Sociological Reading of Lost Illusions based on the Approach of Negative Aesthetic

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

• Zeinab Rezvantalab ¹
• saeed nasrabadi ²

¹ Assistan Professor, University of Tehran, French Department

² Master Student of French Language and literature, University of Tehran, Tehran., Iran

10.22067/rltf.2024.87118.1108

Abstract

The Frankfurt School, with a critical view of art and literature, studies the various dimensions of art in capitalist society and reveals that art has become a commodity tool for controlling the masses. This is where the cultural industry emerges, using any media tool to deceive the masses. In this way, the consumer is at the mercy of this industry, and any will and freedom are taken away from him. “Negative Aesthetics” criticizes the consumerist and anti-intellectual dimensions of a “one-dimensional” society and questions the function of art. Honoré de Balzac, the French writer of the nineteenth century, in the novel Lost Illusions, depicts this consumer society with precision and delicacy. Through the narration of the life of a young provincial and the evolution of his literary life in Paris, he criticizes the cultural industry of his time. This research, using a descriptive-analytical method and the key concepts of consumerism, reification and cultural industry, criticizes the dimensions of “negative aesthetics” in the novel Lost Illusions.

Keywords

• Negative aesthetics
• Lost illusions
• Cultural industry
• Balzac
• Reification
• Consumerism

Main Subjects

• french literature

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