[MD] Taking Words Seriously

[Matt Kundert]

Hi Dave,

DMB said:
The post was aimed at Matt and the ideal reader is basically a device 
whereby you project your own standards of excellence onto a 
fictional reader and then write for him.

Matt said:
Now that you mention it again, I wasn't quite sure what you were 
meaning to convey to me by writing about the ideal reader.  Was it to 
say that you understand now what I had meant about amateur 
philosophers beginning by introspecting about their own standards?  
Was it a signal of agreement?

DMB then said:
Matt, Dan and all would-be writers:...
...See, this isn't just a lesson for creative writers. ...

Matt:
I pull out the above in your last post, Dave, to help pin down why I 
think you're intending to say something to me.  The obliqueness of 
your recent posts, however, would seem to obscure that intention 
by virtue of the obscurity of their intended point, the "lesson" you've 
been intending to teach.  It seems like an algebra lesson for a 
calculus student, and the calculus student is as yet unclear what 
they missed in the algebra.  Indeed, your general penchant for 
"see" clauses creates an arresting, demonstrative-like quality to 
your writing that presses and hounds a reader like a finger in the 
chest.  But I continue to confess my dismay that I'm not sure what 
new thing I am supposed to be seeing.  I confess that I may be that 
unideal reader, whose intelligence is not flattered by, as you put it, 
being "smart enough to understand everything" you say.

Be that as it may, I stand upright and unfazed in the face of the 
finger, and remain simply curious as to its purport.  It couldn't 
possibly be in contradistinction to something I said, could it?

Matt