I think Feagin may be on to an accurate understanding of the role our emotions play in literature. The theory is that we recognize morals and facts about humanity within the work and can appreciate them knowing they are making claims of concepts relative to human society. As we discussed early this semester, a more full understanding of morality comes with an understanding of emotions, it forces abstract notions of freedom, justice, love, equality, etc. to face the material world and be planted into concrete situations, these situations often show us more about these concepts than simply positing them hypothetically.
One of the reasons I believe we may enjoy tragedy in literature is that is shows the other side of the emotional spectrum, it reveals how much more there is to a persons emotional capacity than simply happy and sad. There are moments of ecstasy and also ones of deep grief and isolation, but these are part of the human experience and the combination of a number of emotions is what makes human life so vivid. It is not enough to constantly be happy, being afraid and being sad, they provide a release and experience for us other feeling cannot, they are essential to our existence, and thus must be essential to some of our arts.
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