Philosophy and Literature

Lecture Notes

Lecture 2

Genres of Literature

Brief History of Aesthetics

Early disagreement between Plato and Aristotle:

1) Plato
 True beauty does not exist in this world
 i) World of Forms: there is a perfect, abstract realm. All things in this world are
reflection in the world of forms. E.g. in WoF there’s perfect triangle (shapes), perfect
emotions & feelings.
o Perfect Beauty
 ii) C.f. Realm of appearances: the physical world 
 iii) Imitation of appearances: art
o Plato: poetry is a corruption of the most perfect, destroy the youth;
 Refined by Aristotle – first fundamental/real significant aesthetic disagreement
 How would Plato define ‘good art’: The kind of art that is most proximate to the true
art.
 In principle, good art is the most perfect art. However, Plato does not think we can
accurately and precisely imitate the perfect form.

2) Aristotle
 WoF is an idealization of the real world (opposite to Plato)
 Reject the WoF:
o Art is not a poor imitation; we don’t need WoF to account for knowledge;
o A good artist can uncover universal truths through his creation e.g. justice,
truth, knowledge
 Idealises good values: E.g. creating a story of a hero fighting battle 
brings out the virtue of courage; contrasts his deeds with a villain.
Standard of correctness
 Plato: a recollection, memory of what e.g. ‘beauty’ means;
o Poor, damaging imitation
 Aristotle: telos (function); there is a natural order in this world
o Universal truth
o E.g. function of a human person is to become a morally good person.
o Attributing the correct concept according to their function e.g. craftsman’s
function is to use the hammer, whereas a bad craftsman is to use the hammer
badly.
o Art and aesthetic reveal truth of ourselves.

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 Shared: ART IS IMITATION

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3) Hume
 Q: What makes art good? Taste!
o Aesthetic judgment is a judgment in taste.
 We can all have different tastes/preferences: sentimentalism
o Relative i.e. we do not have natural basis of agreement;
o However, this isn’t usually the case with art appreciation/ critique where we
agree largely. This can be explained because our aesthetic sentiment develops
culturally; grow in the same environment, taught what we should/should not
like.
 Knowledge comes from (cultural) experience: subjective;

4) Kant
 Q: Is beauty in the world or in the mind? Is it objective or subjective?
o Beauty exists in the nature. An artist captures such objective beauty and
express in his own work. It does not depend on what beauty exists in the
artist’s mind.
 Features of beauty:
(i) Disinterest: Beauty for beauty’s sake. (independent of our interest in art)
a. Echoes with Kant’s ethics: good and bad are intrinsic, independent of
personal feelings and situations.
(ii) Universal & necessary: shared among the world and it is a necessary
property; capable of having disagreements, whereas subjective preference
(Hume) do not.
(iii) Purposive without purpose: Beauty is independent of any design, but
beautiful objects should affect us as if there is a purpose.

5) Hegel & Schopenhauer

 H: Best art is the ones that bring the most spiritual freedom??
 S: Music is the highest form of art

6) Nietzsche
 Art can save us from the truth; help us to escape from the real world.
 Unstable definition of truth.

Philosophies of Literature vs Philosophies in Literature

Of
Nature of Literature
 Branch of analytic philosophy
 Interested in providing conditions
for language and meaning
 Give fundamental importance in
powers of reasoning and rationality
In
Identify philosophical themes & discuss the
implication of those themes
 Continental philosophical approach
 Not scientific – acknowledges
limitation
 Subjective: application of

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 philosophy to personal lives

Danto 1964
 What is art? Some arts are indiscernible from non-art.
 The notion of ‘artworld’

Camus: Continental Approach

 Absurdity of life: Search for meaning when we can never find meaning.
 To combat nihilism, we search for meaning with reason.
 Leap from reason to faith, a moral transcendent theory happy, meaningful life.
 Reason tells us that there’s no meaning  embrace nihilism.
 Philosophical suicide (accept that there’s no meaning, but does not take the
consequence i.e. killing himself physically)
 Camus: not giving up just yet and try to remain happy :o)

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Lecture 3

Definitions of Literature

Whether there are necessary and sufficient conditions for counting a piece of text as
literature?
 Belles lettres (fine writing): writing itself, its style, syntax, semantics, produces
beauty
 Beaux arts (beautiful arts):

Belles lettres
 What does it mean to be finely written?
 Q1: Can there be literature as art that is not finely beautifully written?
o E.g. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye (adolescent voice)
o Anne Frank’s Diaries (Child’s diary)
  Literature can exist without being finely written
 Q2: Is beautiful letters sufficient for literature?
o E.g. Ingredient lists, advert slogans, jingles…

Imagination and Literature

 Imaginative role of a composing a piece of fiction
 Problem 1: insufficient because imagination is present even in adverts and poor
literature.
 Problem 2: unnecessary because not all literature is fictional in a sense that it requires
imagination (e.g. great non-fiction, like philosophy)

Lamarque only includes literary fiction as literature in the artistic sense

 Only stipulated the definition of literature in the metaphysical sense.
 Ruled out genres like science fiction, romance, horror, whodunit, spy works,
children’s fiction.
 Problem: Chris thinks it’s too narrow, especially when there are nobel prize winners
in literature falling within the genre not included.

