A Comeuppance Theory of Narrative and Emotions

In an important book of evolutionary literary theory, William Flesch argues that we tell stories to exercise our sense of moral outrage. In this essay I try to spell out some of the consequences of his view. First I give an overview of his argument. Then I revisit a major work of fiction—George Eliot's Middlemarch—with his arguments in mind. Eliot's novel also raises issues about the way that narrative connects with emotions, issues that, I argue, illuminate the structure of narrative itself.