f.r. Leavis_resumen Final

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FRANK RAYMOND LEAVIS (1895-1978)THE MORAL CENTRALITY OF ENGLISH STUDIESLITERATURE AS MORAL AND SOCIAL INQUIRY

The main objective of this UNIT is to helpthe student grasp, first and foremost, theimportance of critical theory in the

process of canon formation. In thisregard, the first chapter addresses theimportance of the critical work of F. R.

Leavis, whose essay The GreatTradition (1948) was seminal inrethinking the canon of English Literature.Leaviss remapping of the canonresponded to a conceptualization ofexcellence predicated on what hedefined as the true English tradition.

Indeed, this meanta specific concept ofENGLISHNESSand a sustained academic and intellectual battleagainst all literature that did not meet the particularmoral and aesthetic standards this conceptualizationrequired.

He launched the literary magazine Scrutiny from which, together with his wifeand his disciples, he led an active war against mass culture and against

literary writers and works that did not conform with his ideals ofEnglishness and literary excellence. Modernists, and veryparticularly the Bloomsbury Group, were some of hismain targets.His influence was enormous, though he was met with strongacademic resistance. Eventually, as we shall see in Units 4 and 5, both hisconcept of Englishness and the canon he had taken such pains to defendwould prove too narrow for the expanding British literary world and thecultural changes later in the century.

Secondly, and indeed accordingly, the UNIT explores how different post-warwriters assessed the effects of mass culture on Englishness in various ways. Eachchapter addresses in some depth the writer and literary work that was mostrepresentational in exploring some aspect of this predicament. In parallel,attention is paid to the gradual change both in literary mood and accompanyingnarrative conventions.

Thus, from a regret for a world irretrievably lost and/or strongcriticism of the bleak present, accompanied of a firmcommitment to realism and belief in truthful representation inthe works of Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene and Kingsley

Amis,writers Muriel Spark and William Golding gradually turnto a more experimental kind of representation.

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One of the most influential literary critics from the earlier to the mid XXthcentury.

His STRONG INTELLECTUAL AND MORAL CONVICTIONS on the value of

literature (ENGLISH LITERATURE), His interests in culture, society and education, and

HIS CONCERN FOR AN INCREASINGLY MATERIALIST WORLD caused himto engage in permanent debate on:

THE ROLE OF THE UNIVERSITY, the responsibility of the critic, and

THE VALUE OF MEANINGFUL TRADITION, SPECIFICALLY OFENGLISH LITERATURE.

He STRONGLY PROMOTED the study of ENGLISH LITERATURE and

discussion of its value. He gave new value to the function of LITERARYCRITICISM by combining the roles of teacher and critic, making criticism auniversity discipline.

In only a decade (from earlier 1920s to earlier 1930s) interest on studyingLiterature changed dramatically. ENGLISH WAS not only a subject worthstudying but THE SUPREMELY CIVILIZING PURSUIT, THE SPIRITUALESSENCE OF THE SOCIAL FORMATION.

When he started his initiative was looked down by the University and considered

as dilettantism (frivolous and amateurish); as another movement tointellectualise literature for an elite. But, far from constituting some amateur orimpressionistic enterprise English was an arena in which the mostfundamental questions of human experience were thrown into vividrelief and made the object of the most intensive scrutiny.

In his faith in education, Leavis was the true inheritor of Mathew Arnold.

His main project is aimed at EDUCATION TROUGH LITERATURE,because it is through teaching that the cultural standards transmitted by tradition

can be maintained. For him THE IDEAL SUBJECT IS ENGLISHLITERATURE and THE IDEAL CLASSROOM IS THE UNIVERSITY. Theuniversity is like the centre for the dissemination of his views; it is the ideal forumfor the exchange of educated opinion. In Leaviss opinion, universities areSYMBOLS OF CULTURAL TRADITION, a directing force that represent wisdomand prestige, with the authority to check and control the blind drive of materialand mechanical development.

Despite his interest in poetry, LEAVIS TURNED MORE AND MORE TONOVELISTS RATHER THAN POETS TO ARGUE HIS CASE FOR LITERARY

STUDIES AS A HUMANE EDUCATION.To Leavis, since the beginning of the 19th

century, novelists had portrayed individual lives in their social interaction moreeffectively and more frequently than poets.

