That course pairing philosophy and fiction sounds fantastic. I’d have loved that. I wrote an essay a few years ago on how Virginia Woolf might have intentionally used ideas from Henri Bergson’s Time and Free Will when writing Mrs. Dalloway.
Speaking of which, Proust definitely drew from Bergson. And apparently was the best man at his wedding (Bergson married Proust’s cousin). Great post.
"The idea of cleanly cleaving Western philosophy into two rival camps is silly anyway. Many philosophers are informed by both traditions, and continental philosophy is a loose term for a vast swath of different ideas and traditions."
This is too pat.
Concern about the analytic-continental no longer very much in vogue, certainly, and I think the analytic-continental wars are mostly a dead letter these days (save on Substack this past fortnight, I suppose). It seems pretty clear that departments are not as divided as they once were. But if you study the history of 20th century philosophy it was a *very* serious categorization, it affected both sides of the divide, and works really *were* (as a matter of intellectual history) divisible into the two camps. This is not to deny that there were occasional crossings—the most famous is Derrida's exchange with Searle (Derrida's two contributions are in his book Lies, Inc.)—but they were very much in the spirit of the more-or-less contemporary cold war cultural exchanges: attempts at peace across a distinctly uneasy boundary.
Now, the terms are imprecise: in particular the term "analytic philosophy" has a narrow reading and a broad one, and it's hard to talk without being careful what you're discussing. (A comparison for SF fans: Samuel R. Delany has long denied he had anything much to do with the New Wave... which is true on a *narrow* reading of the term (they hated space opera, he wrote it, etc), but completely false on the broader and much more common usage, in which he was central to it.) One way to put it is to reserve the term "analytic" for the narrower understanding and use "Anglo-American philosophy" for the broader usage, but this is certainly not consistently done. (Once you make this distinction, you can say Analytic philosophy died all the way back in 1970 (!!) when Kripke resurrected metaphysics with his Naming and Necessity lectures.). And the geographic divisions are also imprecise, since Fichte and Wittgenstein were central to Anglo-American philosophy, and plenty of American philosophers were focused largely on continental (although not, that I can think of off the top of my head, any of the most famous ones).
Once you clarify the terms, however, you can say that no, Iris Murdoch is not on the dividing line; she's an Anglo-American philosopher, one of those who prove that not all Anglo-American philosophy was Analytic in the narrower sense. (There are, unsurprisingly, any number of those.)
Two points about the divide as it existed: it mostly emerged in the late 19th century and lasted about a century, but it was sort of retroactively cast back to Kant; Kant was, I think, fully in the tradition embraced by both sides. Still, you can't *really* make the division until almost a century later. Secondly, I would suggest that one quick way to make the distinction (to the limited extent it still exists) is to ask someone who the greatest philosopher of the 20th century was: if they say "Wittgenstein", they're influenced by the Anglo-American tradition, if they say "Heidegger", they're influenced by the continental. (And I do think those are the two major candidates.)
So I can see why you want to dismiss Mr. Bulldog's essay, which definitely had a retro-90s feel to it. And yes, today the distinction is, as I said, mostly over. But I don't think that you can study the history of 20th century philosophy without understanding it. The division may have been foolish, as in it was a foolish thing to do back then, but to think about it now is not *silly* unless you want to dismiss the recent history of the field entirely.
As for writers influenced by Anglo-American philosophy: I would say Richard Powers, David Foster Wallace, Rebecca Goldstein and, of course, Iris Murdoch all count. There are lots of others too—people who are influenced by science or math often end up with Anglo-American philosophical influences without even realizing it.
Finally, to your list of philosophers who are great writers, I would put in a word for Kierkegaard; his work Either/Or, especially, is a literary as well as philosophical text (and includes a lot of fiction in it).
—Continental philosophy basically is what the layperson thinks of philosophy.
This is an interesting point, especially since continental philosophy seems to be less popular within philosophy departments. I wonder whether continental philosophy's wider audience has something to do with its stronger ties to fiction?
I think we all yearn to see ideas fleshed out and made concrete. Of course, doing that makes a professional academic philosopher vulnerable, since it's usually the concrete example that gets picked apart. It's safer to stay in the realm of abstractions and word math. On the other hand, if an analytic philosopher becomes popular (relatively speaking), they tend to be known for coming up with some particularly captivating thought experiment. So while we don't see many professional analytic philosophers becoming known for their fiction, we do see their thought experiments inspiring others to write stories, especially Sci Fi.
