Mantex

Tutorials, Study Guides & More

  • HOME
  • REVIEWS
  • TUTORIALS
  • HOW-TO
  • CONTACT
>> Home / Archives for Critical theory

Literary Criticism – a new history

September 7, 2010 by Roy Johnson

aesthetic theory from the classical period to the present

Gary Day’s main argument in his impressive study Literary Criticism – a new history is that literary criticism is like a pendulum that swings backwards and forwards in different historical epochs. At one moment it emphasizes the text, and at the next its effect upon the reader. He traces all the main schools of literary criticism, starting with classical Greek and Roman writing on aesthetics, and he shows that many of the notions people imagine to be new have actually been around for two thousand years or more. This makes his book a good antidote to the mistaken idea that literary criticism began in the 1970s with the discovery of French structuralism.

Literary CriticismHe takes the history of both literature and literary criticism through the distinct phases of its historical development, starting with the classics, then looking successively at Medieval, Renaissance, Enlightenment, Romantic, and Modern phases. His emphasis on the whole is on English criticism, though it does not preclude an occasional consideration of other cultures.

His examination of criticism relating to the earlier periods has the instructive effect of condensing their ideas and ‘theory’ into digestible chunks. He points out that in the medieval period for instance there was no concept of either literature or criticism as we know them – only ‘commentary’ on sacred texts. The Greco-Roman classics for instance were interpreted as guides to (Christian) moral behaviour. The medieval period also gave rise to the concept of the auctor (author). It also saw, towards its end, the rise of the written vernacular. Latin was the language of learning, but as trade between nations increased there was more reason than ever for people to use and learn each other’s native language.

In the Renaissance period Day argues that a crucial issue was the Protestant-inspired translation of the Bible into English. This gave the common man both access to divine scripture and the right to its interpretation – previously only in the remit of the church itself. The introduction of printing and the establishment of a vernacular English that pushed out Latin and French as the lingua francas of official discourse led to the publication of books for readers’ pleasure. This in turn gave rise to a literature of the popular marketplace and a need to make distinctions between such products and a canon of revered classics. It is easy to see the point that Gary Day makes several times throughout this study – that many of the critical issues debated with such recent ferocity were evident in literary history centuries ago.

His chapter on the English Enlightenment draws interesting parallels between criticism and finance. If the intrinsic value of a paper five pound note was certainly not five pounds, because there was not a one-to-one correspondence between signifier and signified, so the value of a work of literature could not be determined by the accuracy of its correspondence with some value in the real world.

There is a strong period of Neoclassicism in the eighteenth century that Day attributes to a desire for order, proportion, and rule-based authority after the uncertainties created by the Civil War. However, he argues that it failed to take permanent root and only sprang back into life now and again during politically reactionary phases.

In his chapter on the Romantic period he argues that the cult of individualism, ‘sensibility’, and nature was a reaction to the industrial revolution which reduced man to a mere part in the economy of mass production. Thus the literary criticism that emerged emphasized the possibilities of individual response to and interpretation of a text. This tendency reached its apogee in the art for art’s sake movement at the end of the nineteenth century when all connections between art and moral improvement were finally denied completely.

When it comes to the twentieth century he understandably sees Freud, Max Plank and Picasso as exemplars of revolutionary thinking, though the literary critics he first considers are the very unfashionable Walter Orage and G.K. Chesterton. But in fact the main focus of interest in his final chapter is the establishment of English Studies in the UK university system – a surprising phenomenon both in its recency and the controversy that surrounded it.

Fortunately, he does finish by looking at three major figures critics who were influential from the mid-century onwards – I.A.Richards, William Empson, and F.R.Leavis. He explains their critical methods and their significance, and finally lets himself off the leash to take a few well-aimed swipes at Catherine Belsey, who is obviously his bete noir.

This is not simply gratuitous rival-bashing however, for one of Day’s habits that I found quite entertaining was his demonstrating links between debates held centuries ago with those of the last two or three decades – to show that there is very little that is totally new under the sun. And he is also much given to taking pot shots at the current academic culture of ‘skills’ and ‘performance indicators’ that have come to replace a serious interest in the subject of literature and literary criticism.

