From the Emotions of Conversation to the Passions of Fiction

doi:10.1017/CBO9780511806582.007

7 - From the Emotions of Conversation to the Passions of Fiction

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012

Keith Oatley

Edited by

Antony S. R. Manstead ,

Nico Frijda and

Agneta Fischer

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Keith Oatley: Affiliation:
University of Toronto
Antony S. R. Manstead: Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Nico Frijda: Affiliation:
Universiteit van Amsterdam
Agneta Fischer: Affiliation:
Universiteit van Amsterdam

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ABSTRACT

In this chapter I argue that narratives provide contexts to make sense of emotions, by linking emotions to the principal aspect of their meaning – namely goals. In literature a character is a person who has goals and who enacts plans to pursue those goals. Narrative plays an integrative role by relating emotions to a narrative line and attributing them to characters. Fiction contributes to the building of characters by means of emotions. Four aspects of story structure are discussed, and it is shown how they elicit emotions in the reader, but also how they enable us to understand emotions.

INTRODUCTION: EMOTION, NARRATIVE, CHARACTER

Grief over the death of a parent, suicidal despair, contempt for women, disgust at sexuality, delight upon seeing a friend, curiosity and dread toward the unexplained – how can we make sense of such emotions? Incidents of this kind are recognizable to emotion researchers. They are what we study. Yet, in this form – raw emotions caused by certain events and directed at certain objects – neither the person who experiences them nor we who read about them could understand their meanings. Something else is necessary.

One necessary aspect is a narrative line. Let me add one and run the sequence again. Hamlet, dressed in black, is asked by his mother why he continues to grieve for his dead father. When she departs, accompanied by her new husband, Hamlet feels suicidal: “Oh that this too too sullied flesh would melt,” he thinks.

Type: Chapter
Information: Feelings and Emotions
The Amsterdam Symposium
, pp. 98 - 116

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511806582.007 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2004

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7 - From the Emotions of Conversation to the Passions of Fiction

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