Theory’s Estrangement from Literature and Literature’s Control of Theory: A Survey of the Relationship between Theory and Literature in the Last Hundred Years
Abstract��
The capitalized “Theory” emerged from literary theories, but Theory’s progress showed a gradual estrangement from literature. The “Theory” has entered almost every field from cultural semiotics to Foucault's school, but it apparently ignores the field of traditional literature. Some scholars of post- theories try to turn back to the pre-Theory period to change the trend while some scholars maintain that literature has controlled academics. The paper argues that the concept of “literature” and the relations between literature and theory should be reconsidered. The linguistic turn highlights the intransitivity of language, which leads to the ubiquity of literariness, and as a result, literary works as the working mode of language controls all the modes of writing encompassing theory and academics. Only when taking the above phenomena into consideration can the future of literary theory be properly evaluated.
XU Liang. Theory’s Estrangement from Literature and Literature’s Control of Theory: A Survey of the Relationship between Theory and Literature in the Last Hundred Years[J]. TSLA, 2013, 33(6): 12-18.
2013, Vol. 33 
