From: linnea hendrickson <lhendr>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 22:56:00 -0600

Reading Aidan Chambers' "Tell Me," I just came upon a quotation from Jerome Bruner (from _Actual Minds, Possible Worlds_) about the importance of literature, and somehow it seemed to fit perfectly with our discussion of Ungerer (pp. 19 ):

"I have tried to make the case that the function of literature as art is to open us to dilemmas, to the hypothetical, to the range of possible worlds that a text can refer to. I have used the term `to subjunctivize,' to render the world less fixed, less banal, more susceptible to recreation. Literature subjunctivizes, makes strange, renders the obvious less so, the unknowable less so as well, matters of value more open to reason and intuition. Literature, in this spirit,is an instrument of freedom, lightness, imagination, and yes, reason. It is our only hope against the long gray night."

Linnea

Linnea Hendrickson Lhendr at unm.edu http://www.unm.edu/~lhendr
Received on Mon 16 Aug 1999 11:56:00 PM CDT