A defense of poetry : reflections on the occasion of writing
This work argues that literature can be defined, and that in its definition its unique value can be discovered. It identifies literature ontologically as a sign of the preconceptual, as the "ostensive moment" that discloses neither the purpose nor the structure of existence.
Print Book, English, 1995
Stanford University Press, Stanford (Calif.), 1995
255 p. 23 cm
9780804724524, 0804724520
1014507190
Introduction; Part I. Ostension: 1. Non-construction: history, structure, and the ostensive movement in literature; 2. One last theme: literature as insignificance; 3. The hum of literature: ostension in language; 4. The torturer's horse: what poems see in pictures; Part II. Non-Epiphany: 5. Clearings in the way: non-epiphany in Wordsworth; 6. Nil reconsidered: criticism, actuality, and 'To Autumn'; 7. Possession of the sublime, repression of insignificance; Part III. Return of the Same: 8. The absent dead: Wordsworth, Byron, and the epitaph; 9. Disposing of the body: the common sene of the romantic moment of dying; Conclusion; The ethics of suspending knowledge.