论含混与不确定性

“含混”与“不确定性”同为20世纪西方文论中的重要批评术语，都指意义的难以确定性，二者都和语境有关，在方法上都采用关注语言细节的“细读法”。然而，由于它们分别隶属于新批评和后结构主义，二者之间有很大的差别。首先，产生含混的语境是饱和的、可穷尽的，而产生不确定性的语境则是非饱和的、不可穷尽的；其次，从含混到不确定性是批评重心从文本向读者的转向。

On Ambiguity and Indeterminacy

“Ambiguity”and “indeterminacy” are both important critical terms in western literary criticism of the 20th century. They both refer to the difficulty of deciding on the meaning; they are both related with the context; critics of both schools adopt the method of “close reading”. However, since they belong to the New Criticism and Post-structuralism respectively, they differ a lot. First, the context that causes ambiguity is finitely saturated while the one that causes indeterminacy is infinitely unsaturated. Second, from ambiguity to indeterminacy, the critical focus turns from the text to the reader.