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Single Idea 21939

[filed under theme 21. Aesthetics / B. Nature of Art / 8. The Arts / b. Literature ]

Full Idea

Foucault maintains that for any 'authored' text a plurality of selves fulfils the author function.

Gist of Idea

The author function of any text is a plurality of selves

Source

report of Michel Foucault (works [1978]) by Gary Gutting - Foucault: a very short introduction 2

Book Ref

Gutting,Gary: 'Foucault' [OUP 2005], p.12


A Reaction

This is a completely different concept of a 'self' from the one normally found in this database. I would call it the sociological concept of self, as something changing with context. So how many selves is 'Jane Austen'?


The 11 ideas with the same theme [philosophical aspects of literature]:

Without the surface decoration, poetry shows only appearances and nothing of what is real [Plato]
Poetry is more philosophic than history, as it concerns universals, not particulars [Aristotle]
Tragedies are versified sufferings of people impressed by externals [Epictetus]
Homer wrote to show that the most blessed men can be ruined by poor judgement [Epictetus]
For poets free choice is supreme [Schlegel,F]
Literature is the most important aspect of culture, because it teaches understanding of living [Murdoch]
The author function of any text is a plurality of selves [Foucault, by Gutting]
All great poetry is engaged in rivalry with mathematics [Badiou]
Storytelling is never neutral; some features of the world must be emphasised [Nussbaum]
Wallace Stevens is the greatest philosophical poet of the twentieth century in English [Critchley]
The hermeneutic circle is between the reader's self-understanding, and the world of the text [Zimmermann,J]