Literature and Ideas

Sigrid Nunez

Much of world literature can be said to deal with many of the same questions as philosophy: What is the role of human beings in the universe? What is the relationship between the individual and society? What is reality? Why are things as they are? What is the nature of good and evil? How should a human being live? What is death? However, it is also true, as the novelist Milan Kundera suggests, that a novel's wisdom is different from that of philosophy, and that the theoretical spirit is different from the spirit that gives rise to fiction and poetry. Does the success of a literary work depend on how successfully it deals with ideas? According to Kundera, the novelist makes no great issue of his ideas. For Vladimir Nabokov, the notion of great ideas in literature is rubbish. Susan Sontag, on the other hand, believed that ideas are the only thing that matters. In my talk I will attempt to address these differing views.

文学与思想

西格丽德•努涅斯

可以说，众多世界文学都处理与哲学一样的许多问题：在宇宙中，人类的地位何在？个体与社会的关系是什么？何为真实？为何事物如其所是？善恶的本质是什么？人该如何生活？何为死亡？然而，正如小说家米兰·昆德拉所说，小说的智慧诚然与哲学不同，理论的精神不同于创造小说与诗歌的精神。一个文学作品的成功，是否要取决于它是否成功地处理了思想？在昆德拉看来，小说家并不对其思想太当真。对纳博科夫来说，宏大的思想在文学中就是垃圾。与之相反，苏珊·桑塔格却相信，思想是唯一重要的东西。在我的发言中，我将试图处理这些不同的观点。