Thanks for the links to philosophical novels. I'll be checking those out.
Some more philosophical novels following Plato's divided line-cave allegory: Flowers for Algernon, Faith and the Good Thing by Charles Johnson, The Cave by Jose Saramago, and—here comes the shameless self-promotion—my novel, A Footnote to Plato (although mine is a literary campus novel with philosophical themes, not quite what I would call a philosophical novel).
Thanks for linking my post! One minor point re: Camus's novels: I don't think it's fair to consider them beautiful works of continental philosophy. I think of them more as good novels by someone who happens to also be a continental philosopher, and whose novels incorporate a few philosophical concepts.
You mentioned Chiang elsewhere. Presumably you would disagree with someone who said: "Technical writing can be very beautiful. Consider Chiang, a Microsoft technical writer, and his stories Exhalation and The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate." This despite Chiang both being a paid technical writer and his stories incorporate technical elements!
I've personally been getting into stories by Eric Schwitzgebel recently.
Incidentally, I wrote a deeper/more philosophical review of Chiang, which you might like as well. I think he's more influenced by analytic than continental philosophy, though it is subtle. (https://linch.substack.com/p/ted-chiang-review)
I think this is a very fair objection. I do think that the line can be blurry though. Camus and Sartre's fictions seem like expressions of their philosophies and not merely novels/plays written as a separate barely related career (like Chiang's day job and fiction). Similarly Barthes's essays blur that line often. But it's a fair objection.
I would still say I find e.g. Cioran and Nietzche highly artistic. And Camus's the Myth of Sisyphus is pretty lovely.
(I did mention Murdoch-- I'm reading one of her novels right now actually-- and described her as a hybrid philosopher who draws equally from continental and analytical thinkers. That's how I've normally heard her described.)
You understate the point: many analytic philosophy departments (i.e., any philosophy department in the English-speaking world, absent a few token Continentals) are openly hostile to literature. Less so the visual arts, for whatever reason—and music, of course. Which naturally goes back to Plato's suspicion of rhetoric and poesy. (A friend of mine, at a reputable prestigious university with a reputable prestigious philosophy faculty, was reduced to tears by an academic advisor who told her that double-majoring in English and Philosophy was wrongheaded and counterproductive.)
Of course I can understand a certain defensive attitude—a lot of undergrads don't seem to grasp that academic standards *do* exist in philosophy. It's less a pedagogical problem than it is a deeper problem in outlook.
"Putting an idea, no matter how interesting, in the head of an invented character… I cannot bring myself to do it; I find it completely puerile, even if it is a dramatic convention." - Laurent Binet
I know you're leaving out non-Western philosophical traditions, but literature and philosophy are closely tied in the Indian traditions, especially when it comes to the counterparts of moral and political philosophy. It's partly because philosophical ideas aren't only debated in seminars; they have a life on the street too, and many, if not most, Indians are aware of the moral and political puzzles in the canonical literary texts. Bimal Matilal has an interesting analysis in his 'Ethics and Epics' - https://a.co/d/0clfpype
My professor also paired Don DeLillo's White Noise with Baudrillard, and, as you said, that's why I always think of "the most photographed barn in america," particularly with the advent of AI "art" and Google's new Nano Banana Pro. For other texts we did that paired philosophy with fiction (though it wasn't a dedicated course), we were combining Camus with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (though that's pretty typical when studying absurdist/postmodern literature). What I most definitely won't forget was during my first year at university, our professor had us read Machiavelli's The Prince (which I know is "technically" not the continental philosophy you're referencing), along with Marlowe's Doctor Faustus--absolutely riveting connections.
As an analytic philosopher, I wonder, though, whether your claim that most philosophical fiction uses continental rather than analytic philosophy is a perspective effect.
