Charles Taylor’s ontological hermeneutics and the question of existence in Marilynne Robinson’s Lila

Abstract

Charles Taylor’s contribution (1964-2007) to the question of human existence expands across a wide range of areas to include ontological hermeneutics, linguistics, philosophy, and ethics. His Christian sensibility colors his philosophy of human existence which proposes that the self finds itself as a moral linguistic being who can exist only against a background of distinctions of moral worth and value and who is embedded in a world of meanings and dialogical relation with other linguistic beings. Marilynne Robinson’s acclaimed novel Lila (2015) is an account of the life of a young woman damaged by poverty, abandonment, and neglect and at the end healed by God’s grace. In fact, Lila is the story of how Lila, the title character, in her attempt to understand the meaning of existence through her being in the world and her linguistic awareness finds the answer to her questions in a higher sense of the good, the mystery of grace. In this study, first the dominant theses of Taylor’s philosophical anthropology will be discussed followed by a discussion of Robinson’s stand ‒ which accords with that of Taylor – against the naturalistic theories of the self. Finally, the way the character’s interpretation of human existence accords with Taylorian framework is explored.

Keywords: Charles Taylor, Marilynne Robinson’ Lila, existence, hermeneutics, self-interpretation, dialogical self