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With the exception of T.S.ELIOT AND BLAKE, he finds NO POETS OF THEMODERN AGE to match Dickens, Lawrence and the novelists ofthe GREAT TRADITION:

Jane Austen George Eliot Joseph Conrad and Henry James

The outstanding novelists were the most effective critics of theIndustrial Age and wrote greater poetry than the poets writing in thesame period.This is because in the 19th century and later, the poetic andcreative strength of the English language goes into PROSE FICTION.

For Leavies, ShakespeareBECOMES THE TOUCHSTONE FOR CRITICISMOF THE NOVEL, and the great novelists are the natural successors ofShakespeare. His early criticism of poetry, which includes his early appreciations

of Shakespeare, provided the foundation for his criticism of the novel.What exalts Shakespeare above his contemporaries is his indissolubleunity of the notions of WHAT and HOW; any separation of the two isunimaginable in his art and so this is what F.R. Leavis and his wifeQueenie Leavis value most highly of every novel or poem they judge tobe great.

For him THE NOVEL IS A DRAMATIC POEM and his insistence that the mostimportant novels have the same kind of poetic complexity made the novelgain serious recognition as a major genre of art.

What were, in his opinion, the features of the greatwriter?

He stresses ENERGY(a vital capacity for experience; the ENERGY OFVISION that relates Conrad to Dickens) as a chief quality in his greatnovelists. This energy must be directed towards affirming life.

There must be an organic principle, determining, informing and controlling thestuff into a vital whole.

To him, novels such asJoycesUlysses that are structurally elaborated, rich in

technical devices and with an exhaustive rendering of consciousness are like adead end because all these features signify an intensity of ART FOR ARTSSAKE AND NOT FOR LIFES SAKE.Jane Austen, George Eliot, Henry James, Joseph Conrad andCharles Dickenson the other hand, constitute a tradition by reason of theircommon CONCERN WITH ESSENTIAL HUMAN ISSUES.They devotetheir art to promoting awareness of the possibilities of life.

THE TRULY GREAT WRITER CREATES A VISION OF LIFE; and the energy ofHIS VISION IS A MORAL ENERGY. The art of the great novelist is

distinguished by a marked MORAL INTENSITY.However, in emphasising life as the subject matter of great art, Leavis does notignore aesthetic considerations.

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By moral Leavis implies far more than a narrow puritanical outlook. Hequalifies (califica) moral with terms such as: life, richness, depth ofinterest and human significance. Therefore, the marked moral intensityof his great novelists has nothing to do with contracting or reducing life.It refers to THE CAPACITY TO LOOK AT AND INTO LIFE WITHIMAGINATIVE SYMPATHY RATHER THAN WITH PREJUDICE, wonderinglyrather than knowingly. The novel as art IS NOT A MORAL ESSAY disguised asfiction.

To Leavis, the novelists in the great tradition of the English novel are greatbecause they are individually GREAT AS EXPLORERS OF HUMANMORALITY, and as INNOVATORS AND MASTERS OF THE ENGLISHLANGUAGE.

THE GREAT NOVELIST CREATES OUT OF A DEEP, PERSONALENGAGEMENT WITH REALITY.

The process is not one of self-indulgence, but rather of his STRIVING TOWARDA MORE COMPLETE, MORE DISINTERESTED UNDERSTANDING OF HISRELATIONSHIP TO LIFE.

Consequently HE OR SHE ACHIEVES A VISION OF REALITYUNVITIATED BY PERSONALITY.This kind of IMPERSONALITY thatLeavis will instance again and again, INDICATES THE WRITERS MATURITY INHIS ATTITUDE TO BOTH LITERATURE AND LIFE.

C MORE ABOUT IMPERSONALITYLeavis compared and contrasted a large variety of poems by Wordsworth,

Tennyson, Lawrence, Marvell, Blake and Shelley. He demonstrated that WHEN

THE EMOTIONAL LIFE OF A POEM IS SEEN TO BE CONTROLLED ANDOBJECTIFIED BY THE POETS THOUGHT, THE RESULT IS A SINCERE,MATURE AND IMPERSONAL EVOCATION OF REALITY BUT, WHEN THISDOESNT HAPPEN THE RESULT IS PERSONAL INDULGENCE (CAPRICHO)AND A FALSIFICATION OF REALITY.

THE IMPERSONAL POEM, he says, unmistakably derives from ASEISMIC PERSONAL EXPERIENCE. Indeed, FIRST-HAND EXPERIENCEGENERATES THE EMOTIONAL LIFE IN THE POEM THAT GIVES IT

VITALITY.

