Buried in the Endnotes, part 6: Cosmic Jealousy as a Status Issue

Because readers of a scholarly paper often do not study the endnotes, I want to highlight information buried in the endnotes of my latest published essay. This is the sixth post in this series.

In my recent paper, "A Theory of Humor (Abridged) and the Comic Mechanisms of John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces," published as a book chapter in Theology and Geometry: Essays on John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces, (2020), I slipped in an idea which is related to evolutionary literary criticism in an endnote. There, I argue that Enid Welsford's concept of cosmic jealousy might actually be the jealousy of those lower in the status hierarchy toward those higher in the status hierarchy.

I wrote in the main text, "Welsford investigates the motivation for supporting fools. In many cultures, to praise oneself or to be praised by others risks attracting cosmic jealousy, an evil eye, and the surest way to evade this misfortune is to be mocked by others."

Here is the buried endnote:

One could argue that the real source of supposed cosmic jealousy is in fact the spiteful envy of lower status individuals within the social group.