For me, when I read or watch science fiction I see a lot of analytic philosophy: Blade Runner and I, Robot (and other works about whether artificial people are people, or about whether machines can think) tie in to analytic philosophy of mind. (Turing, Searle, lots of others.) Works on time travel or multiple worlds connect to analytic metaphysics (e.g., David Lewis). Puzzles of divided and combined selves (as in Star Trek's weirdly-frequent transporter accidents!) refer to or are usefully analyzed through analytic philosophy on personal identity (Locke, Parfitt). The TV show The Good Place makes explicit use of a lot of analytic ethics. (The comedic philosophical science fiction novel I'm writing pays homage to David Hume's philosophy of religion, too.) There's so much, in fact, that I'm putting together a course on philosophy in science fiction.
The counter-argument might be that sci fi rarely raises itself to the level of serious literature, but I think that is unfair and perhaps based on an impression about pulp sci fi from more than half a century ago. (Some sci fi candidates for "real" literature: Left Hand of Darkness, Neuromancer, The Three-Body Problem, Handmaid's Tale, Hyperion.) As for serious fiction written by professional analytic philosophers, the dearth might have more to do with the incentive structures in American universities rather than anything about the intellectual endeavor itself.
Thank you! I did not mean to imply that all fiction that is inspired by philosophy is using continental ideas at all, only that most philosophers who also wrote novels (that I'm aware of) were continental. Sartre, Camus, etc. But agree that novelists who are inspired by philosophy might be inspired by either side or other traditions. A lot of the examples I mentioned were inspired by the Ancient Greeks after all. I think you're totally correct that a lot of science fiction draws on some of those analytic traditions. (I'm a SF author so I certainly think of it as serious literature! I mentioned a few SF authors like Le Guin and Ted Chiang in the piece)
It's actually not that uncommon to study philosophy through fiction, not only discussing literature as you rightful mentioned, but working on theory and concepts through fiction. I had to study quite a lot of greek literature in my undergrad (in philosophy), Borges was one of the main texts on an analytical philosophy class. Fiction is also a very present as a device in Western philosophy — think about the Thomas Hobbe's Leviathan or Rousseau's Social Contract. And although analytical philosophy pushes hard against this proximity, there's a vast and fertile philosophical grounds outside this cannon. Great names such as Amartya Sen used a far amount of literary references into his works and so does a lot of feminist philosophers such as Donna Haraway.
Now for the difference between great fiction and great philosophy, Milan Kundera once said (in a Paris review interview) that the difference is the former start with questions, and the latter with answers (he puts it more eloquently).
As for the course (or maybe book club?), it's a great idea! I'd be curious to see your picks.
Oh that's really interesting re: Borges in an analytic class. I agree that fiction is present as a device even outside of straight up novels. E.g., Plato's works are dialogues and fiction of a sort in form, but even outside of that he explains concepts through stories like the allegory of the cave or gods sinking Atlantis.
Yes, to me Plato’s The Symposium is also a great literary piece, and I’d probably remember it poorly if it wasn’t for this. Narrative is just a great way to explain otherwise abstract concepts (which I think was the intention behind reading Borges to discuss finite and infinite, recursion and language). What I’m personally interested in is the difference in status (fiction x philosophy) in relation to our understanding of objectivity and truth. If you haven’t already, I can’t recommend Donna Haraway enough. Here’s a quote from A Cyborg Manifesto “The boundary between science fiction and social reality is an optical illusion.”
Great article. I immediately bought "The Weird and the Eerie" since I am a weird fiction writer. The title is new to me, so thank you for bringing it to my attention.
A fine essay and collection of writers. I would add Charles Johnson, whose training is as a philosopher and who, to this day, describes his work as philosophical novels. His masterpiece is Middle Passage, winner of the 1990 National Book Award, a book I have taught for many years.
My BA thesis in philosophy was on why certain philosophical ideas are best expressed in literature, analyzing "Thus Spake Zarathustra" and the dialogues of Plato. Now I'm a novelist. Thanks for the syllabus, Lincoln!
I always cringe a little when a novel shovels philosophy onto the page. It can be done well but is often inelegant. That could be why I strictly avoided the term “philosophical zombie” while writing a novel about exactly that.
That course pairing philosophy and fiction sounds fantastic. I’d have loved that. I wrote an essay a few years ago on how Virginia Woolf might have intentionally used ideas from Henri Bergson’s Time and Free Will when writing Mrs. Dalloway.
