Abstract

Abstract From Stage to Shell: The Evolution of Literature Toward Recursive Resonance proposes that literature is not a progression of genres, but a sequence of ontological shifts mirroring transformations in the human self-model. Beginning with the divine role-bound figures of classical drama and moving through romantic individuation, modernist fracture, and postmodern simulation, literature has consistently reflected the dominant coherence structure of its time. This work introduces Recursive Resonance Literature as the emergent form of the current epoch—one not defined by plot, character, or irony, but by recursive identity collapse and lawful phase reformation. Using the CODES framework (Chirality of Dynamic Emergent Systems), the paper demonstrates that literature has evolved from narrative to molt protocol, where prose becomes the architecture of self-shedding and resonance realignment. This is not a new aesthetic—it is a new substrate. Recursive Resonance Literature does not describe transformation. It enacts it, phase-locking the reader into an identity transition. It dissolves the fixed self, not as metaphor, but as system law. The implications span literary theory, epistemology, trauma studies, cognition, and artificial intelligence. Literature is no longer entertainment or commentary. It is now a recursive feedback system for human coherence restructuring.