Darwinian literary criticism

Yes, it exists. Someone recently parodied it to me as follows (and I doubt the parody is too far from its model): “Darwin’s theory explains why older rich and powerful males would prefer pretty young females as mates, and vice versa. And isn’t that what Jane Austen’s novels are all about?”

This was perhaps the laugh of the month for me in April. I tried to figure out the reason for my laughter, and I suppose it’s twofold.

1. I’m becoming quite sick of the robotic way in which applying natural selection to absolutely everything is considered an automatic sign of powerful intellectual work.

2. Perhaps more importantly, McLuhan would rip this to shreds. As though the novels of Jane Austen or anyone else are nothing more than intellectual content depicted in an aesthetically pleasing way. “You see, Jane Austen’s novels are actually sociobiological treatises on animal mating habits.”

I think the person who told me this did a similar parody of the “Darwinian” reading of the Iliad, and it was equally ludicrous.

Darwin is a lot of fun to read. But too often, his admirers are just robotic enforcers out to crush the naive.