Parable of the sunfish

"The Parable of the Sunfish" is an anecdote with which Ezra Pound opens ABC of Reading, a 1934 work of literary criticism. Pound uses this anecdote to emphasize an empirical approach for learning about art, in contrast to relying on commentary rooted in abstraction. While the parable is based on students' recollections of Louis Agassiz's teaching style, Pound's retelling diverges from these sources in several respects. The parable has been used to illustrate the benefits of scientific thinking, but more recent literary criticism has split on whether the parable accurately reflects the scientific process and calls into question Pound's empirical approach to literature.

The text of the parable below is excerpted from Pound's ABC of Reading.

A post-graduate student equipped with honors and diplomas went to Agassiz to receive the final and finishing touches. The great man offered him a small fish and told him to describe it.

Post-Graduate Student: "That's only a sunfish."

Agassiz: "I know that. Write a description of it."

After a few minutes the student returned with the description of the Ichthus Heliodiplodokus, or whatever term is used to conceal the common sunfish from vulgar knowledge, family of Heliichtherinkus, etc., as found in textbooks of the subject.

Agassiz again told the student to describe the fish.

The student produced a four-page essay. Agassiz then told him to look at the fish. At the end of three weeks the fish was in an advanced state of decomposition, but the student knew something about it.⁠

Pound opens ABC of Reading with the following pronouncement:

The proper METHOD for studying poetry and good letters is the method of contemporary biologists, that is careful first-hand examination of the matter, and continual COMPARISON of one 'slide' or specimen with another. No man is equipped for modern thinking until he has understood the anecdote of Agassiz and the sunfish.

In the parable, a graduate student is sent to noted biologist Louis Agassiz to complete his education, and Agassiz asks the student three times to describe a sunfish specimen. The student replies with, in turn, the common name of the fish, a brief summary of the species, and a four-page essay on the species. Agassiz finally tells the student to "look at the fish" and "[a]t the end of three weeks the fish was in an advanced state of decomposition, but the student knew something about it." The text of the parable itself spans 131 words over sixteen lines and is often reproduced in full when cited.

...
Wikipedia