文史哲lecture

IV. Literature and Philosophy
------Literature represents philosophy
Definition: Philosophy is “the study or writing of ideas
about the meaning of life, or a particular set of ideas about the meaning of life” (Cambridge Learner’s Dictionary ); or
If literature takes a step backward, it is history If literature takes a step forward, it is philosophy
Literature is the reflection of history and philosophy Literature becomes history and vice versa;
History ·Literature ·Philosophy
------Tradition and Challenge
Gan Wenping
School of Foreign Languages, Wuhan University of Technology
I.General Introduction
Literature is the study of human beings who write about how human beings behave themselves Literature is a mirror of history. Classical literary works
The uniqueness of history invites challenge Concern is showed with the power and ideology behind theΒιβλιοθήκη present History
Texts on history always serve the people in the ruling class Other histories are marginalized and oppressed by the
Examples:
1. China Men (M. H. Kingston) ---“racial discrimination” 2. In the Lake of the Woods ( Tim O‟Brien) ---the true nature of the My Lai Massacre in the Vietnam War: aberration or atrocity?
Marxism
Examples of literary works of naturalism:
1. The Red Badge of Courage 2. The Call of the Wild Examples of literary works of existentialism: 1. Waiting for Godot;
“The historicity of texts” and “the textuality of history” (L.
A. Montrose)
By history of texts, I mean to suggest the cultural specificity, the social embedment, of all modes of writing---not only the texts that critics study but also the texts in which we study them. By textuality of history, I mean to suggest, firstly,that we can have no access to a full and authentic past, a lived material existence, unmediated by the surviving textual traces of the society I question---traces whose survival we cannot assume to be merely contingent but must rather presume to be at least partially consequent upon complex and subtle social processes of preservation and effacement; and secondly, that whose textual traces are themselves subject to subsequent textual mediations when they are construed as the “documents” upon which historians ground their own texts, called “histories”
present History History is poetic in nature (Hayden White). In other words,
History is fictitious in nature
History (a historical text) is identified with literature (a literary text) and vice versa
Examples:
1. All Quiet on the Western Front ( Erich M. Remarque) 2. The Scarlet Letter (Nathaniel Hawthorne)
III. History and Literature
------Literature creates history/discovers new history
and man; nature is hostile to man
Existentialism(since 1930s: Sartre, Camus, Nietzche): absurdity, nothingness, meaninglessness; “Existence precedes essence” Freudian Psychoanalysis
literature participates in the creation of history
Literature deconstructs philosophy
II. History and Literature
Definitions:
------Literature describes history
Examples:
1. Dog Soldiers (Robert Stone):
The mission of literature is to “dig out” those hidden, marginalized and silenced histories. The present History will be disrupted and the dug-out histories come into being.
present History
Such words as power, control, social oppression and racial discrimination become the central concern
Some true histories have probably been buried by the
2. Invisible Man
3. “Black humor” fiction
V. Literature and Philosophy
------Literature deconstructs philosophy
Metaphysics(or called meta-narratives) characterized by philosophy meets with parody or deconstruction “Simplifying to the extreme the „postmodern‟ is characterized by and incredulity concerning metanarratives” (Jean F. Lyotad) “Logos Centralism”is deconstructed (Jacque Derrida) --- “A kind of supernatural spirit”, “Western rationalism”, “Son”, “Existence”, “Essence”, “Truth”, “Absoluteness” Philosophy parodied, religion deconstructed by literature Literature becomes a weapon through which philosophers, critics and writers challenge everything orthodox
always depict and externalize those important historical
events. They bring the reader the consideration of history and human nature and some other aspects
1.History is “the whole series of events in the past which relate to the development of a country, subject, or person.” (Cambridge Learner’s Dictionary) 2. Literature refers to “stories,poems, and plays, especially those that are considered to have value as art and not just entertainment.”(Macmillan English Dictionary) It consists of four types: fiction, poetry, drama and prose.
“the study of the nature and meaning of existence, reality,
knowledge, goods, etc.” (Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English)
Philosophical ideas are always the themes of literature
Two major philosophical thoughts exert great influences on American literature:Naturalism and Existentialism
Naturalism( 1890s: Zola, Darwin): environment and heredity; the survival of the fittest ; indifferent and objective description of nature