It is argued that relations between the discourses of sociology and literature need to be rethought outside the appropriative, yet inappropriate, terms of 'the sociology of...'. The work of Foucault, and particularly his location of the joint emergence of literature and the human sciences at a single 'moment', are enlisted towards this end. While the human sciences are seen to rely, broadly, on a number of fictional postulates and gategories, literature can also be seen as a source of serious and advanced social theory. - Author's abstract, (p. 208)