Verbal Art: A Philosophy of Literature and Literary ExperienceAnders Pettersson presents a comprehensive account of the foundations of literature, grounded in an original analysis of the interactions between author and reader. Drawing on post-Gricean pragmatics and Nicholas Wolterstorff's notion of presentationality, Pettersson develops the idea of the verbal text and conveys an integrated and nuanced understanding of literary experience, its conditions, and the values it affords. In the second part of Verbal Art he systematically examines the cognitive, affective, and formal aspects of the literary work and explores their interrelations.Pettersson demonstrates the implications and applications of the theory through a series of detailed studies of literary works, taking care to show that his theory is compatible with a broad variety of perspectives. Combining an intimate knowledge of modern literary theory and the aesthetics of literature with innovative applications of linguistics and cognitive psychology to the literary work, he provides a thorough treatment of fundamental problems in the area, including the concept of a text or work, the concept of form, and the distinctiveness of the literary use of language. |
Contents
Psychological Considerations | 19 |
Literatures Relevance to the Reader | 35 |
Presentational Communication | 60 |
Meaning and Text | 83 |
Conveyed Thoughts in Literature | 105 |
The Readers Thematization and Application | 146 |
Literature and Feelings | 182 |
Gunnar Ekelöfs But Somewhere Else | 229 |
Form in Literature | 251 |
IO Traditional Ideas about Literary Form | 266 |
On the Nature of Literatures | 284 |
Notes | 301 |
349 | |
367 | |
Other editions - View all
Verbal Art: A Philosophy of Literature and Literary Experience Anders Pettersson Limited preview - 2000 |
Verbal Art: A Philosophy of Literature and Literary Experience Anders Pettersson Limited preview - 2000 |
Common terms and phrases
actual addressee aesthetic analysis Anna Karenina Anniversaries appears aspects assertions associations autonomy basic chap chapter cognitive Cognitive Poetics communicative content complex concept concrete connection container metaphor conveyed criticism described discussion Ekelöf Elimination Theory emotional example existence expected understanding expression expressional fact fantasy Father's Bedroom fictional Ford Scorpio formulations function Gesine Gesine's graphemes Gunnar Ekelöf Ibid idea imagine implicit important intended meaning intentional interpretation Jerrold Levinson John Sykes kind Lamarque and Olsen language linguistic literally literary communication Literary Discourse literary experience literary form literary text literary theory literature's Lowell's mental representations natural normally North Vietnam novel objective correlatives perceive physical object picture of reality pleasure poem possible post-communicative processing present problem question reader reading of literature reason reconstruct relevant Robert Lowell sense sentence sign-sequence statements story Strountes things thoughts tion truth Type Theory Updike's Pygmalion utterance Uwe Johnson Wellek words