The sage and the fool: Antithesis, paradoxy, and reconciliation in a dialectical poetic of "Moriasophia"
Item
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Title
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The sage and the fool: Antithesis, paradoxy, and reconciliation in a dialectical poetic of "Moriasophia"
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Identifier
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d_2009_2013:c480d7b6638b:11583
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identifier
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12133
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Creator
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Pilsner, John D.,
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Contributor
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Clare L. Carroll
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Date
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2012
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Comparative literature | Theology | Philosophy | dialectic | Erasmus | folly | fool | Socrates | wisdom
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Abstract
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This study places the text and method of The Praise of Folly in a European context of folly-and-wisdom discourse, called here "moriasophia." Moriasophia is a perennial theme with literary-historical origins, often depicted as two opposing figures in debate, or as a single, free-thinking individual confronting the dominant social, moral, and political order, or as a literary author writing in the ironic mode of truth-in-fiction. This study analyzes the literary trope on a theoretical level, demonstrating how a bivalent discourse of jest and earnest functions rhetorically and dialectically to explore and verify metaphysical, moral, and epistemological inferences. At issue is whether the breach between literary and logical methods may be reconciled by Folly, as she transforms images of ignorance and malice into likenesses of holy idiocy. Thematic continuity and cultural synthesis is demonstrated in ancient through early modern literature. The discussion emphasizes the seminal figures of Socrates, Diogenes, St. Paul, and Dionysius the Areopagite, with particular attention paid to Plato's Parmenides, Petrarch's On his own Ignorance, and Nicholas of Cusa's On Learned Ignorance and Idiota on Wisdom. The Praise of Folly represents a cultural high point not only because of its command of precedents, literary creativity, and rhetorical sophistication, but because Erasmus invents novel ways of engaging the reader in substantial questions about language, knowledge, and faith. The result is a new generic blueprint, a dialectical poetic which invites theoretical speculation even as it provokes an affective response to human experience.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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2009_2013.csv
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degree
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Ph.D.
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Program
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Comparative Literature
