Why do authors produce textual variation on purpose? Or, why publish a text that is still unfolding?

Post-publication revision causes problems for both an AngloAmerican editorial tradition and genetic critics. Discussion of variance in Shakespeare, Henry James, T. S. Eliot, and Sylvia Plath shows that publication is only as much of an event as an author makes it. It need not entail a neat breach between genesis and transmission. Using WitgensteinȂs notion of ȃseeing asȄ, I propose that ȃin processȄ ǻstill being composedǼ and ȃinishedȄ ǻready for transmissionǼ are aspects of textual apprehension rather than descriptions of any individual documentary stage. Publishing a genetic dossier ixes its contour, just as post-publication revision unixes a circulating work. Keywords: genetic criticism, manuscripts, drafts, revision, variant, variorum edition, English literature, T. S. Eliot, Henry James, Sylvia Plath, William Shakespeare