It occurs to me that verbal overshadowing of feelings may be some of what people are complaining of when they consider explaining to constitute explaining away: where a good verbal description pretty much screens off one’s own memories. This is part of the dangerous magic the good art critic wields—and why it’s possibly more dangerous to an artist’s art to read their positive reviews than their negative ones. It’s a mechanism by which the explanation does, in fact, overshadow the feelings. So I have more sympathy for Keats having learnt of verbal overshadowing than I did before.
I should note it here too:
It occurs to me that verbal overshadowing of feelings may be some of what people are complaining of when they consider explaining to constitute explaining away: where a good verbal description pretty much screens off one’s own memories. This is part of the dangerous magic the good art critic wields—and why it’s possibly more dangerous to an artist’s art to read their positive reviews than their negative ones. It’s a mechanism by which the explanation does, in fact, overshadow the feelings. So I have more sympathy for Keats having learnt of verbal overshadowing than I did before.