Do works of fiction require a moral to be learned after reading?

>>8491503
It's a Victorian idea that literature has to be edifying, but reading can have that power.

>>8491503
Just about anything can 'exist,' anon

Ideally a work of fiction or nonfiction gives you knowledge. Something to think about once it's over. Otherwise it's just a waste of time

That knowledge doesn't necessarily have to be an easily digestible moral, but there should be something that at least raises questions or gives you knowledge about something

>>8491503
>>8491511

personally I don't think a book needs to be pushing a moral, but if a story is true to life you should be able to learn something from it, even if its completely your own construction.

>>8491503

I doubt anyone would argue that they "require" a moral, only that they're improved by one.

And I would not make that argument. I think it's ridiculous to approach fiction as a learning tool. You're not even learning about other people, you're learning about how the author views other people. Any other bits of information are more easily learned from non-fiction.

I can't think of a single work of fiction that influenced anything. Even 1984, which gets referenced all the time... whether or not people would be more or less paranoid about government surveillance without 1984 is a pure guess. It's a claim that nobody can ever substantiate.

>>8491511
>Victorian
Nah, it was an idea that existed since forever, and remained ubiquitous until romanticism (l'art pour l'art).

>>8491535
>I can't think of a single work of fiction that influenced anything.
Literature mainly influences the inside and/or encourages discourse, so it's not surprising that it doesn't influence real world politics. There are some exceptions, though, such as holy books and Tolstoy, who certainly had real influence.

>>8491503
>moral to be learned
how many books have you read, anon?

>>8491503

I don't like it when they try to teach a moral.

If you really want to get a message across, just say it directly. You don't need to take 500 or so pages to tell it through a metaphor of some kind.

>>8491535
>I can't think of a single work of fiction that influenced anything. Even 1984, which gets referenced all the time... whether or not people would be more or less paranoid about government surveillance without 1984 is a pure guess. It's a claim that nobody can ever substantiate.

You're undermining your own claim, literature always influences its readers and extended from that society as a whole, but its subtle and indirect so we can never know for certain how things would be different without them