In Outlines of Skepticism, Sextus Empiricus arrives at suspension of judgement by what he terms equipollence, the equal pulling tension of infinite sets of point and counterpoint in metaphysical dispute (10). In this case, infinitude is rendered as suspension of judgement. He describes the "older skeptics" as employing ten modes of concluding to suspension of judgement, the third being "that depending on the differing constitutions of the sense-organs" (Outlines 13). Empiricus uses the power of the mirror to demonstrate this third mode: "Mirrors, depending on their differing constructions, sometimes show external objects as minute (e.g. concave mirrors), sometimes as elongate and narrow (convex mirros); and some of them show the head of the person reflected at the bottom and their feet at the top" (15). The echoes of this portion of Empiricus' text in William's discourse are obvious. By weaving the notions of ancient skepticism into William and Adso's first journey into the labyrinth, Eco places infinitude in the form of suspension of judgement, synecdochical for ancient skepticism, within the labyrinth. Moreover, by William's reference to his spectacles as mirrors, instruments of distortion, Eco locates William in a labyrinth that extends beyond the library.
Eco explores the novel as a labyrinth of conjecturality in "Postscript to
The Name of the Rose." He asserts that readers of detective fiction are
enthralled by nothing other than the fundamental question that detective
fiction shares with metaphysical inquiry: who is guilty? The reader is
infatuated with conjecturality. "An abstract model of conjecturality is the
labyrinth," Eco posits, and elaborates: "The rhizome [kind of labyrinth] is
so constructed that every path can be connected with every other one. It has
no center, no periphery, no exit, because it is potentially infinite. The
space of conjecture is a rhizome space. The labyrinth of my library is still
a mannerist labyrinth, but the world in which William realizes he is living
already has a rhizome structure: that is, it can be structured but is never
structured definitively" (NR 525-6). Eco places William along with his
readers in a labyrinth of conjecturality. Conjecture defined as an
"inference from defective or presumptive evidence" or a "proposition before
it has been proved or disproved" (Merriam-Webster) is synonymous with
suspension of judgement: both acts occur in an environment of
inconclusiveness; an awareness of the inconclusiveness of knowledge is built
into both acts. Eco locates suspension of judgement within the labyrinth of
conjecturality as within the labyrinthine library. Perhaps his play with
suspension of judgement is immanent to his game with the reader. Perhaps the
model reader is one who suspends judgement infinitely in response to the
inconclusiveness of the novel-labyrinth.
Reference:
Sextus Empiricus, Outlines of Ancient Skepticism. trans. Julia Annas and
Jonathan Barnes. Cambridge University Press 1994.
"I heard something like the hiss of a thousand serpents"
(p. 175): [Mike Almony comments] This passage reflects the content in Dyan Elliot's article "Pollution,
Illusion, and Masculine Disarray: Nocturnal Emissions and the Sexuality of
the Clergy". Constructing Medieval Sexuality (ed. Karma Lochrie,
Peggy McCracken, and James A. Schultz) Minneapolis: University of Minnesota
Press, 1997 which states: "Thus a demon would first pose as a succubus,
garnering the unsuspecting human male's seed, next would transport it at
dizzying speed (so none of the heat of its generative virtue would be
lost), and then would shapeshift into a male-seeming incubus. In this form
it would impregnate a woman."
Although the abstract from the article quoted is relative to the discourse
on nocturnal emissions of monks during sleep, the passage above from The
Name of the Rose does reflect this imagery of sucubus and
incubus demonology.
Later in the novel this imagery is put on the reversal (page 277) which
Adso narrates: "Into my feverish mind came abruptly the ghost of Berengar
[Incubus], swollen with water, and I shuddered with revulsion and pity.
Then, as if to dispel that lemur, my mind turned to other images of which
the memory was a fresh receptale, and I could not avoid seeing, clear
before my eyes.... the image of the girl [sucubus], beautiful and
terrible....."
Though both passages do not have the sucubus and
incubus terminology directly referenced, there is a mentioning of it
on page 242 of The Name of the Rose when Adso is in the kitchen
remembering that he was "driven by an intoxication not unlike the one that
had gripped [him] when [he] was having visions" and it is here where Adso
is trying to "...get away from the moaning thing that was certainly a
succubus summoned for me by the Evil One".
Through hindsight, Adso realizes that the sucubus and incubus encounters as
a result of being intoxicated in the library is the same encounter he
presumes is happening to him in the kitchen.
"suddenly, in the center of one
room, I felt an invisible hand stroke my cheek" (p. 177) [Andrew Pegman comments] While there are
clearly elements of the supernatural element here, if we remember earlier in
the novel Adso's cheek was stroked by a more visible character. After
William's discussion with Ubertino, Ubertino asks "Why must we talk of these
sad things and frighten this young friend of ours?' He looked at me with his
pale-blue eyes, grazing my cheek with his long-white fingers and I
instinctively almost withdrew..." (61). Eco uses intertexuality within his
own novel and the ghostly fingers clearly parallel one another.
There is also an unmistakable reference to the lust for young boys. Adso
later admits himself at having impure thoughts upon seeing the fresh-faced
young boys in church. These fingers across the cheek represent more than the
chilling supernatural, but as an unspoken urge which Eco subtely represents
as a ghostly finger across the young boys flesh. The spirit of the unspoken
desires, and the problems caused by them, can be found throughout this novel.
The next study page is Third Day: From Lauds
to Prime (pp. 181-82).