Secular Conversion: La Nausée as Formative Fiction
This article investigates the uses of familiar conventions of the conversion narrative inJean-Paul Sartre's 1938 novel, La Nausee, arguing that in addition to thematic and structural elements, the novel shares the conversion narrative's perlocutionary goal of guiding the readers toward a c...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
2017
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| In: |
Religion & literature
Year: 2017, Volume: 49, Issue: 2, Pages: 47-68 |
| IxTheo Classification: | CD Christianity and Culture KAJ Church history 1914-; recent history NBE Anthropology VB Hermeneutics; Philosophy |
| Further subjects: | B
Christian Life
B SUSPICION in literature B Christianity B Hermeneutics B LA Nausee (Book) B Philosophy |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | This article investigates the uses of familiar conventions of the conversion narrative inJean-Paul Sartre's 1938 novel, La Nausee, arguing that in addition to thematic and structural elements, the novel shares the conversion narrative's perlocutionary goal of guiding the readers toward a conversion experience of their own. More precisely, the novel invites the readers to convert their interpretive habits through the practice of hermeneutic suspicion. In light of Joshua Landy's idea of "formative fiction," this essay reads La Nausee not merely as an attempt to convey philosophical ideas in fictional form, but also, and more importantly, as a "training ground" that seeks to hone the readers' hermeneutic capacities. If successful, the novel equips the readers to interpret conversion narratives-including La Nausee itself-with a dose of suspicion, thus inviting the readers to question both Roquentin's reliability as a narrator and the efficacy of apologetic literature in both its sacred and secular forms. |
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| ISSN: | 2328-6911 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Religion & literature
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