{"id":760,"date":"2026-05-31T09:02:19","date_gmt":"2026-05-31T09:02:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/?p=760"},"modified":"2026-06-01T09:24:54","modified_gmt":"2026-06-01T09:24:54","slug":"the-virtues-in-literature","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/2026\/05\/31\/the-virtues-in-literature\/","title":{"rendered":"Towards a &#8216;Virtue Theory&#8217; for Literature (1)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">It is often asked why we should read; more specifically, why we should read the classics or \u2018fine literature,\u2019 by which is meant generally poetry, plays, and prose narratives of various kinds \u2013 these days especially, \u2018serious\u2019 novels. The question is motivated by the fact that reading this literature is claimed to be a good thing and that those who do so either are admired for it or should be admired, that the failure to do so is felt to be a personal fault, and that it is even argued that society should take an interest in encouraging such reading. In short, it is held to have real value, and the only question is, what is the value?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Bad Reasons to Read Literature<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The usual range of answers to this question are pretty unconvincing. Consider <a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/bookishwisdom.com\/10-reasons-why-reading-literary-classics-is-still-important\/\">this<\/a> entirely representative list with attached brief critiques:<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">They Provide Timeless Insights Into Human Nature<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Notoriously, the \u2018insights\u2019 offered are banal (or absurd,) and authors have no particular qualifications to offer them anyway. Such insights would be better sourced from a psychology or anthropology textbook.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Classic Literature Enhances Critical Thinking Skills<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">There is no good evidence for this. Some literature may require greater cognitive effort to appreciate, but it rarely involves the assessment of argument validity, statistical reasoning, or the identification of plausible causal relations.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">They Expand Your Vocabulary and Language Skills<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Marginally, possibly, by giving examples of \u2018good\u2019 writing. Actual improvement in language competence comes mostly from practice at producing, not consuming, language; by writing and speaking, not reading and listening.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Classic Books Offer Historical and Cultural Context<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The context usually has to be provided by the Introduction to classic texts. Being set in foreign times and climes is rather a handicap to appreciation than an advantage. Nor does mere acquaintance with an alien context necessarily bring true comprehension.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">They Develop Empathy and Emotional Intelligence<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">This is highly unlikely. If anything, the connection goes the other way: people who are already interested in people are more likely to develop an interest in reading about other people. The \u2018empathy\u2019 and \u2018EI,\u2019 where they aren\u2019t delusions, were there first.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Classic Literature Provides Intellectual Stimulation and Mental Exercise<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">So do many things. That is not a particular quality of classic\/fine literature.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">They Connect You to Literary Traditions and References<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">True, but trivial \u2013 and probably a bit circular.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Classic Books Offer Escape from Modern Digital Overload<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Any book can do this. So can a crossword or a walk in the country.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">They Tackle Universal Themes That Remain Relevant Today<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">But in what does this \u2018tackling\u2019 consist? And what does it matter that they do? Literary treatments of these universal themes (poverty, war, relations between the sexes, etc.) are rarely of great significance intellectually, they do not help us better understand them, they do not help us form wise policies to address them.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Reading Classics Enhances Personal Growth and Self-Reflection<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">What evidence could there be for this? What does it even mean?<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>The Two Roots of Literary Appreciation<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">A curious fact about these lists of reasons justifying the reading of fine or classic literature \u00a0\u2013 which are all essentially utilitarian or otherwise external to the literature itself \u2013 is that, even if we accept that they don\u2019t succeed as justifications, we are no less inclined to defend the worth of reading such works. This will be true of any such external justification of literature, because such justifications are simply misguided: the only justification required for reading at all is that we enjoy it. The problem that remains is to explain how we justify valuing some literature above others by using only reasons or criteria of evaluation that are internal to the literature itself \u2013 but this is not an unusual problem in the arts, the same problem will be found in the visual arts or music, for example.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">In this case, I propose that a possible solution requires that we begin by recognising two sources of pleasure that are universal amongst humans and that seem to be relevant to the question at hand: storytelling, and language-play.