Speaking of which, Proust definitely drew from Bergson. And apparently was the best man at his wedding (Bergson married Proust’s cousin). Great post.
"The idea of cleanly cleaving Western philosophy into two rival camps is silly anyway. Many philosophers are informed by both traditions, and continental philosophy is a loose term for a vast swath of different ideas and traditions."
This is too pat.
Concern about the analytic-continental no longer very much in vogue, certainly, and I think the analytic-continental wars are mostly a dead letter these days (save on Substack this past fortnight, I suppose). It seems pretty clear that departments are not as divided as they once were. But if you study the history of 20th century philosophy it was a *very* serious categorization, it affected both sides of the divide, and works really *were* (as a matter of intellectual history) divisible into the two camps. This is not to deny that there were occasional crossings—the most famous is Derrida's exchange with Searle (Derrida's two contributions are in his book Lies, Inc.)—but they were very much in the spirit of the more-or-less contemporary cold war cultural exchanges: attempts at peace across a distinctly uneasy boundary.
Now, the terms are imprecise: in particular the term "analytic philosophy" has a narrow reading and a broad one, and it's hard to talk without being careful what you're discussing. (A comparison for SF fans: Samuel R. Delany has long denied he had anything much to do with the New Wave... which is true on a *narrow* reading of the term (they hated space opera, he wrote it, etc), but completely false on the broader and much more common usage, in which he was central to it.) One way to put it is to reserve the term "analytic" for the narrower understanding and use "Anglo-American philosophy" for the broader usage, but this is certainly not consistently done. (Once you make this distinction, you can say Analytic philosophy died all the way back in 1970 (!!) when Kripke resurrected metaphysics with his Naming and Necessity lectures.). And the geographic divisions are also imprecise, since Fichte and Wittgenstein were central to Anglo-American philosophy, and plenty of American philosophers were focused largely on continental (although not, that I can think of off the top of my head, any of the most famous ones).
Once you clarify the terms, however, you can say that no, Iris Murdoch is not on the dividing line; she's an Anglo-American philosopher, one of those who prove that not all Anglo-American philosophy was Analytic in the narrower sense. (There are, unsurprisingly, any number of those.)
Two points about the divide as it existed: it mostly emerged in the late 19th century and lasted about a century, but it was sort of retroactively cast back to Kant; Kant was, I think, fully in the tradition embraced by both sides. Still, you can't *really* make the division until almost a century later. Secondly, I would suggest that one quick way to make the distinction (to the limited extent it still exists) is to ask someone who the greatest philosopher of the 20th century was: if they say "Wittgenstein", they're influenced by the Anglo-American tradition, if they say "Heidegger", they're influenced by the continental. (And I do think those are the two major candidates.)
So I can see why you want to dismiss Mr. Bulldog's essay, which definitely had a retro-90s feel to it. And yes, today the distinction is, as I said, mostly over. But I don't think that you can study the history of 20th century philosophy without understanding it. The division may have been foolish, as in it was a foolish thing to do back then, but to think about it now is not *silly* unless you want to dismiss the recent history of the field entirely.
As for writers influenced by Anglo-American philosophy: I would say Richard Powers, David Foster Wallace, Rebecca Goldstein and, of course, Iris Murdoch all count. There are lots of others too—people who are influenced by science or math often end up with Anglo-American philosophical influences without even realizing it.
Finally, to your list of philosophers who are great writers, I would put in a word for Kierkegaard; his work Either/Or, especially, is a literary as well as philosophical text (and includes a lot of fiction in it).
Great post. The first thing that comes to my mind to add to your list is Adam Roberts' "The Thing Itself" which plays with Kant.
—Continental philosophy basically is what the layperson thinks of philosophy.
This is an interesting point, especially since continental philosophy seems to be less popular within philosophy departments. I wonder whether continental philosophy's wider audience has something to do with its stronger ties to fiction?
I think we all yearn to see ideas fleshed out and made concrete. Of course, doing that makes a professional academic philosopher vulnerable, since it's usually the concrete example that gets picked apart. It's safer to stay in the realm of abstractions and word math. On the other hand, if an analytic philosopher becomes popular (relatively speaking), they tend to be known for coming up with some particularly captivating thought experiment. So while we don't see many professional analytic philosophers becoming known for their fiction, we do see their thought experiments inspiring others to write stories, especially Sci Fi.
