symphony? Of course you do! Most people only know the opening theme, though. Secondary literature focussing on “central themes” is a bit like that. Arguably, you need a line-by-line commentary of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus to get beyond the famous Proposition 7 (see e.g. Duncan Richter’s commentary). The point is, then, that understanding a thought, argument or concept is different from understanding a text. But if philosophers care mainly about the former, why bother with the latter? Aren’t the essential ideas enough? Getting the “essentials” of the Tractatus, for instance, is like getting a Readers Digest or worse perhaps a cartoon version of it. Nothing wong with cartoons, you say. Of course not, but why bother with philosophical texts in the first place? But here is a more important point: It is often said that the text as such only really matters, if we consider it or the author an authority we want to defer to. Arguably, then, if we value independent thinking we can bypass the textual details. However, this gets things the wrong way round. For who tells you what “the main point” of a text is, if not an authority that you implicitly defer to? As I see it, then, the supposed “main points” are taken on mere authority and are in fact the outcome of earlier textual work of past generations. It is the detailed commentary that equips you with the material necessary for independent study and thought.

How to write a commentary? – Getting a glimpse of the scholarly work going into a commentary often makes the idea of writing such a thing overwhelming. But fear not, it’s doable. Especially these days with so many searchable resources at hand, you often don’t even need to travel. Here are a couple of preparatory moves, though, that might help you getting into the right frame of mind for beginning to write a commentary:

• Pick and prepare a bit of text: Pick a text you like and find a bit tricky. Not too much: just a couple of lines. The text is your guide. So actually write it down. No, don’t copy it. Only if you actually write it, you will begin to see tricky bits. Write it down, number the sentences, underline words that you want to focus on, and highlight sections that you find tricky.
• Think about the origin of the text: Make clear to yourself how the text made it onto your screen: Is it from an early print, a student or critical edition, a translation? Who edited it and when and why? Is the spelling in keeping with the original, is there something standardized? All these things tell you something about the material basis and politics involved in the text and might matter to what you actually find on the page.
• Translation: If the text is in a foreign language, then try to translate it or write out a given translation beneath or beside it. If you don’t know the language, try to get at least keyterms. Check every keyterm and ask yourself whether you can think of a better alternative. Making a translation is the best way to see what you really don’t get. In my experience, many sentences begin to become unclear if you try translating or paraphrasing them.
• Paraphrase: If the text is in your native or working language, try to make a paraphrase or transfer bits into formal language.
• Variants: If you waver between different paraphrases, write down both or more. These are possible interpretations. If applicable: Have someone else make a paraphrase, too.

Now that you have a version of the text, you can begin with the actual commentary:

• Start with a term you find central: Explain briefly why the term is central. Try saying how its centrality affects the rest of the passage you’ve picked. Say how the term relates to (modern or contemporary) cognates (similarities, differences). Say in what sense the term is part of a terminology.
• Move on to a phrase you find difficult: Say what makes the phrase difficult for an imagined reader (even if it’s no longer dark for you): a certain grammatical feature, an unknown lexical meaning, unfamiliar terminology, strange wording etc. Now spell out some resources that help(ed you) figuring out what the phrase means: a grammar, dictionary, related texts that come with similar phrases.
• Where does the idea expressed by the phrase come from? Hardly anything you find in a text is (entirely) original. This means that there is often something to be gained from asking genealogical questions: Where does this idea come from? Is it almost a quotation? Does the terminology perhaps just signal a slight shift of interest?

When writing your commentary, there are some obvious techniques to be used:

• What if you can’t figure something out? Take the phrase and google it! Likely someone else has commented on it. Or something similar is in a different text that helps you figure it out.
• Make connections within the text: Try to see whether the terms you commented on shed light on the dark phrases. Check logical connectives and see whether they are well used. Check for omissions, enthymemes, implicit assumptions etc. and write them down. Relate these notes to other parts of the same or a different text.
• Think of audiences: Who will understand thee text better with your comments. Will it help students, people new to the material or fellow specialists? Try too gear your comments to one of those audiences. Ideally begin with students who had no exposure to the material.
• Contextualise your priorities: Even if you try focussing on “the text as such”, your interests and what you find worth commenting on will be in keeping with certain interpretive traditions. Make them clear to yourself and use them for deciding how to move forward.

It goes without saying that there are many other factors that you could take into account, but if you follow at least some of these stepts, you’ll end up with a bit of commentary on a bit of text that might present you with a way forward or a spark for doing something else with it. Perhaps you’ll extend it, move on to another text or integrate it in an interpretation. I for one will begin to make the commentary a decisive part of writing exercises for students. My hope is that we might write more commentaries in the future. In the meantime, I’d love to hear your thoughts, suggestions or about your favourite commentaries.*

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* Thanks to Susanne Bobzien, Nicholas Denyer, Michael Kremer, and Michael Walschots for some first suggestions.