Is it possible for postmodernism to offer viable, coherent accounts of ethics? Or are our social and intellectual worlds too fragmented for any broad consensus about the moral life? These issues have emerged as some of the most contentious in literary and philosophical studies. In Renegotiating Ethics in Literature, Philosophy, and Theory a distinguished international gathering of philosophers and literary scholars address the reconceptualisations involved in this 'turn towards ethics'. An important feature of this has been a renewed interest in (...) the literary text as a focus for the exploration of ethical issues. Exponents of this trend include Charles Taylor, Bernard Williams, Iris Murdoch, Cora Diamond, Richard Rorty and Martha Nussbaum, the latter a contributor and a key figure in this volume. This book assesses the significance of this development for ethical and literary theory and attempts to articulate an alternative postmodern account of ethics which does not rely on earlier appeals to universal truths. (shrink)

It is sometimes held that “the aesthetic” and “the cognitive” are separate categories. Enterprises concerning the former and ones concerning the latter have different aims and values. They require distinct modes of attention and reward divergent kinds of appreciation. Thus, we must avoid running together aesthetic and cognitive matters. In this paper, I challenge the independence of these categories, but in unorthodox fashion. Most attempts proceed by arguing that cognitive values can bear upon aesthetic ones. I approach from the opposite (...) direction. I show that a work’s aesthetic merits can affect its cognitive ones and, more provocatively, its philosophical ones. (shrink)

The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy and Literature contains 23 newly commissioned essays by major philosophers and literary scholars that investigate literature ...

What is the relation between works of fiction and the acquisition of knowledge?

A team of leading scholars have been brought together in this impressive book to examine how works of literary fiction can be a source of knowledge. Together, they analyze the important trends in this current popular debate.

A timely and philosophically significant contribution to modern aesthetics featuring some of the best contemporary work in philosophical studies of literature, moral beliefs, and thinking in art Reflects the importance of a moral life of engagement with works of art Forms part of the prestigious New Directions in Aesthetics series, which confronts the most intriguing problems in aesthetics and the philosophy of art today.

Moral imagination, according to John Kekes, is indispensable to a fulfilling and responsible life.

Despite all this, no one has, up to the present, devoted an entire book to the examination and analysis of his properly philosophical thinking and writing.This ...

In this article I argue that a work of art provides the best interpretation of itself - more faithful than any other scholarly interpretative work.

AN ATTEMPT AT SELF- CRITICISM. I. Whatever may lie at the bottom of this doubt- ful book must be a question of the first rank and attractiveness, ...

Introduction In Rene Wellek wrote that the "political attack on literature is a foolish generalization." He was dismissing those who would deprecate ...

This thought-provoking volume is suitable for students and general readers and at the same time examines new and more advanced topics of interest to seasoned ...

This is the first comprehensive study of Nietzsche's earliest (and extraordinary) book, The Birth of Tragedy (1872). When he wrote it, Nietzsche was a Greek scholar, a friend and champion of Wagner, and a philosopher in the making. His book has been very influential and widely read, but has always posed great difficulties for readers because of the particular way Nietzsche brings his ancient and modern interests together. The proper appreciation of such a work requires access to ideas that cross (...) the boundaries of conventional specialisms. This is now provided by M. S. Silk and J. P. Stern in their joint study of Nietzsche's book. They examine in detail its content, style and form; its strange genesis and hybrid status; its biographical background and the controversy engendered by its publication; its value as an account of ancient Greek culture and as a theory of tragedy and music; its relation to other theories of tragedy; and its place in the history of German ideas and in Nietzsche's own philosophical career. (shrink)

The hope is that this collection will encourage students and scholars to further explore the different dimensions of Heiberg's thought, both on its own terms ...

" Of Literature and Knowledge looks ... like an important advance in this new and very important subject... literature is about to become even more interesting.

Examination of the concept of "form" within Lukacs' work and after Lukacs.