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... uth, now dwell forever in texts. That this is not possible, but that it was possible for Germans to burn Jews and for the world to keep silent, that it was possible for slavery to have endured in a land that called its people free, is the accusation to which we must respond in interpreting literature. Works Cited (Annotated) Cohen, Richard A. Elevations: The Height of the Good in Rosenzweig and Levinas.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994. This was offered to me by Dr. Fisher as a possible stake in my claim, but it seems too weak to include in a formal argument that the Holocaust was a profound factor in Levinas' philosophy. I feel strongly, however, that it belongs in the paper even though it may digress. Levinas, Emmanuel. 'Ethics and Spirit. ' 1952. Difficult Freedom: Essays on Judaism.
Trans. Sean Hand. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990. 3 - 10. I rely on this article for Levinas's most famous insight about the human face. I chose it most specifically for the quote, 'The face is not the mere assemblage of a nose, a forehead, eyes, etc. , ' he says; 'it is all that, of course, but takes on the meaning of a face through the new dimension it opens up in the perception of a being. ' It clearly explained the sakes of this mode of engaging the other. Levinas, Emmanuel. 'Ethics as First Philosophy. ' 1984.
Trans. Sean Hand and Michael Temple. Re-Reading Levinas. Ed. Robert Bernasconi and Simon Critchley. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991. 75 - 87.
Levinas makes strong claims for ethics as the first philosophy by arguing that my being-in-the-world has been the usurpation of spaces belonging to the other whom I have already oppressed or starved. He uses Pascal's 'my place in the sun' to mark the beginning of the image of the usurpation of the whole earth. All human action is a response to ethical challenge. Hence ethics are 'first philosophy, ' logically prior to any other mode of thought, which goes along with my claim that it is prior to interpretation. Levinas, Emmanuel. 'From the Rise of Nihilism to the Carnal Jew. ' 1963.
Difficult Freedom: Essays on Judaism. Trans. Sean Hand. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990 221 - 25. This article condemns the silence of those who will not respond. Levinas argues that human subjectivity the feeling of being 'not guilty, but accused. ' This is a feeling that comes up again and again whilst reading Dillard and Morrison and others.
Also this links closely with his existence claims and sets up this feeling of anxiety affirms our existence and since it is an ethical question it again places ethics before any other mode of thought. Levinas, Emmanuel. 'God and Philosophy. ' 1975. Trans. Richard A. Cohen. Re-Reading Levinas.
Ed. Robert Bernasconi and Simon Critchley. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991. 166 - 89. An enormous point about the other comes from this article. The 'It' 'Thou" discussion crystallizes a link to literature because these terms are dealt with specifically in literary criticism about subjectivity. Having some prior knowledge of the discussion made it easier to follow, which is often difficult.
Levinas, Emmanuel. 'Meaning and Sense. ' 1964. Basic Philosophical Writings. Ed. Adriaan T. Peperzak, Simon Critchley, and Robert Bernasconi. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1996. 33 - 64.
This article argued that Levinas's ethics are not prescriptive but descriptive. It is not that I should be responsible; I already am responsible by virtue of having consciousness. I chose it for two great quotes about how the injustice to another 'imposes itself upon me, ' Levinas says, 'without my being able to be deaf to its call or to forget it, that is, without my being able to suspend my responsibility for its distress' and that a human being cannot be reduced to an object because to do so is 'disturbed and jostled by another presence, ' which cannot be 'integrated into the world. ' Levinas Emmanuel. 'Reality and Its Shadow. ' 1948. Trans. Alphonso Links. Re-Reading Levinas.
Ed. Robert Bernasconi and Simon Critchley. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991. 130 - 43. Levinas praises literary critics in this article as those who determine ethical responsibility. Art according to Levinas is irresponsible for many reasons and it is criticism that is the ethical activity of restoring literature to responsibility by reattaching images to the human reality. Levinas, Emmanuel. 'A Religion for Adults. ' 1957.
Difficult Freedom: Essays on Judaism. Trans. Sean Hand. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press. 1990: 11 - 23.
This article criticizes prior notions of deontology by questioning its metaphysical claims. The quote I'm using is that 'Self-consciousness is not an inoffensive action in which the self takes note of its being, ' Levinas says; 'it is inseparable from a consciousness of justice and injustice. ' Levinas, Emmanuel. 'Toward the Other. ' 1968. Nine Talmudic Readings. Trans. Annette Aronowicz. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990. 12 - 29.
This article was in response to a commonly sighted paradox of Levinas' notions of responsibility preceding understanding and human speech. I did my best in the paper to address this problem as Levinas does in this article and then relate what he says about speech to literature. Levinas, Emmanuel. 'Transcendence and Height. ' 1962. Basic Philosophical Writings. Ed. Adriaan T.
Peperzak, Simon Critchley, and Robert Bernasconi. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1996. 11 - 31. He proposes to replace deontology with a counterfactual ethics of responsibility. The injury I do the other is counterfactual, because it is not specified and therefore not limited and therefore my relation to the other is a relation of infinite responsibility. Weber, Elizabeth. "The Notion of Persecution in Levinas's Otherwise than Being, or Beyond Essence. " Ethics as First Philosophy. Ed.
Adriaan Peperzak. New York: Routledge. 1995: 69 - 76 As much as I wanted to read this Otherwise than Being I just ran out of time. I did find this article and I took the quotes a little out of their context to the article but it offered the linkage between Levinas' philosophy and his past experience in the Holocaust. I found it hard not to mention it then. Sklarew, Myra. 'Teaching Children. ' From the Backyard of the Diaspora. Washington: Dryad, 1981. 34.
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