The Dermicity of Phenomenology and Literature.

Proust, Merleau-Ponty and Levinas on the Sensible

Abstract

From Jean-Paul Sartre to Bruce Bégout, many of those who dive into phenomenology have also dived into literature. Is this a coincidence merely due to a historical moment particularly appropriate for the emergence of literary forms of philosophical enquiry? Is it due to a certain disposition towards the literary description of experience that phenomenologists share? Or is it due to a more intrinsic link between phenomenology and literature? In this article, I look into these questions by studying literature’s significance for phenomenology and how Proust can be seen as a proto-phenomenologist, to then examine Merleau-Ponty’s and Levinas’ stands regarding Proust’s À la recherche du temps perdu. In this examination, literature appears not only as relevant for phenomenology but even as coinciding with it, the degree of dermicity between philosophy and literature achieving with phenomenology its acme. I conclude by comparing Levinas’ and Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenologies of the sensible with regards to their focal theme and their interpretation of what philosophical discourse should become.