FICTIONAL TELLERS A RADICAL FICTIONALIST SEMANTICS FOR FICTIONAL DISCOURSE

• Authors: Predelli Stefano
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

This essay proposes dissolution of the so-called ‘semantic problem of fictional names’ by arguing that fictional names are only fictionally proper names. The ensuing idea that fictional texts do not encode propositional content is accompanied by an explanation of the contentful effects of fiction grounded on the idea of impartation. After some preliminaries about (referring and empty) genuine proper names, this essay explains how a fiction’s content may be conveyed by virtue of the fictional impartations provided by a fictional teller. This idea is in turn developed with respect to homodiegetic narratives such as Doyle’s Holmes stories and to heterodiegetic narratives such as Jane Austen’s Emma. The last parts of the essay apply this apparatus to cases of so-called ‘talk about fiction’, as in our commentaries about those stories and that novel.

Keywords

EN

FICTION; FICTIONAL NAMES; NARRATIVE; PROPER NAMES; SEMANTICS

• Publisher: Institute of Philosophy of the Slovak Academy of Sciences and Institute of Philosophy of Academy of Sciences of Czech Republic
• Journal: Organon F. medzinárodný časopis pre analytickú filozofiu
• Year: 2021
• Volume: 28
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 76 – 106

Contributors

author

Predelli Stefano

• University of Nottingham, Institute of Philosophy, Nottingham NG7 2RD, United Kingdom

Identifiers

DOI

https://doi.org/10.31577/orgf.2021.28105