Emotions and Fiction: Philosophical and Psychological Puzzles

This special issue explores one of the most intriguing puzzles in aesthetics and philos ophy of mind: our emotional engagement with fiction. Why do we have emotions to ward events and characters we know to be non-existent? And what do these responses reveal about the nature, rationality, and val ue of emotions? Bringing together leading philosophers and emerging scholars, the volume revisits classic debates – from the paradox of fiction to the appeal of tragedy and horror – while also offering new per spectives on phenomena such as emotional recalcitrance, moral self-knowledge, and the attraction of “junk” fiction. The contributions show how engagement with fiction shapes our emotional lives, evaluative outlooks, and understanding of ourselves. The result is a rich and interdisciplinary dialogue that underscores both the enduring vitality of these questions and their broader signifi cance for theories of emotion, imagination, and knowledge.

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GIULIO SACCO, IRIS VIDMAR JOVANOVIC,
MARCO VIOLA, Emotions and fiction: philosophical and psychological puzzles

DEREK MATRAVERS, Fiction and emotion: what is the problem?

STACIE FRIEND, ALEX GRZANKOWSKI, Fiction, emotion, and recalcitrance

DONG AN, A pragmatist solution to the paradox of fiction

ED ARMITAGE, Anticipatory imagining and the paradox of fiction

ANDREA SCARANTINO, How emotions about fictional objects motivate behavior

FABRICE TERONI, Emotions for fictional entities and their epistemic role

DIANA CRACIUN, Fiction, emotions, and self-knowledge

ALFRED ARCHER, NATHAN WILDMAN, Like I’ve been there before: the consolation of
junk fiction

MATTHEW STROHL, Cringe comedy as social horror

KACI HARRISON, Pondering the paradox: a play theory of painful art

Varia
YING LAN, Dreyfus’s interpretation of Heidegger’s art theory: the ontology of art in background practices

STEFANO FERRANDO, Art, history, representation, and consciousness in early Danto philosophy

GABRIEL GALIANO, Otomo Yoshihide: musicista o “noise-maker”? Una lettura  wittgensteiniana

Read the volume online here