Being bound up with

Question

Does the highlightrd "being" in the following sentence refer to "popular readings of Magritte’s work" or "Magritte’s work"?

Context:

Contrary to popular readings of Magritte’s work being bound up with the trauma he experienced aged 13 of seeing his mother’s corpse after she had drowned, and a subsequent repressed sexuality, he describes the poetic dynamic of constructing a painting which remarkably echoes Freud’s description of condensation...

Anonymous · Accepted Answer

cattttDoes the highlightrd "being" in the following sentence refer to "popular readings of Magritte’s work" or "Magritte’s work"?

It's too bad the writer didn't ask herself this question. The sentence is a mess. Luckily, that doesn't matter because its import is trivial.

Grammatically, there are two mysteries. One, if she meant that Magritte's work was indeed bound up with those things, she should have written "work's" by the rule of possessive with gerund. If she meant that the readings were bound up with those things, she should have written "as being bound up".

Two, it is hard to see how the noun "readings" can be contrary to the verb "describes".

I guess I would paraphrase as "Popular readings of Magritte’s work are bound up with the trauma he experienced at the age of 13 of seeing his mother’s corpse after she had drowned, and a subsequent repressed sexuality. Mr. X takes a different view, describing a poetic dynamic of constructing a painting that remarkably echoes Freud’s description of condensation …."

Being bound up with

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