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Abstract Anti-detective fiction is a contemporary novel form that appeared and flourished in 20th century. Scholars’ discussions mostly focus on its disruption on detective fiction’ s ontology, epistemology and reading experience, but ignore the postmodernism and post-structuralism con¬text’s destruction on subject’s interpretation in the text. As a typical anti-detective fiction, Amer¬ican author Paul Auster’s The New York Trilogy subverted the very important interpretation course in detective fiction, and made the cognitive subject impossible to perceive the world and others. This article suggests that the evolution of relationship between words and things results in the evolution of “text” and “writing” which are the traditional instruments of interpretation: the referential and ideographic functions of language are ineffective, “text” loses meaning due to intertextuality, and the act of “writing” dissolves the existence of the subject and the world. These evolutions lead to The New York Trilogy’s refusal of interpretation. The rational cognitive subject in detective fiction has become a drowning man in a symbolic world.
Key words: The New York Trilogy; anti-detective; interpretation; text; writing
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