Literature and Technology: Nature’s “Lawful Offspring in Man’s Art”

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John Hollander Literature and Technology: Nature’s “Lawful Offspring in Man’s Art” MY RUBRIC MAY BE THOUGHT TO COVER AT LEAST THREE DIFFERENT questions, each of them vast and complex. The first concerns the tech­ nologies contributing to and shaping the formation of the activities and institutions of literature throughout history. The second comprises the matter of technology as represented in or by literature. I shall be more concerned with the second o f these than the first. A third question, as to whether literature is itself a technology, will be considered shortly. A trivially technological response to being asked to discuss literature and technology might be to inquire—in the language by which many of us cope with databases—what sort of Boolean opera­ tor the “and” in this case is. As a rubric it could cover: Literature “about” Technology; Literature “as” Technology; Literary Technologies (whatever they might be); The Literature of Technology (also ambiguous). The first ques­ ti

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