Abstract

Much of our talk about fiction seems to commit us to the existence of fictional characters, places, objects and other fictional entities. The apparent truth of such sentences as "Sherlock Holmes is a detective," "Sherlock Holmes is more famous than Hercule Poirot," "Namia is a fictional land" and "Some villains in fiction are depicted sympathetically," is taken as raw data for any adequate theory of fiction to explain. Extant theories include eliminativism, which denies fictional entities, Lewis's reductionism, which holds that fictional entities are non-actual, possible objects, and Meinongian reductionism, which holds that fictional entities are independent abstract objects or non-existent, subsistent objects. A fourth theory is endorsed here, which has fictional entities as dependent abstract objects, which are created by authors and contingently exist. Such a view avoids problems plaguing other theories, which typically fail to account for the apparent truth of some or all of the sentences above. The theory endorsed has its roots in the work of Peter van Inwagen and Saul Kripke, yet modifies their proposals to avoid certain counter-intuitive results concerning true singular negative existentials The present theory then provides us with the most effective way of treating some of the common problems associated with works of fiction, fictional characters and names in fiction