Essentialism vs Non-essentialism
 Essentialism: All literature has some shared essence(s) that is essential to literature
that makes a text into a work of literature
o Assumed position regarding literature and art generally – starting point of
discussion.
 Anti-essentialism: There is no shared essence that makes a text into a work of
literature.

A. Essentialism
 Tends to emphasise one crucially important aspect of literature.

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 Preference for which essence is considered to be fundamental appears to be
historically variable.

Overview: Essentialist Approaches and the coordinates of Art Criticism

Mimetic Theories Work-to-world (universe) relation

Pragmatic Theories: pragmatic function Work-to-audience relation
Expressive Theories Work-to artist relation
Autonomy Theories: shouldn’t judge, Work-in-itself
independent of author’s intention and the
broader context

(i) Mimetic Theories

 Literature must mimic or imitate reality
 Work-to-world: The work is structured so as to imitate the world.
o Idea dates back to Greek philosophies
 E.g. Aristotle: exposes universal truth and benefits us
 E.g. Trainspotting
 Mimesis and Value: if mimesis is the essence of literature, it also sets a standard for
valuing literature, then we can direct our critical response with work-to-world
relation.
 Mimesis and the Creation of literature: the theory of literature we adopt can also
influence us on our creation of literature – because it defines what is good.
 Advantages of mimesis: many pieces of literature imitate reality to some extent.
 Disadvantages of mimesis:
o Contrary to the explicit intention of creating fictional situations (e.g.s world,
characters, abilities)
o Art could be written with the intention to be as surreal or irrational as
possible with a complete disregard for reality.
 Therefore, mimesis may have been a dominant (exclusive) influence of art and
literature traditionally, but it has changed with time.

(ii) Pragmatic Theories

 Literature must or should bring about a certain effect in the audience. It influences
the reader in an important sense.
 These effects might be emotional, but they might also be to do with our values and
knowledge.
o Reactions is essential to any piece of literature
 Pragmatic Function: Literature has functions. It serves as a means to an end. The
means is the literature, the end is the effect on the audience.
o Samuel Johnson (1755): ‘the end of writing is to instruct, the end of poetry is
to instruct by pleasing.’
o Here, pleasing seems to be the essence of literature, as distinguished from
mere text.

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 Pragmatic Effects:
o Pleasing (or pleasure)
o Fear
o Pity
o Laughter
o Excitement
 For Aristotle, the desired effect depended on the type of literature.
 Pragmatic effects could also include, e.g.:
o Motivating to action,
o Cause a change in principles,
o Cause a change in attitude to life.
 Advantages:
 Disadvantages:
o There exists a work of literature that didn’t elicit emotions. For instance, no
one has ever read it.
o Individuals are influenced differently by the work, and they have varied
interpretation – so what is the appropriate response towards the work?

(iii) Expressive Theories

 Mimetic and Expressive theories take us up to the romantic era.
 Literature must accurately exhibit the thought or feelings of the writing who creates it.
 Work-to-artist: work created to reflect the artists’ thoughts or feelings.
 Classic to Romantic
o Abrams (1953): the shift to expressivism is a shift from questions about truth
and judgments of the audience to questions about whether the work is
genuine, sincere, honest.
 Expressive examples:
o A strong focus on poetry of the romantic era (late C18th-late C19-th)
 e.g. William Wordsworth, John Keats
 Commitment to expressivism changes the way an artist conducts his work.
 The desire to reflect one’s states of mind regardless of mimetic or pragmatic
consequences could result in an entirely different style of work.
o A fully committed expressivist should have little or no interest in the audience
reading.
 Disadvantages:
o Too much emphasis on the author’s state-of-mind. Do they really only seek to
express their emotions?
o …

(iv) Autonomy (or Objective) Theories

 Overlaps with Formalism
 The work itself – autonomy.
 Features of the work which make it a piece of good literature may be formal.