He has very little to say about contemporary forms of literary criticism which range from feminism, postcolonialism, post-Modernism, and queer theory – except to conclude somewhat radically that

the sheer variety should not distract us from one fundamental truth: that the demands of bodies like the Quality Assurance Agency are making the study of literature ever more prescriptive for students while the Research Assessment Exercise has distorted it for academics. Criticism is better off outside the academy.

This sort of writing could signal the beginnings of a long overdue and very welcome change in the practice of academic literary criticism.

Literary Criticism Buy the book at Amazon UK

Literary Criticism Buy the book at Amazon US

© Roy Johnson 2010


Gary Day, Literary Criticism: a new history, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2010, pp.344, ISBN: 0748641424


More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories


Filed Under: 19C Literature, 20C Literature, Literary Studies, Theory Tagged With: Critical theory, Cultural history, English literature, Literary criticism, Literary studies

Literary Theory: the basics

May 24, 2009 by Roy Johnson

schools of literary criticism 1900-2000 explained

Despite its title, this is a survey of modern literary criticism. Hans Bertens starts from a critique of Matthew Arnold’s liberal humanist and essentially romantic appeal that literature exists on a higher spiritual plane that we are invited to visit. He then goes on to show the links with T.S.Eliot, Ivor Richards, F.R.Leavis, and the New Criticism of the United States in the early decades of the last century. Then its on to the Russian formalists and Prague structuralism – Shklovsky, Propp, and Jakobson .

Literary Theory: the basicsThese progress by a slightly dog-legged chronology to the French structuralists of the 1960s and 1970s. Roland Barthes picks up Saussure and runs with the ball of structuralism. Genette develops the same lines in his theories of narratology. When it came to Marxism I had a minor quibble with his account of ideology and I think he lets Georgy Lukacs off rather lightly – but on the whole it’s an even-handed treatment.

I enjoyed his explanations of feminism, race, and gender theory, and I couldn’t help feeling that his own interests were transmitted more infectiously as his story approached the present. What a rich choice of approaches any young student of literature has today.

When he arrives at the ‘poststructuralist revolution’ you have to be prepared for an excursion into the realms of philosophy. Literature seems a long way off, but you’ll get an account of Derrida which makes him seem almost accessible. The same is true of his chapter on Lacan

We know now that the deconstructionists took literary theory to a point where it appeared that nothing certain could be said about a text. So what happened afterwards? Well – it’s interesting that the fashions in literary theory which followed tend to focus upon on a single topic – race, class, sexuality, colonialism, or gender, and erect a series of abstact generalisations upon it.

Bertens gives very generous considerations to these late twentieth-century developments. The strength of this approach is that the theories are explained very well. The weakness is that we don’t get to see them applied. Literary texts themselves seem a long way off, and only get the occasional mention. It’s really difficult to see what ‘queer theory’ can tell us about Bleak House or The Odyssey. Go on – prove me wrong.

Nevertheless, I think this is a book worth recommending to people embarking on literary studies at undergraduate level, if for no other reason than it gives a reasonable account of what these theories claim without shirking from their weaknesses. And as he points out, although the latest of them tend to claim the intellectual high ground, their predecessors are still in general circulation.

Each separate chapter is followed by an annotated bibliography of further reading. I mention the annotation because this makes it far more useful to the reader than the long bare listings you usually find in books of this kind.

© Roy Johnson 2007

Literary Theory   Buy the book at Amazon UK

Literary Theory   Buy the book at Amazon US


Hans Bertens, Literary Theory: The Basics, Abingdon: Routledge, 2nd edition 2007, pp.264, ISBN: 0415396719


More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories


Filed Under: 19C Literature, 20C Literature, Literary Studies, Literature, Theory Tagged With: Critical theory, Literary criticism, Literary studies, Literary theory, Theory

Modernism – a very short introduction

September 1, 2010 by Roy Johnson

radical developments in the arts 1900-1930

As a critical term ‘modernism’ needs careful use and understanding. For it refers not to things that are modern, but to the general movement of experiment in the arts that took place in the period 1900-1930. Modernism is the loose term we use for discussing Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway, and Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon. Christopher Butler offers as background reasons for these radical artistic developments the loss of religious belief, the growth of science and technology, the spread of mass culture, and radical changes in gender roles and relationships.