HOWEVER, FOR THE POEM TO BECOME FULLY IMPERSONALISED AND TO BE MORE THAN A MERE OVERFLOW OFPERSONAL EMOTION, FEELING MUST BE CONTROLLED BY THETHOUGHT OR CRITICAL ATTITUDE WHICH THE POET ADOPTSTOWARDS IT.

According to Leavis, George Eliot, Henry James and Joseph Conrad

wrote out of URGENT PERSONAL EXPERIENCE, BUT maintaining aDISTINCTION BETWEEN EXPERIENCER AND EXPERIENCE.

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IT IS A MATTER OF THE NOVELISTS INSIDE WHILE ATTHE SAME TIME ADOPTS A CRITICAL ATTITUDE TO IT FROMOUTSIDE.

Leavis exemplifies this operation of IMPERSONALITY in Lawrences twomasterpieces:

The Rainbow and

Women in Love

He sees them as much greater works of art than Sons and Lovers because, bythis stagehe arguesLawrence knows himself better and knows how toTRANSMUTE INTENSELY PERSONAL EXPERIENCE INTOIMPERSONAL ART.He can do this because he has put the CATHARSIS of Sons and Loversbehind him, and in his NEW MATURITYhe has a surer grasp of realising bydramatic means, and so objectifying, the issues of life that most concern him.

Leavis notes that the relation that Paul Morel has with his mother in Sons andLovers is still too transparently and poignantly autobiographical of Lawrencesown relation with his mother.

In The Rainbowsays LeaviesLawrence has fully understood his relationshipwith his mother, and has distanced and impersonalised it in the relationshipbetween the child Ursula and her father.

This example gives the idea of IMPERSONALITY as already seen in The

Great Tradition:AN OBJECTIFYING (Make impersonal or present as an object,depersonalising), OR REALISATION (darse cuenta, tomar consciencia),OF DEEPLY-FELT PERSONAL EXPERIENCE BY CRITICAL AND DRAMATICMEANS.

In his analysis of Tom Brangwen in The Rainbow, Leavis goes further, suggestingthat IMPERSONALITY in Lawrence has a deeply religious character. Herereligious refers to the intensity with which his men and women hearkening(listening) to their deepest needs and promptings (iniciativas propias) as theyseek fulfilment in marriage, know that they do not belong to themselves but

are responsible to something that, in transcending the individual, transcends loveand sex as well.Leaviss terms are almost mystical, not because he is being purposely portentousbut because Lawrences uncanny (asombrosa) rendering of life forces him to beallusive rather than explicit and definite. And this is because life itselftranscends love and sex; it is an indefinable mystery and reverenced as suchby Lawrence.

Most critics have been troubled by Leaviss use of the term RELIGIOUS, arguingthat it implies belief.

If there is a poet to whom the terms religious and belief can be applied to, heis T.S. Eliot. But, to Leavis, Eliot lacks the NECESSARYIMPERSONALITY for truly constructive thought.

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By NECESSARY IMPERSONALITY Leavis means THE DEEPESTCONVICTIONS ABOUT LIFE, SANCTIONED (AUTORIZADO/CONSENTIDO)AND TESTED BY INTENSE PERSONAL EXPLORATION OF EXPERIENCE , thereligious depth ofBlake and Lawrence.

But in Eliot religious involves, according to Leavis, less personal responsibilitybecause faith is outside himself and adhered to a formal creed.A GREAT POET NEEDS NO THEOLOGICAL APOLOGY.

A GREAT POET QUICKENS OUR SENSE OF LIFE AS REVERENT,WONDERFUL, MYSTERIOUS AND SO, WHATEVER ODDS, AS FULL OFPOSSIBILITY AND HOPE .

One of Leaviss most cherished convictions is that the truly relevant andreally significant writers are those who defend humanvalues and human life in the face of the dehumanisingforces inas he terms itthe technologic-Benthamite age (***JeremyBentham:English philosopher and jurist; founder of utilitarianism (1748-1831),and who do so not by overt propagandising but by creating insightsinto what human values are and by imagining anddramatising in a richly poetic art possibilities of livinghumanely.

What were Leaviss aims in writing The GreatTradition?

Leavies writings on the novel in The Great Tradition, D.H. Lawrence:Novelist and Dickens the Novelist mark with progressive intensity hisRESEARCH TO JUSTIFY THE HUMAN AND HUMANE VALUES he puts onthe study of literature.

