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The Metaphysics of Interpretation THE METAPHYSICS OF INTERPRETATION By ALLISON JILL HEPOLA A Dissertation submitted to the Graduate School-New Brunswick Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Program in Philosophy written under the direction of Peter Kivy and Dean Zimmerman and approved by _______________________________ _______________________________ _______________________________ _______________________________ _______________________________ New Brunswick, New Jersey May 2011 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION The Metaphysics of Interpretation by ALLISON JILL HEPOLA Dissertation Directors: Peter Kivy and Dean Zimmerman In The Metaphysics of Interpretation, I explore the ontological issues surrounding fictional characters, literary works, and literary interpretation. My central claim is that if one accepts a certain position on the ontology of fictional characters and literary works – artifactualism – then, under certain circumstances, the misinterpretation of a literary work will result in the full-fledged destruction of that work. Some related matters that are studied include: realism about fictional characters, artifactualism’s implications for the debate between textualism and constructivism, the seeming temporal “gappiness” of literary works, and the question of validity in interpretation. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS AND DEDICATION Above all, I am indebted to my dissertation co-directors Peter Kivy and Dean Zimmerman for their unflagging support and guidance throughout this project and for their extensive comments on its text. Also I am grateful to my outside reader Amie Thomasson, first for her many helpful comments and suggestions on the manuscript, and secondly for her ground-breaking work in artifactualism that has made this all possible. I owe a special thanks to previous committee member and advisor Ted Sider for first suggesting the topic of fiction to me and for his guidance during the initial stages of this project. It has been said that philosophy is fundamentally a dialogue, and it is difficult to imagine how this project could have taken form without the enormously helpful feedback I received in conversations with faculty and fellow graduate students. I would like to thank Barry Loewer in particular for his feedback on the project. I am especially grateful to faculty from the Rutgers English department – William Galperin, Jonathan Kramnick, and Henry Turner – for taking time out of their busy schedules to discuss philosophy and literature with me. This project was greatly enriched by their insights about interpretation and literary theory. I also wish to thank the following people for their helpful comments: Saba Bazargan, Nick Beckstead, Tim Campbell, Ruth Chang, Janice Chik, Joe Corabi, Heather Demarest, Kate Devitt, Richard Dub, Jeff Glick, Gabe Greenberg, John Haldane, Thomas Hibbs, Doug Husak, Michael Johnson, Peter Klein, Mark Lee, Karen Lewis, Howard iii McGary, Brian McLaughlin, Jeff McMahan, Jenny Nado, Anthony O’Hear, Bryan Parkhurst, Andrew Sepielli, Justin Sharber, Stephen Shortt, Holly Smith, Joshua Stuchlik, Meghan Sullivan, Nicholas Teh, Jason Turner, Candace Vogler, Evan Williams, participants in Barry Loewer’s dissertation seminar, participants in the Center for Cultural Analysis’ April 2010 conference on fiction, and participants in the Witherspoon Institute’s Aesthetics and Morality Seminar. Additionally I must thank two professors from my undergraduate days at Notre Dame: Mike Loux and Neil Delaney. During the first semester of my freshman year, I took introduction to philosophy with Mike and an honors humanities seminar with Neil. In the former, I bristled against Mike’s allegation that non-existent objects like dragons had no properties (we were discussing the ontological argument); in the latter, Neil had us read Borges and encouraged us to ponder, among other things, the number of Don Quixote-s. Little did I know at the time, but seeds were being planted that very first semester of college that some ten years later would blossom into significant parts of my dissertation. It is delightful how philosophy sometimes works out that way. Finally I must thank my family, especially my husband Andy Poker. Without his constant support and encouragement, his occasional proof-reading assistance, and his invaluable background in literature, none of this would have been possible. It is to him that this dissertation is dedicated. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract of the Dissertation ii Acknowledgements and Dedication iii Introduction 1 Chapter 1. Fictional Realism and Anti-Realism 12 Chapter 2. Varieties of Fictional Realism 57 Chapter 3. Artifactualism and Interpretation 137 Chapter 4. Gappiness 189 Chapter 5. Lingering Questions 220 Bibliography 260 Curriculum Vitae 272 v INTRODUCTION In The Metaphysics of Interpretation I explore just that - the ontological issues surrounding the interpretation of literary works. I argue that if one embraces artifactualism, then in some situations the misinterpretation of a literary work results in the full-fledged destruction of that work. Artifactualism is the claim that literary works – poems, novels, short stories, plays – are abstract artifacts. While literary works are artifacts, they are not concrete entities like books, hammers, or bicycles. And while literary works are abstracta, they are not eternal and necessary entities – like abstracta traditionally conceived – but rather contingent things that can be destroyed. Literary works are contingent abstracta, a rather broad category that includes many other familiar “cultural” entities from everyday life such as marriages, laws, institutions, and the like. A literary work comes into existence when an author (or group of authors) composes a text with the intention of creating a literary work. Once created, a literary work can continue to exist even long after the death of its author. A literary work depends for its continued existence upon the existence of at least one physical copy of its text and at least one reader who can read the language the text is written in and - as I will argue - who can correctly interpret the text. If no such text or reader exists, then the literary work no longer exists. Artifactualism was first advocated by Roman Ingarden, but was fully developed by Amie Thomasson. Thomasson is responsible for coining the term artifactualism, 2 among other things. I accept Thomasson‟s version of artifactualism, and it is I her theory of it that I analyze and extend in new directions over the course of this dissertation. I came to accept Thomasson‟s theory of literary works in a rather roundabout fashion. Thomasson is also an artifactualist regarding fictional characters; according to her, entities like Hamlet and Jane Eyre are abstract artifacts. At the outset of my dissertation, I was deeply interested in the ontology of fictional characters. As I researched the matter, Thomasson‟s account of fictional characters was by far the most compelling. But Thomasson‟s theory of fictional characters is only coherent within her overall theory of literary works. Fictional characters stand and fall, so to speak, with the literary works in which they are found. This is hardly surprising since there is a rather obvious connection between a fictional character and whatever novel, short story, or play it appears in. One cannot fully understand the ontology of fictional characters without also understanding the ontology of literary works. So it was quite natural for me to adopt an artifactualist stance towards literary works. Subsequently I discovered that the artifactualist account of literary works is quite interesting in its own right and has some startling implications for the issue of interpretation. My project‟s origin in the ontology of fictional characters is reflected in the first two chapters. Chapter 1 is devoted to a discussion of fictional realism. Fictional realism is the belief that fictional characters such as Hamlet and Sherlock Holmes are objects. This formulation may sound odd; realism is generally believed to involve claims about existence, not objects. However I have chosen to define fictional realism as a claim about objects rather than existence for a very important reason. Not all fictional realists believe that fictional entities exist. Notably, Meinongian theories of fiction claim that 3 fictional entities are non-existent. Given the important historical role Meinongianism has played in fictional realism, I think it is best to take Meinongian views into account when defining fictional realism as a whole. What all forms of fictional realism have in common is the assertion that fictional entities are bona fide objects with bona fide properties. Before presenting the case for fictional realism in Chapter 1, I trace the historical development of the theory with a heavy emphasis on the works of Franz Brentano and Alexius Meinong. I believe Meinong should be considered the first fictional realist; he is the first person to specifically devote philosophical treatment to the ontology of fictional characters, concluding that they (as well as literary works) are non-existent objects. But it is fortunate that Meinong is not the last word in fictional realism, given the unappealing metaphysical baggage of his overall ontological theory. Having given Meinong his due credit, I turn towards a more contemporary case for fictional realism, which I term the “linguistic case” for fictional realism. The linguistic case typically begins with the observation
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