Thanks for the links to philosophical novels. I'll be checking those out.
Some more philosophical novels following Plato's divided line-cave allegory: Flowers for Algernon, Faith and the Good Thing by Charles Johnson, The Cave by Jose Saramago, and—here comes the shameless self-promotion—my novel, A Footnote to Plato (although mine is a literary campus novel with philosophical themes, not quite what I would call a philosophical novel).
Thanks for linking my post! One minor point re: Camus's novels: I don't think it's fair to consider them beautiful works of continental philosophy. I think of them more as good novels by someone who happens to also be a continental philosopher, and whose novels incorporate a few philosophical concepts.
You mentioned Chiang elsewhere. Presumably you would disagree with someone who said: "Technical writing can be very beautiful. Consider Chiang, a Microsoft technical writer, and his stories Exhalation and The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate." This despite Chiang both being a paid technical writer and his stories incorporate technical elements!
For that matter, some analytic philosophers also moonlight as writers. Iris Murdoch is maybe the most famous: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iris_Murdoch#Fiction
I've personally been getting into stories by Eric Schwitzgebel recently.
Incidentally, I wrote a deeper/more philosophical review of Chiang, which you might like as well. I think he's more influenced by analytic than continental philosophy, though it is subtle. (https://linch.substack.com/p/ted-chiang-review)
I think this is a very fair objection. I do think that the line can be blurry though. Camus and Sartre's fictions seem like expressions of their philosophies and not merely novels/plays written as a separate barely related career (like Chiang's day job and fiction). Similarly Barthes's essays blur that line often. But it's a fair objection.
I would still say I find e.g. Cioran and Nietzche highly artistic. And Camus's the Myth of Sisyphus is pretty lovely.
(I did mention Murdoch-- I'm reading one of her novels right now actually-- and described her as a hybrid philosopher who draws equally from continental and analytical thinkers. That's how I've normally heard her described.)
You understate the point: many analytic philosophy departments (i.e., any philosophy department in the English-speaking world, absent a few token Continentals) are openly hostile to literature. Less so the visual arts, for whatever reason—and music, of course. Which naturally goes back to Plato's suspicion of rhetoric and poesy. (A friend of mine, at a reputable prestigious university with a reputable prestigious philosophy faculty, was reduced to tears by an academic advisor who told her that double-majoring in English and Philosophy was wrongheaded and counterproductive.)
Yikes. I didn't encounter that so much myself, but I only minored in philosophy. My college's department was pretty continental friendly though.
Of course I can understand a certain defensive attitude—a lot of undergrads don't seem to grasp that academic standards *do* exist in philosophy. It's less a pedagogical problem than it is a deeper problem in outlook.
Just started reading Laurent Binet's The Seventh Function of Language. If you haven't read it you, and your readers, might want to take a look. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36031246-the-seventh-function-of-language
"Putting an idea, no matter how interesting, in the head of an invented character… I cannot bring myself to do it; I find it completely puerile, even if it is a dramatic convention." - Laurent Binet
I know you're leaving out non-Western philosophical traditions, but literature and philosophy are closely tied in the Indian traditions, especially when it comes to the counterparts of moral and political philosophy. It's partly because philosophical ideas aren't only debated in seminars; they have a life on the street too, and many, if not most, Indians are aware of the moral and political puzzles in the canonical literary texts. Bimal Matilal has an interesting analysis in his 'Ethics and Epics' - https://a.co/d/0clfpype
My professor also paired Don DeLillo's White Noise with Baudrillard, and, as you said, that's why I always think of "the most photographed barn in america," particularly with the advent of AI "art" and Google's new Nano Banana Pro. For other texts we did that paired philosophy with fiction (though it wasn't a dedicated course), we were combining Camus with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (though that's pretty typical when studying absurdist/postmodern literature). What I most definitely won't forget was during my first year at university, our professor had us read Machiavelli's The Prince (which I know is "technically" not the continental philosophy you're referencing), along with Marlowe's Doctor Faustus--absolutely riveting connections.
Love this piece, thanks for putting it together.
As an analytic philosopher, I wonder, though, whether your claim that most philosophical fiction uses continental rather than analytic philosophy is a perspective effect.
