Although practically anything can appear anywhere, in terms of spatial relations, most often things seem to appear before or in front of an other (a subject such as a reader or a judge). There seems to be an obvious reason for it: more often, only what appears in front of our eyes can be said to appear, as we bear witness to its appearance. That does not mean that what appears at our feet, at our back, or above our heads, cannot be said to appear, recognised in its appearing. But as we tend to look straight ahead, at the so-called ‘eye level’, such appearances are less frequently recognised. Also, that does not mean that there are not other ways of witnessing, through other senses: touching, as in the well-known case the sceptic disciple of Christ, that needed to feel Christ wound to believe in his resurrection; listening to something said; even in a general sense, as one can say to sense a presence appearing, beyond the grasp of a particular sense organ. In the eighteenth century novel, however, there seems to be a privilege of the visual; and, even today, we are far from having left it behind. But, even if such privilege was only ‘apparent’ -for example, in the eighteenth century novels, in opposition to what people really privileged as organs of perception-, I am interested in such an appearance, as my focus is on what appears in the novels.
In that sense, unless otherwise stated, ‘to appear’ seems to imply that, what appears, it does so before or in front of someone, as it is said of Tom Jones’s mother, Jenny, ‘[…] summoned to appear in Person before Mrs. Deborah […]’ A static, stationary position, submitted to a legal injunction, exposed to judgement (beyond the witnessing of the its appearing), also seems implied, by definition. [According to Johnson’s Dictionary, ‘to appear’ can mean ‘to stand in the presence of another, generally used of standing before some superior; to offer himself to the judgement of a tribunal,’ or ‘to exhibit one’s self before a court of justice’ (senses 3 and 5). An ‘appearance’ then becomes an ‘exhibition of the person to a court’ (sense 8). The OED records a similar meaning of ‘appearance’ as ‘the action of appearing formally at any proceedings; esp. formal presentation of oneself in a court to answer or prosecute a suit or charge, called making or putting in an appearance’ (sense 2).] Again, there seem to be obvious reasons for it, as it happens more in terms of ‘to appear’ and ‘appeared’, commanding a full appearance or signalling the end of the act of appearing, more than its process. After all, when someone or something appears, it is declared as such at the end of the process; or, caught by the eye, for example, with no further changes visible, developing, it is thought to have arrived to a standing point, then it can be said to have ‘finally’ appeared. Otherwise, caught in between a pure non-existence and a definitive existence (or the idea of such things), in its appearing, it may not be obvious what it is that is appearing (since it is in a process, it can change), and if it is really appearing (it can dissolve, be a momentary illusion, etc.); even if a ghost -standing in between non-existence and existence- takes a form, appears, nonetheless. Unless what we have here is an avoidance of the ghostliness of every appearing; since, even if there is not a clear or explicit sense of ‘to appear before’, most appearances seem to share the structure of such appearing.
