Literary practice on the immediate horizon of the elaboration of semiotics: Peirce's meetings with a few great authors
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Jean Fisette
His research interests include semiotics, literary semiotic, and musical semiotic. His publications include
Introduction à la sémiotique de Peirce (1990);Pour une pragmatique de la signification (1996); andIntroduction to the Semiotics of C. S. Peirce (1997).
Abstract
As a consequence of the specific nature of Peirce's philosophical view, the literary text need not be set against semiotic theory; instead, it may be situated in such a way as to prolong the sign and the movement of semiosis. In the first instance, the author investigates the manifestation of the literary object within Peirce's semiotic discourse. Several references to Emerson's famous poem ‘The Sphinx’ are analyzed. This is followed by an analysis of three recurring literary figures: Hamlet, Robinson Crusoe, and Chevalier Dupin. It becomes obvious that Peirce had a significant knowledge of these figures but, more importantly, this leads to recognizing the affinity that exists between such literary projects and Peirce's semeiotic: the latter seemingly feeding off the fictional nature of such literary works in constituting itself as a full-fledged semiotic discourse.
In the second part of the article, the author examines two theoretical themes such as they develop within two classical literary works: aspects of Firstness (feelings and potentiality) with regards to the famous ‘Madeleine’ episode in Proust (Du côté de chez Swann); and an excess of iconicity such that it inhibits any movement of semiosis in Edgar Allan Poe's ‘The Fall of the House of Usher.’
About the author
His research interests include semiotics, literary semiotic, and musical semiotic. His publications include Introduction à la sémiotique de Peirce (1990); Pour une pragmatique de la signification (1996); and Introduction to the Semiotics of C. S. Peirce (1997).
© Walter de Gruyter
Articles in the same Issue
- Preface
- Diagramming narrative
- The new literary semiotics
- The contributions of Peirce's philosophical disciplines to literary studies
- Literary practice on the immediate horizon of the elaboration of semiotics: Peirce's meetings with a few great authors
- The making of the literary symbol: Taking note of Langer
- A semiotic definition of literary discourse
- Semiosis, art, and literature
- Story (first order predicate) logic
- Narrative self-reference in a literary comic: M.-A. Mathieu's L'Origine
- Recontextualizing character: Role-theoretic frameworks for narrative analysis
- Universal minds
- Reconsidering the unreliable narrator
- The cognitive import of the narrative schema
- The story turned upside down: Meaning effects linked to variations on narrative structure
- The role of Vorstellung in literary semantics
- Action between plot and discourse
- Perception already stylizes: On phenomenological semiotics
- Literary semiotics and cognitive semantics
- The representation of consciousness in language and fiction: A cognitive theory of enunciation
- Laughing brains: On the cognitive mechanisms and reproductive functions of mirth
Articles in the same Issue
- Preface
- Diagramming narrative
- The new literary semiotics
- The contributions of Peirce's philosophical disciplines to literary studies
- Literary practice on the immediate horizon of the elaboration of semiotics: Peirce's meetings with a few great authors
- The making of the literary symbol: Taking note of Langer
- A semiotic definition of literary discourse
- Semiosis, art, and literature
- Story (first order predicate) logic
- Narrative self-reference in a literary comic: M.-A. Mathieu's L'Origine
- Recontextualizing character: Role-theoretic frameworks for narrative analysis
- Universal minds
- Reconsidering the unreliable narrator
- The cognitive import of the narrative schema
- The story turned upside down: Meaning effects linked to variations on narrative structure
- The role of Vorstellung in literary semantics
- Action between plot and discourse
- Perception already stylizes: On phenomenological semiotics
- Literary semiotics and cognitive semantics
- The representation of consciousness in language and fiction: A cognitive theory of enunciation
- Laughing brains: On the cognitive mechanisms and reproductive functions of mirth