ModernismHe starts his survey of the period very wisely by presenting and analysing three iconic modernist works – James Joyce’s Ulysses, Fernand Leger’s La Ville, and Berthold Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera, explaining how they ‘work’ in terms of their use of new techniques including fragmentation, collage, strange juxtapositions, abstraction, parody, allusions, and referentiality.

Then he looks at the theories that were advanced as attempts to underpin these developments. This is a tricky area, because what artists say or claim about their own work is not necessarily to be taken at face value. There are other problems too. Picasso and Braque for instance invented cubism without writing a single word explaining the process.. Many other artists on the other hand wrote manifestos full of complex notions and theories that turn out to be entirely unconnected with the works of art they produced.

Schoenberg thought his twelve tone system would assure the dominance of world music by Germany for the next one hundred years [sounds familiar?] but within a short time most listeners had tired of atonality. Writers such as Joyce, Woolf, and Eliot fared better in explaining their methods because literature is a medium which must faux de mieux be articulated via language.

The range of Butler’s references and examples discussed is enormous – though I was not persuaded by his attempts to recruit Wallace Stephens and William Faulkner into the Pantheon of Significance. It’s surprising how quickly some artistic reputations fade or in some cases are revealed as completely bogus – Wyndham Lewis, Aldous Huxley, Herman Broch, Andre Gide, and Gertrude Stein spring to mind as candidates.

He devotes an entire chapter to the creation of a subjective point of view and its counterpart in modern fiction, the Epiphany. Literature naturally dominates here, but he compensates for this by including a section on surrealism, in which painting is the main art form. Interestingly enough, even though it was a short-lived phenomenon, it still lives on in occasional appearances in the visual arts, whereas in literary forms it is as dead as the dodo.

He brings all his arguments together with a quite refreshing examination of modernism and politics. This starts with the surrealists who half-heartedly tried to ally themselves to the Communist Party, then passes on to show how the communist orthodoxy of Socialist Realism chimed exactly with the Nazi policy on the arts. He also includes a lively critique of Berthold Brecht, who often escapes censure for his Stalinist propaganda, disguised as it often is beneath historical allegory.

He concludes with arguments that are quite contemporary in their scepticism. No matter which critical approach we take for instance, it is simply not possible to say which parts of Women in Love, The Firebird, or Guernica are ‘progressive’ or contribute to social development or enrichment. But what is more interesting is that these great modernist works still speak to us as vibrant examples of artistic achievement long after the historical and political events that provide their context have passed.

Modernism Buy the book at Amazon UK

Modernism Buy the book at Amazon US

© Roy Johnson 2010


Christopher Butler, Modernism: a very short introduction, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010, pp.117, ISBN: 0192804413


More on art
More on media
More on literature
More on the novella


Filed Under: Art, Literary Studies, Theory Tagged With: Christopher Butler, Critical theory, Cultural history, Modernism

Thomas Hardy criticism

September 30, 2009 by Roy Johnson

annotated bibliography of Hardy criticism and comment

Thomas Hardy criticism is a collection of publications on Thomas Hardy and his works, with bibliographic details and a brief description of their contents. The details include active web links to Amazon where you can buy the books, often in a variety of formats – new, used, and as Kindle eBooks. The listings are arranged in alphabetical order of author.

The list includes new books and older publications which may now be considered rare. It also includes print-on-demand or Kindle versions of older texts which are much cheaper than the original. Others (including some new books) are often sold off at rock bottom prices. Whilst compiling these listings I bought a copy of Ian Gregor’s critical study, The Form of Hardy’s Major Fiction for one penny.

Thomas Hardy criticism


Thomas Hardy criticism The Poetry of Thomas Hardy: A Handbook and Commentary –
J.O. Bailey, The University of North Carolina Press, 1971. The complete poems, plus critical commentary.

