Litteraturens viden om etik

Generativity, mutuality, and ethical sense of Kirsten Hammann and Christina Hesselholdt

Abstract

The article claims that fictional literature has a privileged access to the individual and intrahu- man reality. Thus it can tell us something about the subjective part of the ethical question, what Erikson calls ‘the ethical sense’. The point is il- lustrated through a close reading of two danish novels from the present, which shows ethic’s particular psychological-existential challenges in late modern society – as described by e.g. Giddens. The article argues, with basis in phe- nomenological and humanistic-existentialis- tic developmentpsychology, that the lack of egoidentity in the main character in Kirsten Hammanns Fra smørhullet (From the Land of Milk and Honey) gives rise to conform social ethic’s and an ‘ethical flickering’. While the higher degree of egoidentity and generativity in the main character in Christina Hesselholdts I familiens skød (In the Family) gives rise to a more mature ethical sense, which in part contains an element of muturality, reflexivity and mentalization, in part contains an element of ability to stick to one’s own standpoint. Fi- nally the article argues that the perhaps most important contribution made by literature to the discussion of ethic’s lies in this emphasis on the complexity of the ethical question.