<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">There now seems to be good evidence that we are in fact hard-wired to process information more effectively when it comes in the form of a narration: more brain areas are activated corresponding to a virtual experience of the narrated events, memories are more reliably and completely formed (Haven, 2007) (presumably, because the narration provides a coordinating context for the embedded facts,) oxytocin, a chemical related to empathetic identification, may be released (Zak, 20013,) mirror neurons are activated so that emotional engagement is enhanced (Iacoboni, 2009.)\n<p><\/span><\/span><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Explanations for this fact are generally offered in terms of evolutionary psychology and the advantages to be gained through such enhanced effectiveness of transmission (Boyd, 2009; Carroll, 2012; Gottschall, 2012,) but there are also explanations in terms of displays of creativity and competence and all that that might signal to potential mates and competitors about the storyteller\u2019s fitness (something like an intellectual peacock\u2019s tail.) For our purposes it doesn\u2019t really matter, except that as a cultural response to an evolutionary strategy, we might expect there to be certain conditions and limits and characteristics imposed on that cultural response so that stories that violated them would be less well-rewarded by positive responses in the audience.<\/p>\n<p><\/span><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Possible examples of such inherent requirements of a story are those elements identified as universal preferences: a plot structure of setup, conflict, and resolution (note that an unresolved conflict is known to create cognitive tension as an instance of the Zeigarnik Effect,) identifiable characters, a coherent emotional setting, etc. The fact that we cannot conceive of a successful story that violates these strictures may be a consequence of our evolved storytelling faculty, or it might simply be that they are objectively necessary elements of any narration. Again, it hardly matters why these strictures may apply, it only matters that they do apply.<br \/>\n<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Storytelling, of course, requires language, which is also universal amongst humans. Language is, however, a skill that has to be developed and then perfected for real competence: it does not simply arrive at its full and final competence like sight or hearing or breathing. In this respect it is much like other motor, cognitive, and social skills that characterize normally competent humans. Like those other skills, the development of language in its early stages is marked by creative, rule-testing, rule-breaking, repetitive, competence-testing, etc. exercises that constitute what is called play (Gras,1901.) Children play at physical sports in order to hone physical competences; children play at language use in order to hone linguistic competence. (This, and much else of interest, is discussed in Ben\u00edtez\u2010Burraco <em>et al<\/em>. 2025.) The evolutionarily derived motivation for all this is simply that play is experienced as enjoyable: play gives pleasure.\n<p><\/span><\/span><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The pleasure to be found in play does not disappear at the end of the developmental phase, though its expression and its forms of appreciation do alter. Adults still find enjoyment in play, even if for them the opportunities to indulge in play are fewer and social approval for such indulgence is limited. Some adults will, of course, continue to treat such play as worthwhile in itself \u2013 just as some adults continue to play children\u2019s games like tennis or rugby \u2013 but adults in general are more inclined to find the pleasure in play in the appreciation of play by others: some will play and others will enjoy their playing. The significance of the play-element, in Western culture at least, is well covered in Huizinga\u2019s (1950) <em>Homo Ludens.<\/p>\n<p><\/em><\/span><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The important point to note here is that not all non-standard usages of language can count as play, and not all are therefore going to be appreciated by whatever innate mechanisms are at work when we regard language play. Benitez-Burraco <em>et al<\/em> (<em>op. cit.<\/em> p. 4) make the relevant comment that:<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 80px;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Given that the concept of play is quite elusive, it is of course difficult to assess which uses of language involve some sort of play, not to say which structural aspects of language are motivated by such putative playing function. In general, language play concerns playing with linguistic forms, as well as the semantic and pragmatic aspects of language (Crystal 1998; Cook 1997, 2000). It therefore has a formal dimension, on the one hand, as well as a semantic and pragmatic dimension on the other hand. It is this formal side of playing with language that is captured when talking about the \u2018aesthetic\u2019 use of language, or, put differently, the formal dimension of language play is a form of \u2018aesthetic action\u2019 (Albuquerque and Emilee Moore 2024).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Recognising Excellence in Literature<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Literature is a performance of language use (of a particular kind) and has natural elements of assessment as a performance of a certain kind. (They may not be the only elements of assessment, but they are the fundamentals.) In the particular case of fine literature as we are understanding it, those natural elements of assessment are exactly the elements of literature determined to be relevant to the two sources of pleasure in literature that we have identified: storytelling and language play. Excellence in literature will be judged by the degree to which excellence is displayed in those elements.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Two questions are immediately suggested by this claim. The first is how we might precisely identify the elements to be assessed, and the second is how we might specify the criteria according to which the excellence in each element of the literary performance might be judged. Consider these in turn.<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">It might be thought that this is essentially an empirical question, since the elements involved are ultimately those determined to be so by observation of actual literary performance. In the case of storytelling, it has been observed that plot structure, characterization, tone, etc. are universally regarded as essential to an effective performance, while in the case of language use itself, considerations of play have indicated that structural innovation, rhythm, semantic sophistication and so on are universally recognised as aesthetically relevant. We might expect that further empirical research in this area would complete the list of relevant elements.