This week at The Junkyard we’re hosting a symposium on Patrik Engisch and Julia Langkau’s (eds.) recent book: The Philosophy of Fiction: Imagination and Cognition. Today we begin with an introduction from Patrik Engisch and Julia Langkau. Commentaries will follow Tuesday through Thursday.

Recent philosophy of fiction in the analytic tradition has concerned itself extensively with the distinction between fiction and non-fiction and why this distinction matters. Following the pioneering work of Kendall Walton (1990), Gregory Currie (1990) and Peter Lamarque & Stein Haugom Olsen (1994), three general theses have been particularly scrutinized: one concerning the definition of fiction, one concerning our engagement with fiction, and one concerning our learning from fiction. The volume presents new research on each of these theses.