Beardsley on literature, fiction, and nonfiction

Abstract

This paper attempts to revive interest in the speech act theory of literature by looking into Monroe C. Beardsley's account in particular. Beardsley's view in this respect has received, surprisingly, less attention than deserved. I first offer a reconstruction of Beardsley's account and then use it to correct some notable misconceptions. Next, I show that the reformulation reveals a hitherto unnoticed discrepancy in Beardsley's position and that this can be explained away by a weak version of intentionalism that Beardsley himself actually tolerates. Finally, I assess the real difficulty of Beardsley's theory and its relevance today.Szu-Yen Lin is a doctoral candidate in philosophy at the University of Auckland. He received his MA in philosophy from National Chung Cheng University in Taiwan. His research areas include aesthetics and philosophy of the arts, in particular the philosophy of literature. He is currently working on the problem of literary interpretation. Apart from being a philosophy researcher, Szu-Yen is also a mystery writer, having published 8 novels and 28 short stories in Chinese, one of which also appeared in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine.

Keywords

• illocutionary act
• representation
• intentional fallacy
• intention
• interpretation