The Swimmer Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Rebecca Hughes and Kieron O'Hara

Critical Essay by Rebecca Hughes and Kieron O'Hara

SOURCE: Hughes, Rebecca, and Kieron O'Hara. “John Cheever's ‘The Swimmer’ and the Abstract Standpoint of Kantian Moral Philosophy.” In The Ethics in Literature, edited by Andrew Hadfield, Dominic Rainsford, and Tim Wood, pp. 101-15. New York: St. Martin's Press, Inc. 1999.

In the following essay, Hughes and O'Hara consider “The Swimmer” in terms of Kantian philosophy.

Kantian Moral Abstraction

In Kantian philosophy, morality demands that individuals be treated as deserving significant and equal respect. People should be seen as ends of moral behaviour, and not just as means to independently desirable outcomes. Morality is grounded on the categorical imperative, that ‘I should never act except in such a way that I can also will that my maxim should become a universal law’. In other words, one may be subject to contradictory desires or interests, but these cannot be supported by reason.

In the second place, because any plausible moral maxim must be universal,...
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