Fictional characters, real problems : the search for ethical content in literature / edited by Garry L. Hagberg.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Hagberg, Garry, 1952- editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Ethics in literature.

Literature and morals.

Physical Description:

xii, 389 pages ; 25 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2016.

Summary:

Literature is a complex and multifaceted expression of our humanity of a kind that is instructively resistant to simplification; reduction to a single element that would constitute literature's defining essence would be no more possible than it could be genuinely illuminating. Yet one dimension of literature that seems to interweave itself throughout its diverse manifestations is still today, as it has been throughout literary history, ethical content. This striking collection of new essays, written by an international team of philosophers and literary scholars, pursues a fuller and richer understanding of five of the central aspects of this ethical content. After a first section setting out and precisely articulating some particularly helpful ways of reading for ethical content, these five aspects include: (1) the question of character, its formation, and its role in moral discernment; (2) the power, importance, and inculcation of what we might call poetic vision in the context of ethical understanding and that special kind of vision's importance in human life; (3) literature's distinctive role in self-identity and self-understanding; (4) an investigation into some patterns of moral growth and change that can emerge from the philosophical reading of literature; and (5) a consideration of the historical sources and genealogies of some of our most central contemporary conceptions of the ethical dimension of literature. In addition to Jane Austen, whose work we encounter frequently and from multiple points of view in this engaging collection, we see Greek Tragedy, Homer, Shakespeare, Charlotte Bronte, E. M. Forster, Andre Breton, Kingsley Amis, Joyce Carol Oates, William Styron, J. M. Coetzee, and David Foster Wallace, among others. And the philosophers in this five-strand interweave include Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Locke, Shaftesbury, Kant, Hegel, Freud, Heidegger, Wittgenstein, Gadamer, Levinas, and a number of recent figures from both Anglophone and continental contexts. All-in-all, this rich collection presents some of the best new thinking about the ethical content that lies within literature, and it shows why our reflective absorption in literature is the humane-and humanizing-experience many of us have long taken it to be. Book jacket.

Contents:

Part I Ways of Reading for Ethical Content

1 Sophie, Antigone, Elizabeth-Rethinking Ethics by Reading Literature / Nora Hämäläinen Hämäläinen, Nora 15

2 Caring about Characters / Eileen John John, Eileen 31

3 Hamlet and the Problem of Moral Agency / Robert B. Pierce Pierce, Robert B. 47

Part II Matters of Character

4 Othello's Paradox: The Place of Character in Literary Experience / Garry L. Hagberg Hagberg, Garry L. 59

5 Character, Social Information, and the Challenge of Psychology / Noel Carroll Carroll, Noel 83

6 Emma's Extravagance: Jane Austen and the Character-Situation Debate / Valerie Wainwright Wainwright, Valerie 102

Part III Literature, Subjectivity, and Poetic Vision

7 The Question of Truth in Literature: Die poetische Auffassung der Welt / Richard Eldridge Eldridge, Richard 119

8 The Moral Relevance of Literature and the Limits of Argument: Lessons from Heidegger, Aristotle, and Coetzee / J. Jeremy Wisnewski Wisnewski, J. Jeremy 139

9 An Endless Person: Heidegger, Breton, and Nadja at the Limits of Language / Jonathan Strauss Strauss, Jonathan 153

Part IV Language, Dialogical Identity, and Self-Understanding

10 The Dialogic Self in Hamlet: On How Dramatic Form Transforms Philosophical Inquiry / Anthony Gash Gash, Anthony 175

11 "The Power of Conversation": Jane Austen's Persuasion and Hans-Georg Gadamer's Philosophical Hermeneutics / Richard Dawson Dawson, Richard 194

12 Quartet Wallace's Wittgenstein, Moran's Amis / Stephen Mulhall Mulhall, Stephen 209

Part V Patterns and Possibilities of Moral Growth

13 Moral Development in Pride and Prejudice / Alan H. Goldman Goldman, Alan H. 237

14 The Breadth of Moral Character / Daniel Brudney Brudney, Daniel 254

15 Learning To Be Good (or Bad) in (or Through) Literature / Mitchell S. Green Green, Mitchell S. 282

Part VI Historical Genealogies of Moral-Aesthetic Concepts

16 In Praise of Aristotle's Poetics / Humberto Brito Brito, Humberto 305

17 Shaftesbury as Virtuoso: Or, the Birth of Aesthetics Out of A Spirit of Civility / Martin Donougho Donougho, Martin 325

18 Fate, Philology, Freud / Jules Brody Brody, Jules 340.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 367-382) and index.

ISBN:

9780198715719

0198715714

OCLC:

918878963