Less on the Sublime

Focusing on "On the Sublime" by Longinus, I still find myself lost in the definition of sublime however I find myself much more intrigued with his earlier statements about the author and the audience. He expects each to play a specific role in the text and demands much more from both the author and the audience. While reading through "On the Sublime," I tended to focus on the roles of the author and audience and less on the sublime.

He goes on to make claims about the author stating, "We felt that it was inadequate to its high subject, and failed to touch the essential points. Nor indeed did it appear to offer the reader much practical help, though this ought to be the writers principal object." It is clear what Longinus expects of the authors and simply because he found the previous work on the sublime to be ineffective, he chooses to attack it from his standards of writing.

Once again, we are left to discuss how important an audience is to an author- whether it is fiction or ineffective; the audience plays a significant role in a text. Longinus has high expections of the author and the audience; he decides how effective a text is by his standards of authorship. It leaves to me to question, how do I judge the effectiveness of an article or novel? What criteria have I developed? Am I doing my proper job as the audience/author?