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  Quotes:
o Oscar Wilde: “Art never expresses anything but itself.”
o “Life imitates art far more than art imitates life.”
o A.C. Bradley: “Poetry is not a part, nor yet a copy, of the real world, but a
world by itself, independent, complete, autonomous…”
 Advantages: ?
 Disadvantages:
o Hard to agree with the features of the work in itself that we should consider to
analyse the work.
o Indiscernible works

Normative and Descriptive claim

 Problem 1: The essentialist theories are not really definitions, but in fact express the
value judgments about the literature.
 The essentialist theories are useful for assessing the standards of value for the period,
but they are not useful definition of literature. – They are not metaphysical account of
what literature is.
 Problem 2: Whether essentialist theories are empirically verifiable or falsifiable?
 How could we prove that e.g. literature is always an expression of emotion or that it
always has a pragmatic effect. It’s really difficult but we should expect be able to do
so, if the theories really hold any weight.

B. Anti-essentialism
 There is no shared essence that makes a text into a work of literature.
 Two kinds: (i) Radical Anti-essentialism (ii) Family resemblance arguments

(i) Radical Anti-essentialism

 Terry Eagleton (1983): essence is an illusion.
 Advantages: varying nature of artistic movements through the ages: it depends what
people value at the time. Open-ended as to what counts as literature.
 Disadvantages: given that value is still playing a role, we might want to know more
about what this value is.
o Contrast: We value other texts instruction manual for various reasons distinct
from why we value literature.
o  What kind of value is important for literature?  Then we go back to
differentiating between values and finding what is the most essential value of
literature?

(ii) Family Resemblance Theories

 Descend from Wittgenstein
 There is no essence, but instead only ‘complicated network of similarities overlapping
and criss-crossing’, such that we recognize literature by these similarities

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 No essence, only overlapping similarities.
 So, no one particular essence (or particular group) is necessary or sufficient to define
literature.
 Contrast the question: What is a game?
 For literature we might say a work can have:
o (A) Good form
o (B) Appropriate language
o (C) Depth of emotion
o (D) Strong narrative
o (E) Interesting character development
 Advantages: Sit well with arts and literature development over time. Allows changes
to the properties we consider important to works of literature over time, but not as
open-ended as radical anti-essentialism.
 Disadvantages:
o Family resemblance isn’t sufficient.
o Which one matters?

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Lecture 4
Role of the Author

Central Questions:
- What is an author?
- What is the relation between a work and the author’s intentions?

1. Introduction
 Like literature, the concept of ‘author’ carries some weight.
 Difference between mere text and literature ~ someone who writes and an author

1.1 Product Question

 (Ontological) Product question: To what extent does the existence/persistence of a
work depend on the author?
 The work is an…
o Idealism – …Object in the author’s mind (a collection of ideas)
o Contextualism – …Object in the public sphere
 The question depends on how much of the context we should take into account?
o e.g. The history, culture, norms of the world.
 Manifestation of the work is the piece of paper

1.2 Semantic Question

 (Semantic) meaning question: To what extent does a work take its meaning from
the author?
 The meaning of a work depends on...
 Extreme expressivism: entirely on the author
 Contextualism: entirely independently of the author (it is impersonal)
 How much of the meaning of the work depends on the author’s meaning?

2. Theories

2.1 Expressivism: The Poet as Sage

 Expressivism’s emphasis on the author underlies many theoretical approaches to
literature
 Ambras (1953): strongest emphasis on the role of the poet (author)
 The author was considered the indubitable source of the meaning of a text. This
reached the extent of turning the author into an idol or sage.
o C.S. Lewis calls it ‘Poetolatry’ – excessive worship of poets.
 Study of literature  study of the author
 Raises questions about the author’s mind, position as a genius, experience…

2.1.1 For Expressivism Emotional Responses

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 (a) Affective attitudes (emotions): depends on our knowledge of the author’s life and
intentions.
(b) Understanding: our knowledge or understanding of the work can be affected by
author’s intentions
a. when works are based on real people Dostoyevsky – St. Petersburg – can we
learn knowledge about real places in fictions?;
b. Anne Frank’s Diary read as a real diary, compared with if it were a fiction.

2.1.2 Against (extreme) Expressivism

(a) Role of inspiration: even if life is relevant, the meaning might not necessarily come
from the author’s explicit intentions – cannot be attributed to his life experiences.
o Detach the author from their work by noting that inspiration takes over.
a. Interpretation 1: Inspired work does not come from the author’s intentions; but
it still come from the author in some important sense.
i. Implications for the role of the author’s intentions.
b. Interpretation 2: Inspired work has nothing important to do with the author –
it comes from somewhere else; they do not create the work.
i. E.g. In Plato’s Ion, it is suggested that the inspiration of the poet is out
of their control – in some sense divine.
(b) Impersonality of Poetry: Works have a life of their own
a. T.S. Eliot (1919) ‘Tradition and the Individual Talent’
i. Tradition/ intertextuality: Art appreciation is not about the author, but
about how a person fits into the world of literature. (over-focus in
originality, rejected tradition of literature.)
ii. Poet’s Mind: This is a medium for connecting ideas and putting them
into works – the work itself is then assessed autonomously (Mature vs
Immature: Mature writer feels the weight and necessity to draw on
tradition e.g. Greeks).
iii. Poet’s personality: The poem forms independently of the poet’s
personality (they are just catalyst of ideas)
iv. Result: Literary criticism and evaluation should be directed at the work
and not the author.