\n<p><\/span><\/span><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">We need not, however, outsource our critical facilities entirely to the laboratory, for a critic, being human, will have an innate sense of what will count as an element of assessment and what won\u2019t. Moreover, in his audience, the critic has a mostly reliable guide to whether he has strayed from the path. If his audience come to a general agreement that some element of the performance that he has selected for consideration is not relevant as an assessment of a literary performance (<em>qu\u00e2<\/em> literary performance,) it will not be added to the list of elements that other critics will consider. The critic\u2019s audience is itself the equivalent of a laboratory test of his hypothesis.<br \/>\n<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">As to the specific criteria of evaluation for any particular element of assessment, it is highly unlikely that there will be any fixed scale for judgement. What kind of scale would measure the excellence of a plot structure, of a characterization, or of a work\u2019s tone? Against what scale would one measure the excellence of a grammatical innovation, of a semantic shift, or of a lexical rhythm? These are rather matters of taste \u2013 within certain hard to define bounds anyway, and the critic will have no better course than to appeal to his own taste to make such an assessment.\n<p><\/span><\/span><span style=\"color: #000000;\">This needn\u2019t mean that every critic\u2019s preferences are \u2018mere taste\u2019 and deserving of no more respect than any other person\u2019s. Hume made the point long ago that we are not all alike in our ability to recognise the particular forms and qualities that are productive of that pleasant feeling, and that this recognition has several consequences: firstly, we accept that there are those who have an elevated sensibility and should be taken as experts in the matter; secondly, it is possible to train one\u2019s sensibility so as to improve one\u2019s taste. With luck or practice one may become a true critic with \u201cStrong sense, united to delicate sentiment, improved by practice, perfected by comparison, and cleared of all prejudice.\u201d We can see in all this that there is room for a good deal of discussion and argument, and even for reasonable claims of error in aesthetic judgement; thus, Hume\u2019s proposal would be one way to square the circle of the ultimate subjectivity of aesthetic judgements coexisting with their disputability.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<hr \/>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Albuquerque, D. L., and E. Emilee Moore. 2024. \u201cForegrounding Co\u2010Artistry in an Aesthetic and Plurilingual\/Pluriliteracies Approach to Additional Language Teaching and Learning.\u201d <em>Frontiers in Education<\/em> 8<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Ben\u00edtez\u2010Burraco, A., S. Hartmann, M. Pleyer (2026) \u2018The Role of Play in Language Structure, Acquisition and Evolution\u2019 <em>Language and Linguistics Compass<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Boyd Brian. 2009. <em>On the Origin of Stories: Evolution, Cognition, and Fiction<\/em>. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Carroll Joseph. 2012. \u201cThe Truth About Fiction: Biological Reality and Imaginary Lives.\u201d <em>Style<\/em> 46 (2): 129-60.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Cook, G. 1997. \u201cLanguage Play, Language Learning.\u201d <em>ELT Journal<\/em> 51, no. 3: 224\u2013231.<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none;\">\n<ol start=\"2000\">\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><em>Language Play, Language Learning<\/em>. Oxford University Press.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Crystal, D. 1998. <em>Language Play<\/em>. University of Chicago Press.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Gottschall Jonathan. 2012. <em>The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human<\/em>. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.gutenberg.org\/cache\/epub\/58411\/pg58411-images.html\">Groos, K. <em>The Play of Man<\/em>, Appleton, New York, 1901<\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Haven, K. (2007).\u00a0<em>Story proof: The science behind the startling power of story<\/em>. Libraries Unlimited.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Huizinga, J. (1950) <em>Homo Ludens<\/em> \u00a0Boston, MA: Beacon Press<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Iacoboni, M. (2009).\u00a0<em>Mirroring people: The new science of how we connect with others<\/em>. Picador.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Zak, P. J. (2013). \u201cWhy your brain loves good storytelling\u201d.\u00a0<em>Harvard Business Review<\/em>. <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/hbr.org\/2014\/10\/why-your-brain-loves-good-storytelling\">https:\/\/hbr.org\/2014\/10\/why-your-brain-loves-good-storytelling<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It is often asked why we should read; more specifically, why we should read the classics or \u2018fine literature,\u2019 by which is meant generally poetry, plays, and prose narratives of various kinds \u2013 these days especially, \u2018serious\u2019 novels. The question is motivated by the fact that reading this literature is claimed to be a good [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,13,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-760","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art","category-cogsci","category-philosophy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/760","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=760"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/760\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":768,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/760\/revisions\/768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=760"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=760"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=760"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}