For me, when I read or watch science fiction I see a lot of analytic philosophy: Blade Runner and I, Robot (and other works about whether artificial people are people, or about whether machines can think) tie in to analytic philosophy of mind. (Turing, Searle, lots of others.) Works on time travel or multiple worlds connect to analytic metaphysics (e.g., David Lewis). Puzzles of divided and combined selves (as in Star Trek's weirdly-frequent transporter accidents!) refer to or are usefully analyzed through analytic philosophy on personal identity (Locke, Parfitt). The TV show The Good Place makes explicit use of a lot of analytic ethics. (The comedic philosophical science fiction novel I'm writing pays homage to David Hume's philosophy of religion, too.) There's so much, in fact, that I'm putting together a course on philosophy in science fiction.
The counter-argument might be that sci fi rarely raises itself to the level of serious literature, but I think that is unfair and perhaps based on an impression about pulp sci fi from more than half a century ago. (Some sci fi candidates for "real" literature: Left Hand of Darkness, Neuromancer, The Three-Body Problem, Handmaid's Tale, Hyperion.) As for serious fiction written by professional analytic philosophers, the dearth might have more to do with the incentive structures in American universities rather than anything about the intellectual endeavor itself.
Thank you! I did not mean to imply that all fiction that is inspired by philosophy is using continental ideas at all, only that most philosophers who also wrote novels (that I'm aware of) were continental. Sartre, Camus, etc. But agree that novelists who are inspired by philosophy might be inspired by either side or other traditions. A lot of the examples I mentioned were inspired by the Ancient Greeks after all. I think you're totally correct that a lot of science fiction draws on some of those analytic traditions. (I'm a SF author so I certainly think of it as serious literature! I mentioned a few SF authors like Le Guin and Ted Chiang in the piece)
It's actually not that uncommon to study philosophy through fiction, not only discussing literature as you rightful mentioned, but working on theory and concepts through fiction. I had to study quite a lot of greek literature in my undergrad (in philosophy), Borges was one of the main texts on an analytical philosophy class. Fiction is also a very present as a device in Western philosophy — think about the Thomas Hobbe's Leviathan or Rousseau's Social Contract. And although analytical philosophy pushes hard against this proximity, there's a vast and fertile philosophical grounds outside this cannon. Great names such as Amartya Sen used a far amount of literary references into his works and so does a lot of feminist philosophers such as Donna Haraway.
Now for the difference between great fiction and great philosophy, Milan Kundera once said (in a Paris review interview) that the difference is the former start with questions, and the latter with answers (he puts it more eloquently).
As for the course (or maybe book club?), it's a great idea! I'd be curious to see your picks.
Oh that's really interesting re: Borges in an analytic class. I agree that fiction is present as a device even outside of straight up novels. E.g., Plato's works are dialogues and fiction of a sort in form, but even outside of that he explains concepts through stories like the allegory of the cave or gods sinking Atlantis.
Yes, to me Plato’s The Symposium is also a great literary piece, and I’d probably remember it poorly if it wasn’t for this. Narrative is just a great way to explain otherwise abstract concepts (which I think was the intention behind reading Borges to discuss finite and infinite, recursion and language). What I’m personally interested in is the difference in status (fiction x philosophy) in relation to our understanding of objectivity and truth. If you haven’t already, I can’t recommend Donna Haraway enough. Here’s a quote from A Cyborg Manifesto “The boundary between science fiction and social reality is an optical illusion.”
Great article. I immediately bought "The Weird and the Eerie" since I am a weird fiction writer. The title is new to me, so thank you for bringing it to my attention.
Absorbing read, thanks.
A fine essay and collection of writers. I would add Charles Johnson, whose training is as a philosopher and who, to this day, describes his work as philosophical novels. His masterpiece is Middle Passage, winner of the 1990 National Book Award, a book I have taught for many years.
My BA thesis in philosophy was on why certain philosophical ideas are best expressed in literature, analyzing "Thus Spake Zarathustra" and the dialogues of Plato. Now I'm a novelist. Thanks for the syllabus, Lincoln!
I always cringe a little when a novel shovels philosophy onto the page. It can be done well but is often inelegant. That could be why I strictly avoided the term “philosophical zombie” while writing a novel about exactly that.