Book contents
- Kant and Literary Studies
- Cambridge Studies in Literature and Philosophy
- Kant and Literary Studies
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Introduction
- Part I Kant on Literature
- Part II Kant, Literary Theory, and the Critical Formation of the “Human” Disciplines
- Chapter 4 “A New Light Broke upon the First Person …”
- Chapter 5 Modern Being in the World
- Chapter 6 Voice Enjoined
- Chapter 7 Narrative Discontinuity
- Part III Kant and Literature
- Index
- References
Chapter 5 - Modern Being in the World
Kant’s Philosophical Anthropology and Wordsworth’s Poetry
from Part II - Kant, Literary Theory, and the Critical Formation of the “Human” Disciplines
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 May 2025
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Book contents
- Kant and Literary Studies
- Cambridge Studies in Literature and Philosophy
- Kant and Literary Studies
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Introduction
- Part I Kant on Literature
- Part II Kant, Literary Theory, and the Critical Formation of the “Human” Disciplines
- Chapter 4 “A New Light Broke upon the First Person …”
- Chapter 5 Modern Being in the World
- Chapter 6 Voice Enjoined
- Chapter 7 Narrative Discontinuity
- Part III Kant and Literature
- Index
- References
Summary
This chapter explores the essentially narrative dimensions of substantive self-knowledge, conceived of as understanding to what extent and in what ways one has or has not exercised one’s distinctively human powers in reasonably endorsable ways within a social setting. (There are also important social preconditions for this conception of substantive self-knowledge.) The thought is that both Kant and Wordsworth conceive of self-knowledge in this way – as a kind of open-ended achievement of moral self-assessment – rather than as primarily a matter of introspective awareness or the discernment of fixed qualities of character. Wordsworth (who was engaged with the reading of Kant and Fichte in 1791) in particular worries about and makes evident the continuing problem of arriving at stability or closure in self-assessment.
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- Kant and Literary Studies , pp. 126 - 144Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2025
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