| Through a critical reading of the philosophers Ernst Cassirer and Maurice Merleau-Ponty, this study seeks to account for a particular understanding of myth in contemporary fiction. I argue that Cassirer's theory of mythical thought as an immediate existence and presence corresponds to Merleau-Ponty's insistence on the 'worldliness' of perception as a form of truth. Along with his theories of the body, intention, and intersubjectivity, Merleau-Ponty will be used to clarify Cassirer's links between language and myth. These links will then be used in a sustained analysis of three contemporary novels that enact this understanding of myth: William T. Vollmann's The Ice Shirt, Anne Carson's Autobiography of Red, and Lawrence Norfolk's In the Shape of a Boar. Drawing on such works, I argue that a phenomenology of myth presents a significant step in moving beyond post-structuralism, and serves as a means of understanding how fiction makes imperfect, but fundamental, attempts at recovering truth. |