Thomas Hardy criticism An Essay on Hardy – John Bayley, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981. A critical assessment of the novels and the poetry, with an emphasis on eroticism and humour.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy and Women: Sexual Ideology and Narrative Form – Penny Boumelha, Barnes and Noble, 1982. A critical study of Hardy’s novels showing the relationship between gender and the telling of the tale.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Short Stories of Thomas Hardy – Kristin Brady, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1982. A critical introduction to the complete short stories.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy: The World of his Novels – J.B. Bullen, Frances Lincoln, 2013. A study of Hardy’s Wessex, exploring the buildings, places, and scenes that inspired his fiction.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Language of Thomas Hardy – Raymond Chapman, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1990. A study of Hardy’s distinctive phraseology and sentence-structure in both the poetry and the fiction.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy: The Critical Heritage – R.G.Cox, London: Routledge and Keegan Paul, 1970. A collection of critical essays, showing the historical development of Hardy criticism.

Thomas Hardy criticism Ambivalence in Hardy: A Study of his Attitude to Women – Shanta Dutta, Anthem Press, 2010. Hardy’s attitudes to women in his fiction and in his interactions with his wives, literary protégées and contemporary female authors. Combines a feminist approach with close textual analysis.

Thomas Hardy criticism Sexing Hardy: Thomas Hardy and Feminism – Margaret Elvy, Crescent Moon Publishing, 2007. A study of gender, desire, class, economy, socialization, identity and patriarchy in Hardy’s fiction and poetry.

Thomas Hardy criticism Hardy the Creator: A Textual Biography – Simon Gattrel, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989. The evolution of Hardy’s novels and stories from first draft to final revised texts as he took them through the process of dealings with magazine editors, publishers, and printers.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Complete Poems of Thomas Hardy – James Gibson (ed), London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001. A compendium of Hardy’s eight published books of poetry, plus critical notes.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Great Web: The Form of Hardy’s Major Fiction – I. Gregor, London: Faber & Faber, 1982. A critical study of the great later novels.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Life of Thomas Hardy – Florence Emily Hardy, Wordsworth Editions, 2007. This is more or less Hardy’ s autobiography, since he told his wife what to write.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Complete Critical Guide to Thomas Hardy – Geoffrey Harvey, London: Routledge, 2003. A student’s guide to Hardy – the man and his work in fiction and poetry.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Sense of Sex: Feminist Perspectives on Hardy – Margaret Higgonet (ed), Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1993. A collection of essays which offer an overview of feminist critiques of Hardy and his treatment of gender.

Thomas Hardy criticism Authors in Context: Thomas Hardy – Patricia Ingham, Oxford University Press, 2009. Social and political background to Hardy and his times, showing how modern interpretations on film and television create new contexts in which to read the works afresh.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy (Feminist Readings) – Patricia Ingham, Humanities Press International, 1989. Critical studies of sexuality and gender issues in the major novels.

Thomas Hardy criticism Reading Hardy’s Landscapes – Michael Irwin, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2000. A study of the importance of geography and physical topography in the stories, poems, and novels.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Feminist Sensibility in the Novels of Thomas Hardy – Margaret Kaur, Sarup & Son, 2005. Hardy’s presentation of women characters. Often dubbed anti-feminist, this study attempts to exonerate Hardy of this view.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy: The Forms of Tragedy – Dale Kramer, London: Macmillan, 1975. A chronological study of the major novels.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Cambridge Companion to Thomas Hardy – Dale Kramer, Cambridge University Press, 1999. A collection of critical essays commissioned from specialists on all aspects of Hardy’s work.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy: Distance and Desire – J. Hillis Miller, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1970. A critical study of the interrelation of the literary themes of distance and desire woven throughout the novels and poems.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy: His Career as a Novelist – Michael Millgate, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1994. Critical readings of the novels in the context of Hardy’s intellectual background, his friendships and family relationships, and his evolution as a professional writer.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy: A Biography Revisited – Michael Millgate, Oxford University Press, 2006. This is the fully updated version of the definitive biography.

