Quo Vadis?: Literary Theory Beyond Postmodernism‪.‬

"Beyond postmodernism"--one can almost hear a sigh of relief. Finally we can say out loud what a growing number of books admit: postmodernism as a movement of renewal has run its course. In literary studies it is not just the inclusion of postmodernism in encyclopedia entries but also its own evident inability to come up with engaging new readings that signal the end of postmodern literary theory. This does not mean that we have already reread the traditional literary canon in postmodern terms but rather that any such readings have become more or less predictable. Postmodern literary theory was born of a desire to liberate from the predictable, a desire for constant renewal and unexpected interpretations, but it has clearly exhausted this potential. Where shall we go from here? Recent studies that try to answer this question indicate that the future of literary theory involves a renewed desire for humanism. The following review of this trend toward humanism suggests that the greatest obstacle in reconceptualizing theory after postmodernism is the failure to ask foundational questions about our reading practices. I shall propose that daring to ask such questions connects the future of theory inevitably with ontology, humanism, and theology. If we agree with the trend of theory after postmodernism and yet desire to affirm postmodern concerns about humanism, the future of theory depends on our ability to define this neo-humanism ontologically by acknowledging the hermeneutic nature of all self-knowledge and the end of metaphysics. With the help of Incarnational theology, we can sketch a reading practice that takes postmodern concerns seriously while allowing us to recover the humanist idea of self-knowledge as the purpose of literary theory.