In this pairing of quotations, we learn that every act of reading is either
aporetic or a
palimpsest (or both?).
Every act of reading is an act of forgetting: the experience of reading is a palimpsest, in which each text partially covers those that came before. Those books that allow us to forget the most are accorded the authority of the classic.
—James A. Second, Victorian Sensation
Every act of reading is when memory and forgetting collide: every act of reading is aporetic, as one has to both remember and forget at the same time. Each time reading occurs, one is not just reading the text for the first time, but also reading for the first time.
