The Paradodž of AversioŶ: CoŵŵeŶts oŶ KorsŵeLJer’s Savoring Disgust 1 Mitchell Green One issue that drives the dialectic of KoƌsŵeLJeƌs fasĐiŶatiŶg, Savoring Disgust (hereafter SD), is what she calls the Paradox of Aversion. As a first approximation, this is the problem raised by our ability to find enjoyable an experience that might also be repulsive, disgusting, or sickening. Examples are scenes from gross-out movies, works of visual art that feature objects such as human entrails, a beating heart, blood, or putrefaction in its various forms. One can also imagine a musical work featuring disgusting sounds that might also be enjoyable for some reason. So too one can even imagine extreme artforms in which the works exude noxious smells, or offer nauseating taĐtile edžpeƌieŶĐes oŶ the ŵodel of ǁhat oŶe is asked to stiĐk oŶes hands into in haunted houses. In some cases we might find such experiences enjoyable in spite of their repulsiveness; in yet other cases, K seems to suggest, we find such experiences valuable iŶ theiƌ oǁŶ ƌight. IŶ ǁhat folloǁs Ill foĐus ŵLJ ĐoŵŵeŶts oŶ Ks disĐussioŶ of the Paƌadodž of Aversion, as well upon her solution to it. That solution depends on her account of pleasure, so we will pause over that, as well as her account of how disgust in art has a cognitive value. Ill conclude with some reflections on how aesthetic disgust relates to expressive behavior. 1. Standard version of the paradox of fictional emotions. What Korsmeyer terms the Paradox of Aversion is neither equivalent to nor a special case of what is sometimes called the Paradox of Fictional Emotions. To see the ĐoŶtƌast, Ill fiƌst 1 Paper presented at an Author Meets Critic session, Pacific Meeting of the APA, Seattle, WA, March, 2012. I thank Carolyn Korsmeyer and Jenefer Robinson for useful comments and discussion.