Part of what I’m doing in that essay is trying to define what other people mean when they use that word as an accusation. So in that sense I think the definition that I’m invoking of sentimentality is, when the word sentimentality is used, it is being used as a critique of work that is overly emotional in some kind of cheap way.

But, I think the understanding of how sentimental affect can be working in art that I want to defend or make a case for, is: [When] art makes us feel deeply, often in ways we can’t explain, there can be a sort of second stage to that feeling where we reflect on why those feelings happen and how they might guide us going forth. It’s in that second stage or second layer that I want to offer something to what sentimentality can be or how it can play out.

What if, to quote from your essay again, this “strokes the ego of our sentimental selves”? How do you make sure, when you’re having this second layer of experience after feeling something, that you’re not just patting yourself on the back for having feelings?

Right, right. I quote Milan Kundera in that piece, too: “We cry one tear for the children playing on the grass, and then we cry another tear for our ability to cry at the children playing on the grass!” I think the way we escape the endless cycle of just back-patting ourselves for our own deep feelings is by being willing to be critical of what those feelings are and being willing to question whether those feelings are doing any good.

Some of that gets into the relationship between art and action. So instead of thinking of it as a kind of closed circuit where you’re like, “Okay, I had the feeling; I’m a good person for having that feeling; now I’m done with my work for the day!” To [instead] think about that feeling as kind of an open door. And if you’re going to open that door there’s some responsibility behind it.

Could it be that ultimately the most redeeming thing that this kind of art does is make us kinder to each other in the real world? Because we can go through all of these emotional exercises, or stretches, while watching movies or reading novels—and then later we can apply our imaginations in order to empathize with strangers the way we might have empathized with the fictional characters?

Well, that’s certainly a hope. And I believe that’s a possibility. But I think that sometimes people place their faith too readily in the ways in which consuming narrative or art makes us more empathetic. I feel like The New York Times puts out an op-ed every six months about empathy and reading! But Empathy and the Novel, by Suzanne Keen, basically poses a skeptical view of that and even suggests that there’s a way in which empathizing for fictional characters relieves—we feel like we’ve done our work, but there weren’t really any stakes to that work. Because empathizing with a fictional character didn’t necessitate any kind of action.