Empathy and the NovelOxford University Press, 2007 M04 19 - 274 pages Does empathy felt while reading fiction actually cultivate a sense of connection, leading to altruistic actions on behalf of real others? Empathy and the Novel presents a comprehensive account of the relationships among novel reading, empathy, and altruism. Drawing on psychology, narrative theory, neuroscience, literary history, philosophy, and recent scholarship in discourse processing, Keen brings together resources and challenges for the literary study of empathy and the psychological study of fiction reading. Empathy robustly enters into affective responses to fiction, yet its role in shaping the behavior of emotional readers has been debated for three centuries. Keen surveys these debates and illustrates the techniques that invite empathetic response. She argues that the perception of fictiveness increases the likelihood of readers' empathy in part by releasing them from the guarded responses necessitated by the demands of real others. Narrative empathy is a strategy and subject of contemporary novelists from around the world, writers who tacitly endorse the potential universality of human emotions when they call upon their readers' empathy. If narrative empathy is to be taken seriously, Keen suggests, then women's reading and responses to popular fiction occupy a central position in literary inquiry, and cognitive literary studies should extend its range beyond canonical novels. In short, Keen's study extends the playing field for literature practitioners, causing it to resemble more closely that wide open landscape inhabited by readers. |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 88
Page vii
... fictional characters and other aspects of fictional worlds. As this book demonstrates, readers' and authors' empathy certainly contributes to the emotional resonance of fiction, its success in the marketplace, and its character ...
... fictional characters and other aspects of fictional worlds. As this book demonstrates, readers' and authors' empathy certainly contributes to the emotional resonance of fiction, its success in the marketplace, and its character ...
Page ix
... fictional worlds. The most artful and complex evocation of shared feeling ... characters. They believe that novel reading opens their minds to experiences ... characters' feelings. Though these claims have bearing on matters of narrative ...
... fictional worlds. The most artful and complex evocation of shared feeling ... characters. They believe that novel reading opens their minds to experiences ... characters' feelings. Though these claims have bearing on matters of narrative ...
Page xii
... character comes first is an open question: spontaneous empathy for a fictional character's feelings sometimes opens the way for character identification. Not all feeling states of characters evoke empathy; indeed, empathetic responses to ...
... character comes first is an open question: spontaneous empathy for a fictional character's feelings sometimes opens the way for character identification. Not all feeling states of characters evoke empathy; indeed, empathetic responses to ...
Page xiii
... fiction writers score higher on empathy tests than the general population.18 (Their high ... fictional world-making does not always transmit to readers without ... characters because of the protective fictionality, but (if Preface xiii.
... fiction writers score higher on empathy tests than the general population.18 (Their high ... fictional world-making does not always transmit to readers without ... characters because of the protective fictionality, but (if Preface xiii.
Page xiv
Suzanne Keen. situation and characters because of the protective fictionality ... fictional world-making limits these potential results. I theorize that ... fiction must be accorded the respect of experimental inquiry. It will not do to ...
Suzanne Keen. situation and characters because of the protective fictionality ... fictional world-making limits these potential results. I theorize that ... fiction must be accorded the respect of experimental inquiry. It will not do to ...
Contents
1 Contemporary Perspectives on Empathy | 3 |
2 The Literary Career of Empathy | 37 |
3 Readers Empathy | 65 |
4 Empathy in the Marketplace | 101 |
5 Authors Empathy | 121 |
6 Contesting Empathy | 145 |
A Collection of Hypotheses about Narrative Empathy | 169 |
Notes | 173 |
Works Cited | 209 |
Index | 235 |
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Common terms and phrases
activity aesthetic altruism Anil’s Ghost another’s argues authors Batson behavior believe Book Club brain Butler C. K. Stead chapter character identification character’s cognitive compassion contemporary cultivation cultural Daniel Batson discussion effects of reading Efuru emotional contagion emotional responses empa empathetic reading experiences empathetic response empathic inaccuracy emphasize ethical false empathy female Female Genital Cutting fictional characters fictional worlds fMRI gender genres Hakemulder Hoffman imagination individuals instance intentionally left blank J. K. Rowling Kuiken literary reading literature Martha Nussbaum Miall middlebrow mirror neurons Mistry’s Moral Development motives Nancy Eisenberg narration narrative empathy novel reading novelists Nussbaum Octavia Butler Ondaatje one’s Oprah personal distress popular postcolonial prosocial action psychologists reactions readers representation rescuers responses to fiction result role taking role-taking shared feeling social story suggests sympathy texts theorists theory tion tive understanding universal victims Victorian Wayne Booth Winfrey Winfrey’s women writing