Literature needs to serve today's world

Sartre's "What is Literature?" is a great essay, extremely well-written and illustrated like many of his other work. It attempts to be persuasive in ever line and paragraph, and may even succeed at times but for the narrow view of literature espoused, particularly with the role of literature in modern society. I am forced to agree with Sartre when he says that literature needs to serve today's world; but it would again be a limited idea, inherently defective and contradictory to Sartre's advocacy of the primacy of free thought and expression. All literature written today cannot serve today's world, some need to and can, but others should exist in equal terms, whether accepted by today's world or not. Literature can be a tool for societal change but its primary role may not be this Marxian view at all, particularly in today's globalised world. Thejaswi Shivanand Location: Bangalore, India posted by Dumaketu Saturday, October 29, 2005 @ 11:43 AM 14 comments