In The Great Tradition, Leavis SEEKS TO ESTABLISH AN ORDER OFIMPORTANCE AND EXCELLENCE IN THE NOVEL in the manner of Arnold andEliot.Leavis claims that LITERATURE MUST BE JUDGED AS AN EXPRESSION OFLIFE seen as a complex ethical reality.When form is pursued at the expense of subject matter, he argues, the writercuts himself off from his richest material: HUMAN EXPERIENCE; LIFE.

The term Great Tradition refers here to the tradition towhich what is great in English fiction belongs and NOT to thegreatness of the English novel tradition.

LEAVIS CRITICISM BECOMES PROGRESSIVELY SOCIOLOGICAL INDIRECTION AND MORE DEEPLY ROOTED IN THE SPIRITUAL QUALITIES OFCREATIVE LITERATURE.

HE BECOMES MORE AND MORE URGENTLY INTERESTED IN POETRY ANDFICTION THAT VINDICATE MANS ESSENTIAL HUMANITY ANDINDIVIDUALITY.

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It is in this sense that Leavis makesLAWRENCE THE TOUCHSTONE (standard opunto de referencia) for THE GREAT TRADITION on the grounds of what, tohim, are the manifestly Lawrentian criteria:

Vital capacity for experienceA Kind of reverent openness before life andA marked moral intensity.

What impact did he have on English Studies?

The result is a NEW TRANSCENDENTLY GREAT LINE IN ENGLISHLITERATURE composed of one poet and a few novelists (or DRAMATICPOETS):

William Blake Jane Austen George Eliot Charles Dickens

Joseph Conrad Henry James and D.H. Lawrence with William Shakespeare at the head.

Leavis conceptualized the novel as A DRAMATIC POEM IN PROSE. Bypoem Leavis means far more than poetic prose, imagery, symbolism or otherpoetical effects. HE MEANS THE WHOLE NOVEL CONCEIVED AS A POETICCREATION, that is, as having the density and complexity of meaning andorganisation usually associated with formally poetic works.

In THE NOVEL-AS-DRAMATIC-POEM, meaning is conveyed not only by thenovelists dramatic methods, but also by his sheer power of poetic evocation withwords in the narrative parts which integrate the dramatic action. Hence,POETIC FOR LEAVIS IS SYNONYMOUS WITH CREATIVE, NOTPOETICAL.In other words, Lawrences POETIC PROSE DOES NOT MERELY PAINTPICTURESQUE EFFECTS BUT CREATES SUBSTANCES, MEANINGS ANDCONCEPTS WHICH ARE ESSENTIAL TO HIS TOTAL VISION.

LEAVIS TEACHING AND HIS NUMEROUS CRITICAL WORKS, TOGETHERWITH THOSE OF QUEENIE LEAVIS, HIS WIFE, CHANGED THEAPPRECIATION OF SIGNIFICANT ENGLISH AUTHORS ANDESTABLISHED A LITERARY CANON WHICH LASTED WELL UNTIL THENINETEEN SEVENTIES.However the nature of this canon is extremely problematic since politics play animportant role in its formation.

In summary, LEAVIS EXERTED AN ENORMOUS INFLUENCE ON THE FIELDOF ENGLISH STUDIES AS WELL AS RAISING A HEATED CONTROVERSY.

As a humanist and socialist, he battled against the ills of his time summed up inwhat he saw as a mind impoverishing mass culture. In this he coincided with T.S.

Eliot but while Eliot took refuge in the nostalgia for a lost civilization, LEAVIS

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TURNED TO THE MORAL STRENGTH OF THE TRUE ENGLISHTRADITION.

ENGLISHNESS WAS, THUS AT THE CORE OF HIS CRITICALVENTURE.

LEAVIS HAD LITTLE CONFIDENCE IN THE CAPACITY OF THE

CONTEMPORARY NOVEL TO SPEAK ON BEHALF OF LIFEagainstthe technocratic, bureaucratic nightmare that he saw building everyday.

HIS GRANDIOSE CLAIMS FOR THE NOVEL AS FORM PERVADED THEPERIOD AND STIMULATED THE SENSE BOTH OF ASPIRATION AND OFNIGGLING (persistente/molesto) UNEASE WITHIN POSTWAR NOVELSABOUT ENGLAND.

