추론의 대안으로서의 경험: J. M. 쿳시의 『엘리자베스 코스텔로』읽기

In Elizabeth Costello, J. M. Coetzee does not reveal, as usual, his own position concerning the matter of whether or not there exist any epistemological locus to confirm humanitarian values. Starting with the deconstruction of linguistic autonomy, the writer problematizes the reliability of reason, sympathy and radical experientialism. He questions reality itself in general by featuring Elizabeth Costello who struggles to escape from the epistemological quandary. Without any hope of epistemological salvation, the reader is left helpless down to the very closing line of the story. Even if the writer deserves to be disoriented himself or to disorient his readers, the readers' actual life cannot afford to enjoy such a labyrinth. Because life should go its way in a spacio-temporal setting, an individual or a particular community needs to attain an epistemological tool efficient enough to indicate a direction in light of decision-making. ‘Experience' suggested by John Dewey might work up as an epistemological alternative to reasoning that has been privileged throughout the metaphysical history of the west. Surely, the reader deserves to be re-oriented toward his or her individual or communal value directed by ‘social intelligence' in the pragmatist perspective.