In Frankenstein's scars

On June 10, a virtual talk was held by the open chair of Philosophy at the University of Azuay.

It was attended by Álvaro Cueli, professor of Philosophy, Language and Literature, doctoral student at the University of Seville, and writer, as special guest and main speaker.

In addition, Diego Jadán, a professor at the University of Azuay, who served as moderator, was present.

Cueli divided said talk into two parts to be able to deal at the beginning with the approach to the limits between philosophy, literature and the poetic space, and later to present some books and works in which the philosophical, the literary and the poetic are found.

The exhibitor used the analogy of Frankenstein's scars because, in his opinion, in the fragment of Mary Shelley's work in which the monster wonders what and why it is, this approach is reflected.

Fragments of Frankenstein's skin are for Cueli the literature that arises in men from experience, from storytelling, they are pieces of skin in that instant of poetic creation that make up the body through the scar.

However, when the monster acquires life, it wishes to be human as its creator and to achieve its essence and wisdom, that is when that sewn skin is transformed into philosophy, but when it does not achieve its purpose, that literature that lives in it through its scars they rebel against its creator.

Following that line of thought, Cueli explained that the novel can then be highlighted as the greatest artifact created by the writer to become a god and thus convert philosophy into wisdom.

In addition, he stressed the importance of the musicality of the poetic text since this musicality marks its essence as a literary text and differentiates it from other technical or scientific texts; He also defined the scar as that instant of immanence shared by the poetic and philosophical text, that is, that they are inseparably linked to its essence despite the fact that they can be rationally distinguished.

"The philosophy that always dreamed of reaching for the stars, perhaps only reached them through literature and poetry that gives life to the monster and that provokes its philosophical and human desire, the scar is still there", declared Cueli.

Finally, he presented four works that are fundamental in the history of literature and that unite well those levels of the philosophical, literary and poetic:

In Search of Lost Time, by Marcel Proust

The Divine Comedy, by Dante Alighieri

King Lear by William Shakespeare and

The Metamorphosis, by Franz Kafka

For Cueli, these works represent that union of the three levels since they handle theories, especially theories of love that are clearly literary and turn them into philosophical ones.

UDA Correspondent