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"Human beings are captivated by stories. In the modern world we consume fiction as literature, at a huge rate, whether on paper or electronic devices - but what is at the heart of the experience of the novel, of silent reading? Philosophers of art have traditionally focused on a reading experience in which novels are read, re-read, savored, and studied in depth. In this book, Peter Kivy looks at the more common experience of a reader who just reads a novel once, or who, if they do read it again, do so for the same reasons that they read it the first time: to be told a story. This is not the reading experience of the scholar or critic, but that of the average reader, and it represents an engagement with the age-old experience of storytelling that is bound up with the very beginnings of humanity. Drawing comparisons with other art forms, this book examines the role of aesthetic features in silent reading, such as narrative structure, and pursues the experiential core of what it is to read a novel: a tale once-told"-- "Drawing comparisons with other art forms, this book examines the role of aesthetic features in silent reading, such as narrative structure, and the core experience of reading a novel as a story rather than a scholarly exercise. Focuses on the experience of the art form known as the novel. Uses the more common perspective of a reader who reads to be told a story, rather than for scholarly or critical analysis. Draws comparisons with experience of the other arts, music in particular. Explores the different effects of a range of narrative approaches."-- Drawing comparisons with other art forms, this book examines the role of aesthetic features in silent reading, such as narrative structure, and the core experience of reading a novel as a story rather than a scholarly exercise. Focuses on the experience of the art form known as the novelUses the more common perspective of a reader who reads to be told a story, rather than for scholarly or critical analysisDraws comparisons with experience of the other arts, music in particularExplores the different effects of a range of narrative approaches Peter Kivyis Board of Governors Professor of Philosophy at Rutgers University and a past president of the American Society for Aesthetics. He is author of The Possessor and the Possessed: Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, and the Idea of Musical Genius(2001), Introduction to a Philosophy of Music(2002), The Performance of Reading(Wiley-Blackwell, 2006), Music, Language, and Cognition: And Other Essays in the Aesthetics of Music(2007), and Antithetical Arts: On the Ancient Quarrel Between Literature and Music(2009), and editor of The Blackwell Guide to Aesthetics(Blackwell, 2004).
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