Abstract: The question of the cognitive value of literature is the central challenge in the development of a serviceable model of humanism, and it is also the most difficult to answer. The sceptic has powerful arguments to the effect that, even if it is true that literature can bring our world to view, literature contributes nothing to our knowledge of this world in its act of presentation. The most we can say is that literature presupposes rather than imparts knowledge of the world. This chapter argues that this is no loss, indeed that the traditional humanistic search for so-called knowledge through literature seriously miscasts the role literature can play in intellectual life.

Keywords: literature, sceptic, knowledge, humanism, intellectual life,