On literature and knowledge

Moving from liteary cognitivism, this paper explores the epistemological value of literature, with particular but not exclusive reference to the novel. Literature can convey knowledge in different ways; either by publishing data, or by creating sociological labs, or simply by conceptualizing some kind of knowledge that the reader already possesses. Literature can also convey emotional knowledge, unlike other non-fictions. The literary knowledge of a fact is more similar to experiential knowledge than to manual knowledge conveyed in that it implies both the knowledge of a datum and the emotional implications of this experience. This makes literary knowledge rather complex, but not more difficult to acquire.