His wife Queenie Leavis paid more attention to the contemporarynovel than did her husband, but was even more disdainful of it andnostalgic for THE ENGLISH MIXTURE OF HUMANE INCLUSIVENESS ANDEXPERIENTIAL MINUTENESS that she found in the work of George Eliotand other XIXth century realists.THE WANING (decaimiento/desvanecimiento) OF THE ENGLISH NOVEL,

OR OF WHAT QUEENIE LEAVIS CALLED THE ENGLISHNESS OFTHAT NOVEL IS DUE TO THE LOSS OF WHAT SHE BELIEVES TO BE ASPECIFICALLY ENGLISH CONDITION OF A UNIFIED ANDINTERCONNECTED NATIONAL LIFE, TO BE REPLACED BY THECONDITIONS OF CONTEMPORARY SQUALOR (inmundicia, miseria):

(...a country of high-rise flat dwellers, office workers and factory robots andunassimilated multi-racial minorities, with a suburbanized countryside, factoryfarming, sexual emancipation without responsibility, rising crime andviolence...comparable with the novel tradition of so different a past.)

What are the basic tenets (principios) of his criticalpractice?

One of the basic tenets in Leaviss criticism of the novel is THE INTENSITY WITHWHICH A NOVEL CORRESPONDS TO LIFE AND ITS AIR OF REALITY.

For Leavis THE NOBLEST ART DEALS WITH HUMAN EXPERIENCE.

LEAVIS CRITICISM BECOMES PROGRESSIVELY SOCIOLOGICAL INDIRECTION AND MORE DEEPLY ROOTED IN THE SPIRITUAL QUALITIES OFCREATIVE LITERATURE.He becomes more and more urgently interested in poetry and fictionthat vindicate mans essential humanity and individuality.

Yet, in emphasising life as the subject matter of great art, Leavis does not ignoreaesthetic considerations.AS A CRITIC OF THE NOVEL HE PLACES A GREAT DEAL OF IMPORTANCEON A NOVELISTS STYLE AND TECHNIQUE, WELL AWARE THAT THE

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NOVELIST MAKES CLEAR HIS VISION OF ART THROUGH HIS STYLE, BYTHE WAY HE USES LANGUAGE.

Leavis conceptualized the novel as A DRAMATIC POEM IN PROSE. HEMEANS THE WHOLE NOVEL CONCEIVED AS A POETIC CREATION, that is, ashaving the density and complexity of meaning and organisation usuallyassociated with formally poetic works.

From this perspective, HE IS A PRACTITIONER OF CRITICISM BASED ONCLOSE READING that would flourish in America from the late 30s to the1950s, that would be known as NEW CRITICISM. COHERENCE ANDINTEGRATION WERE THE KEYNOTES.

Habitually, Leavis and his wife confront a literary work, quoting form it, analysingit, and commenting on it in a way that reveals the process of their criticism(CLOSE READING---NEW CRITICISM) showing the reader how he or she maypractice criticism for her or himself, and encouraging him or her to reread thework in question.

LEAVIS WANTS THE READER TO CONSIDER THAT EVERY ELEMENT IN THENOVEL (action, scene, episode, dialogue, character, irony, contrast, variety ofmode and style, the very use of language, symbolism, imagery and so no) HASBEEN SO ORGANIZED BY THE NOVELIST AS TO RESULT IN A COMPLEXORGANISM OF MEANING and fertile with the richness of evocation he wouldexpect in Shakespearean drama.Such novels, then, are not novels of plot in the conventional sense. They do notyield their meaning only through what happens in the story as it unfolds andthrough such traditional devices of plot as peripeteia and dnouement.

***Peripeteia: A sudden and unexpected change of fortune or reverse ofcircumstances (especially in a literary work).***Dnoument: The outcome of a complex sequence of events. The finalresolution of the main complication of a literary or dramatic work.

Rather, PLOT MEANS THE TOTAL DESIGN, THE WHOLE IMAGINATIVEVISION. NOR ARE THEY NOVELS OF IDEAS as such, IN WHICH THE NOVELISTUSES HIS STORY AS A DISGUISED ESSAY ABOUT LIFE.

For Leavis, the masterpiece the critic points to is far more important thananything that could be said about it, since it conveys by poetic means and as a

poetic whole what the critic can only allude and point to in discursive prose.

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Where can we place Leavis?

According to P.J.M Robertson, in earlier ages, he would have been called acritic and everybody would have recognized him as one endowed withcommon sense and moral tact and skilled in logic who, while making his criteriaclear and clearly based on an ethical view of reality, undertook to advise readers

what was worth reading and what was not and it would have been his readers,using their own common sense and moral tact to decide whether he gave goodadvice or not, whether he was a good critic or not.