2.1.3 Implications: Personal vs Impersonal

o Personal: Emotions/thoughts expressed in literature should be associated with
the author;
o Impersonal (Contextualist): emotions/thoughts in literature should be attributed
to characters in the literature – this is the case even if the author happened to
experience those emotions.
Understanding
o Personal: real facts about the world (people, places, the author’s life) are
essential to understanding the work;

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 o Impersonal: real facts about the world are not essential to understanding the
work
o These facts might be interesting for sociological reason, but not
necessarily relevant to literary evaluation and appreciation.
o Any use of genuine facts should be consider valuable, but...
2.2 Anti-Intentionalism (Reading)
 Intentionalists: Thoughts/intentions of the author are relevant to the work

2.2.1 Central Claims of Anti-Intentionalism

 The design or intention of the author is neither available nor desirable as a standard
for judging the success of a work of literary art
o Why not? Because the author can be confused about his own intentions!
 Intention is not a standard for evaluation
 Intention is not a standard for literary meaning – it depends on linguistic
conventions.
o E.g. Idiot cannot mean genius.
 External evidence for the meaning of a poem is irrelevant to literary criticism
o Evidence internal to the work (semantics, syntax, language, etc) is the correct
evidence for assessing the value of a work.
o External evidence about the author really just is internal – the significance of
words for him just are to do with the word’s history (external meaning)
 Authors should not be confused with dramatic speakers
o Dramatic speaker: the speaker of the text, whether intended to be personal or
not, should be understood as a character of the text. It should not be thought of
as the author.
 The literary work is a self-sufficient entity
o A work can be exhaustively explained via internal evidence alone. The work is
autonomous.

2.2.2 Intentioanlist Responses

 Intentions of an author can be easily accessed.
o Behaviorism: mental states just are observable behavioural outputs.
 Producing a work is a behaviour, so the work just is an exemplification
of the author’s intentions. Therefore, work and mind is entirely
inseparable.
o  Depends on whether the theory of mind stands.
 Ineliminable connection between author and work
o Semantic intention e.g. unconscious intention, mistakes could fail, however,
categorical intentions cannot fail.

2.3 No Author (Extreme view)

 Rejects the previous two theories, though it fits with an extreme form of
contextualism.

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  The basic idea is that emphasis on an author is a social construct.

2.3.1 Theoretical routes to No Author

(a) Metaphysical: Rejection of the self. If the idea of a self, as an individually distinct
person, is rejected, then there can be no meaning from an author, because there are no
authors.
(b) Linguistic: Rejection of the author speaking in his work. Instead, only the language
within the work speaks.
2.3.2 Barthes (1961) ‘The Death of the Author’
 Narratives (as we find in literature): These existed long before literary texts. For
instance, in oral form.
 They were spoken by e.g. story tellers and shamans. The focus was not on the person
as an author, but on the performance of the text.
 Significance of the narrative was thus independent of ay author. The ‘author’ of today
is thus the equivalent of these story tellers.
 In a literary text, there are many potential sources of the writing/word/meaning.
 The author combines all of these into a text. However, as with the story tellers of old,
the focus should not be on the person that does this, but on the narrative produced.
 Barthes takes the desire of critics and readers to know more about the author, to be a
kind of cultural preference. He claims it originates with a modern focus on the
importance of the individual and capitalism – we are interested in individuals…

2.3.3 Implications
 For Expressivism: The writer is not expressing himself, he is making something more
like a cultural gesture. ‘A gesture of inscription’ and not an expression.
 For Contextualists: Still a problem, insofar as they look for a hidden contextual
message.

2.3.4 The proper focus of literature – Reader

 The synthesis of all the ideas in a text takes place in another place, and only this place
– the reader.
 Barthes says critics try to control the reader by manipulating their attitudes towards
their work, criticizing that they consider themselves as champions.

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Guest lecture
The paradox of fiction

1. The central paradox

2. Critics’ arguments

Pseudo Coleridge against P3: “willing suspension of disbelief”

3. Responses to critics’ arguments

Currie against Pseudo Coleridge:

4. Theories of Emotion
(a) Non-cognitive ToE: difference between emotions and moods (undirected)
(b) Cognitive Theory: emotions are judgments (propositional attitude like belief or desire
or evaluative judgement)
(c) Damasio’s Theory from Neuroscience
(d) Combined theories – emotions as a process

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