Literature and the Philosophy of Intention [Paperback]

This book attempts to reinstate the importance of authorial intention by examining arguments against it from a variety of sources - American New Criticism, European Structuralism and various kinds of postmodernist theory. It enlists the aid of Kantian aesthetics and contemporary philosophy of language and action, as well as studying the play on intention in the manipulation of character and action in the work of Shakespeare and other English writers from 1600 to the present day.Table of Contents Preface and Acknowledgments Good Intentions Shakespeare Kant Milton, Sterne, Prince Epilogue Notes IndexPatrick Swinden is Senior Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Manchester.