Shakespeare and the Literary Monkey

(Note: Originally Posted 12-12-05)

The evolution bug has mutated once again and infected yet another human discipline. A November 6th article in the New York Times Magazine, "The Literary Darwinists," asks the question: "Can evolutionary principles shed new light on the literary canon?"

In field after field, the unfounded assumption that human intellect is equivalent to neurons firings in the brain and no more makes an appearance. The key premise promoted by the "we are bio robots" crowd tells us we are no more than evolved bio machines, thus everything we do, including reading and writing, is based upon random mutations selected for by natural selection. Of course, such "scientists" have yet to provide even the sketchiest evidence that consciousness is equivalent to brain activity. Very few scientific endeavors get this far out of the barn with absolutely no support for their most basic hypothesis. It is not difficult to conclude we are witnessing metaphysical propaganda masquerading as science.

And it is not difficult to locate the source of contagion. Those ill with the evolutionary psychology virus have been spotted at the scene: "The alpha male of Literary Darwinism is the 76-year-old Harvard biologist Edward O. Wilson." It turns out "Wilson contributed a forward to 'The Literary Animal' in which he writes that if Literary Darwinism succeeds and 'not only human nature but its outermost literary productions can be solidly connected to biological roots, it will be one of the great events of intellectual history.'" There are others, myself among them, who consider Literary Darwinism to be one of the low points of intellectual history.

The current state of psychology, unfortunately, amounts to an attempt to "demystify the nature of consciousness itself, positing, for example, that the brain is a collection of separate modules evolved to serve mental operations, more like a Swiss Army Knife than a soul." We find society divided between those who wish to achieve spiritual enlightenment and those who wish to reduce Man to the level of a really handy bio robot. Of course, at the scientific and intellectual level, the contest is over. The existence of spirit has won out. However, with the propaganda campaign mounted by naturalists like Wilson in full gear, one might easily miss the anticlimactic nature of the current debate. The school of literary criticism known as Literary Darwinism failed to get the memo.

What is Literary Darwinism? "Literary Darwinists read books in search of innate patterns of human behavior." The Literary Darwinists, "…say that it’s impossible to fully appreciate and understand a literary text unless you keep in mind that humans behave in certain universal ways and do so because those behaviors are hard-wired into us." Speaking of literary hard-wiring, the movie Bladerunner based upon the Philip K. Dick short story, "Do Androids Dream of Sheep?" comes to mind. The androids in the story, discovering they’re hard-wired bio machines, rather than real humans, take exception to the fact and give Harrison Ford a rather difficult time. One can only hope temperamental writers, upon finding out they are hard-wired bio machines, do not exhibit such hostile sentiments. Then again, a few writers experiencing disgust with these Darwinists might be just what we need.

Darwinists ask how writing "makes us more adaptive, more capable of passing along our genes" when this "strange exercise of the imagination" may have "no purpose," giving evolution reason "to dispense with it." Anyone familiar with the joke about the actress in Hollywood who naively slept with the writer appreciates the fact literary toil does not enhance gene transmission. A quick look at the bank accounts of most writers confirms writing is also not much of a survival strategy. Perhaps writers need to engage in a little "survival of the fittest" behavior. Seeing their imaginations, their very personal fantasies, being denigrated as the work of survival-obsessed dreams, may cause them to strike back with well-aimed keystrokes. Imagine a whole new sub-genre of horror literature targeting the new breed of Social Darwinists. Writers will find ample inspiration in the history of eugenics and the Holocaust.

But, I digress. To be fair, one must ask if Literary Darwinists have a valid point. Compare Shakespeare with current Hollywood fare and one feels the approaching chill of extinction. Was Shakespeare the epitome of perfect literary genes? His genes, seeking survival, no doubt computed the fact that writing was the path into the heart of the ruling class. Perhaps the radiation glow emanating from our television sets has since mutated our imagination genes. Music video directors now possess the dominant gene.

Literary Darwinists explain Shakespeare’s Hamlet as a "…play [that] becomes the story of a young man’s dilemma choosing between his personal self-interest (taking over the kingdom by killing his uncle, his mother’s new husband) and his genetic self-interest (if his mother has children with his uncle, he may get new siblings who carry three-eighths of his genes)." One can only wonder why Shakespeare wastes time having Hamlet talk to ghosts rather than to his genes. To be fair to the Literary Darwinists, the Hamlet analysis suggests an answer to a question I previously considered unfathomable. Why in the world is gangsta' rap so popular? Literary Darwinists would tell us some bad ass genes want to reproduce. Maybe they have a point.

Writing fiction has often been considered sanctioned lying. Perhaps lying is a survival behavior; a certain amount of dissembling has value in tight spots. Literary Darwinists may be following in this grand tradition of writers when they represent evolutionary psychology as science.

Tags: evolution, Literary Darwinists, Darwin, Darwinism, science, biologist, psychology, consciousness, eugenics, "social darwinists"