Literature:
Conflict and the Importance of Moral Ambiguity
In his autobiography Speak, Memory Nabokov suggests that,
In a first rate work of fiction the real clash is not between the characters but between the author and the world. Contemporary authors have become increasingly aware of the possibilities in this clash. (Works often considered under the heading Text as Game.) Fiction is no longer a simple question of what story one tells, but how one tells the story. This paper looks at the possible intersection of game theory, math theory, and artistic interactions (specifically
literature). By proposing that art is not simply mimesis this paper will suggest that literature is best understood not as mimetic/referential but rather as performative/generative. In this way literature operates as a game a
conflict, creating a textual field of play, where play occurs between the author created text, and the reader. Although this is part of a much longer work which draws on reader-response criticism, and the work of Massumi and Lyotard, for the humanitech conference I want to focus on the parts of the paper which use game theory and analysis of asymmetrical conflict. In the end I hope to point at carving out a space for art in the post-modern world as the field which allows for moral ambiguity.