Abstract

This paper briefly addresses John Smith’s criticisms of Brand Blanshard’s views on philosophical style. Blanshard elaborates these views in his On Philosophical Style, and Smith maintains that Blanshard is, “far too lenient on the reader” when it comes to the responsibility for understanding a text. In opposition to this leniency, Smith asks “what and how much is the reader expected to know about the subject of a work in order to understand it”, and later adds