E-Book Overview
This book offers innovative investigations of the concept of life in art and in theory. It features essays that explore biopoetics and look at how insights from the natural sciences shape research within the humanities. Since literature, works of art, and other cultural products decisively shape our ideas of what it means to be human, the contributors to this volume examine the question of what literature, literary and cultural criticism, and philosophy contribute to the distinctions (or non-distinctions) between human, animal, and vegetal existence.
Coverage combines different methodological aspects and addresses a wide field of comparative literary studies. The essays consider the question of language (as a distinctive feature of human existence) in a number of different contexts, which range from Aristotle’s works, through several historical layers of the philosophical discourse on the origins of speech, to modern anthropology, and 20th century continental philosophy. In addition, the volume includes concrete case studies to the current post-humanism debate and provides literary, art historian, and philosophical perspectives on animal studies.
The historical multiplicity of the various cultural representations of biological existence (be that human, animal, vegetal, or mixed) might serve as a productive foundation for discussing the nature and forms of literature’s critical contributions to our understanding of these fundamental categories. This volume opens up this subject to students and scholars of literature, art, philosophy, ethics, and cultural studies, and to anyone with a theoretical interest in the questions of life.
E-Book Content
Numanities - Arts and Humanities in Progress 12 Zoltán Kulcsár-Szabó Tamás Lénárt Attila Simon Roland Végső Editors Life After Literature Perspectives on Biopoetics in Literature and Theory Numanities - Arts and Humanities in Progress Volume 12 Series Editor Dario Martinelli, Kaunas University of Technology, Kaunas, Lithuania The series originates from the need to create a more proactive platform in the form of monographs and edited volumes in thematic collections, to discuss the current crisis of the humanities and its possible solutions, in a spirit that should be both critical and self-critical. “Numanities” (New Humanities) aim to unify the various approaches and potentials of the humanities in the context, dynamics and problems of current societies, and in the attempt to overcome the crisis. The series is intended to target an academic audience interested in the following areas: – Traditional fields of humanities whose research paths are focused on issues of current concern; – New fields of humanities emerged to meet the demands of societal changes; – Multi/Inter/Cross/Transdisciplinary dialogues between humanities and social and/or natural sciences; – Humanities “in disguise”, that is, those fields (currently belonging to other spheres), that remain rooted in a humanistic vision of the world; – Forms of investigations and reflections, in which the humanities monitor and critically assess their scientific status and social condition; – Forms of research animated by creative and innovative humanities-based approaches; – Applied humanities. More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/14105 Zoltán Kulcsár-Szabó Tamás Lénárt Attila Simon Roland Végső • • • Editors Life After Literature Perspectives on Biopoetics in Literature and Theory 123 Editors Zoltán Kulcsár-Szabó Department of Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies Eötvös Loránd University Budapest, Hungary Attila Simon Department of Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies Eötvös Loránd University Budapest, Hungary Tamás Lénárt Department of Comparat