Literature, Transparency, Ideology: Functions of Literature in Negotiating Transparency

Abstract

The chapter engages with functions of literature in negotiations of transparency by focusing on four selected fields. First, the chapter argues that the creation of transparency cannot be assumed as per se a function of literature, since literature can also serve to create and maintain intransparency. Secondly, in discussing the relationship of literature and knowledge, the author explores specifically literary forms of producing, storing and transmitting knowledge in the sense that literary devices and procedures become “devices for articulating truth”. Third, the chapter considers literature as a privileged medium of self-exploration, as a guide to self-interpretation and self-understanding in a tradition of confessional literature. Finally, the author discusses transparency in the process of literary creation and the laying bare of literary artifice.