Thomas Hardy criticism Women and Sexuality in the Novels of Thomas Hardy – Rosemarie Morgan, London: Routledge, 1988. Kindle version of an early feminist study of the major fiction.

Thomas Hardy criticism Student Companion to Thomas Hardy – Rosemarie. Morgan, Greenwood Press, 2006. This study explores Hardy’s life, his career, and most important and unconventional works, and why he abandoned novel-writing in favour of his first love – poetry.

Thomas Hardy criticism Seeing Hardy: Film and Television Adaptations of the Fiction of Thomas Hardy – Paul J. Nemeyer, McFarland & Co, 2002. A study of adaptations of the major novels for the cinema, plus television films and mini-series based on Hardy’s work.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy’s Personal Writings – Harold Orel (ed), London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1967. A collection of Hardy’s novel prefaces, his literary opinions, and reminiscences.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Oxford Reader’s Companion to Hardy – Norman Page, Oxford University Press, 2000. Forty essays by experts on all aspects of Hardy’s work – ranging from alcohol, humour, and pets, to the historical context in which he wrote.

Thomas Hardy criticism A Thomas Hardy Companion: A Guide to the Works of Thomas Hardy – F.B. Pinion, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1968. A general critical commentary on the major works and their social background.

Thomas Hardy criticism A Thomas Hardy Dictionary – F.B. Pinion, New York: New York University Press, 1993. Features architectural terms, the sources of quotations, identification of fictional characters, and the explanation of rare or rustic words.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy: A Bibliographical Study – Richard L. Purdy and Charles P.C. Pettit, The British Library Publishing Division, 2002. An important bibliography first published in 1954, and now supplemented by modern criticism and recent Hardy studies.

Thomas Hardy criticism Hardy’s Use of Allusion – Marlene Springer, London: Macmillan, 1983. A study of Hardy’s widespread use of allusions from classical, biblical, historical, and literary sources.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Neglected Hardy: Thomas Hardy’s Lesser Novels – Richard H. Taylor, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1982. A critical examination of the lesser-known novels.

Thomas Hardy criticism The Personal Notebooks of Thomas Hardy – Richard H. Taylor, Columbia University Press, 1979. Includes the unpublished passages from the original typescripts of the ‘Life of Thomas Hardy’.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy: The Time-torn Man – Clair Tomalin, London: Penguin, 2012. A biography of Hardy with emphasis on the death of his first wife and the curious marriage to his second.

Thomas Hardy criticism A Preface to Hardy – Merryn Williams, London: Longman, 1976. A readable and unexpectedly positive study of Hardy’s prose and verse.

Thomas Hardy criticism A Companion to Thomas Hardy – Keith Wilson, Wiley-Blackwell, 2012. A collection of essays offering a one–volume resource which encompasses all aspects of Hardy’s major novels, short stories, and poetry.

Thomas Hardy criticism Thomas Hardy: Towards a Materialist Criticism – George Wooton, Barnes & Noble Books, 1985. Explores the historical, social, aesthetic and ideological determinants of Hardy’s novels.

© Roy Johnson 2015


The Complete Critical Guide to Thomas HardyThe Complete Critical Guide to Thomas Hardy is a good introduction to Hardy criticism. It includes a potted biography of Hardy, an outline of the stories, novels, and poetry, and pointers towards the main critical writings – from the early influential full length study by D.H. Lawrence to critics of the present day. Also includes a thorough bibliography which covers biography, criticism in books and articles, plus pointers towards specialist Hardy journals. These guides are very popular.


More on Thomas Hardy
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories


Filed Under: Thomas Hardy Tagged With: Critical studies, Critical theory, Literary studies, Thomas Hardy

Get in touch

info@mantex.co.uk

Content © Mantex 2016
  • About Us
  • Advertising
  • Clients
  • Contact
  • FAQ
  • Links
  • Services
  • Reviews
  • Sitemap
  • T & C’s
  • Testimonials
  • Privacy

Copyright © 2025 · Mantex

Copyright © 2025 · News Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in