EROTIC AESTHETICS: THE THEORY PRACTICE OF IRONY STUDIES IN STERNE, KIERKEGAARD, AND BARTHES

The dissertation is primarily concerned with the interrelation and friction between the domains of the aesthetic and the erotic. Through detailed readings of works by Laurence Sterne, Soren Kierkegaard, and Roland Barthes, it attempts to show that these authors have paid systematic attention to this question, and that they have produced--despite their differences--theoretical formulations which have a great deal in common. In each case, theory cannot be distinguished from practice; and, in each case, the textual strategies and conceptual configurations involved are sufficiently close to justify a single label: irony. Part One of the dissertation consists of a discussion of Sterne\u27s Tristram Shandy. Part Two--the longest part--is concerned with Kierkegaard\u27s The Concept of Irony. Part Three consists of discussions of Kierkegaard\u27s Either/Or (Volume I) and selected works by Barthes. Various other authors and theorists are appealed to along the way, including Jacques Derrida, Friedrich Schlegel, V. N. Volosinov, and Ludwig Wittgenstein. Particular attention is given to the general problem of conceptual and semiotic indeterminancy, a problem which is currently of interest in a number of different disciplines. The dissertation argues that the special relation of the aesthetic and the erotic in the West derives from the way in which aspects of indeterminacy have been highly determined in the general textual and semiotic practice of the West