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However, nowadays the answer to the question is far more complexbecause our postmodern condition has made us profoundly suspicious oflanguage.

Words and concepts such as: common sense, truth and values, mansessential humanity, religious intensity, moral awareness, engagement withreality, reverent openness to life and many others, typical of Leavissvocabulary, have been made to show their deeply problematic nature.

The same applies to HIS CONCEPT OF TRADITION: ATRANSCENDENTAL/SYMBOLIC TRADITION WHICH HAS ITS ROOTS INTHE OLD ENGLISH WAY OF LOOKING AT THINGS...FROMSHAKESPEARES ENGLAND.

What are the objections Terry Eagleton raises againstLeaviss criticism?

Terry Eagleton, the Marxist critic, argues that the Leavisianbelief in ESSENTIAL ENGLISHNESS(its conviction that some kinds ofEnglish were more English than others) was in part the offshoot(ramificacin ,derivacin) of a gradual shift in class tone within Englishculture:

ENGLISHNESS was less a matter of imperialist flag-waving than of countrydancing; rural popular, populist and provincial rather than metropolitan and

aristocratic. IT WAS CHAUVINISM (fanatical patriotism) MODULATEDBY A NEW SOCIAL CLASS, who with a little straining (distortion) could see

themselves rooted in the English people of John Bunyan rather than in asnobbish ruling caste.

**John Bunyan: English preacher and author of an allegorical novel, Pilgrim'sProgress (1628-1688).

THEIR TASK WAS TO SAFEGUARD THE ROBUST VITALITY OFSHAKESPEAREAN ENGLISH. (Eagleton)

Literature was important not only in itself, but because it encapsulated creativeenergies which were everywhere on the defensive in modern commercialsociety. In literature, and perhaps in literature alone, a vital feel for the creativeuses of language was still manifest, in contrast to the philistine (inculto,ignorante) devaluing of language and traditional culture blatantlyapparent in mass society . (Eagleton)

For Leavis and the SCRUTINISTS, language is alienated ordegenerate unless it is crammed (abarrotada/atestada) with the

physical textures of actual experience, plumped (rellenado) with therank (absolutos) juices of real life.

Armed with this TRUST IN ESSENTIAL ENGLISHNESS, Latinate or verballydisembodied writers such as Milton or Shelley, could be shown the door and prideof place only assigned to other writers such as Donne or Hopkins, who reallymanifested the essence of Englishness.

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WITH BREATHTAKING BOLDNESS (AUDACIA), SCRUTINYREDREW THEMAP OF ENGLISH LITERATURE, EAGLETON STATES.

JOYCE, WOOLF AND MOST WRITERS AFTER D.H. LAWRENCE WERESIMPLY LEFT ASIDE.

ENGLISH INCLUDED TWO AND A HALF WOMEN: AUSTEN, GEORGE ELIOT

AND EMILY BRONT AS A MARGINAL CASE; ALMOST ALL OF ITS AUTHORSWERE CONSERVATIVES. (Eagleton)

The Scrutinycase, at least at first, did not take the road of extreme right-wingreaction Eagleton argues, on the contrary, it represented nothing less than thelast-ditch stand (el intento desesperado) of liberal humanism, concerned, asEliot and Pound were not, with the unique value of the individual and the creative

realm of the interpersonal. These values could be summarized as Life, aword which Scrutinymade a virtue out of not being able to define.If you asked for some reasoned theoretical statement of their case, you

had thereby demonstrated that you were in the outer darkness EITHERYOU FELT LIFE OR YOU DIDNT.Great literature was a literature reverently open to Life and whatLife was could be demonstrated by great literature. The case wascircular, intuitive, and proof against all argument, reflecting the enclosedcoterie (An exclusive circle of people with a common purpose) of the Leavisitesthemselves...IF LIFE WAS CREATIVELY AT WORK ANYWHERE THEN, IT WASIN THE WRITINGS OF D.H. LAWRENCE, WHOM LEAVIS CHAMPIONEDFROM AN EARLY DATE.

According to Eagleton, spontaneous-creative-life in LAWRENCE seemedhappily to CO-EXIST with the most virulent SEXISM, RACISM ANDAUTHORITARIANISM, and few of the Scrutineers seemed particularlydisturbed by the contradiction.

THE EXTREME RIGHT-WING FEATURES WHICH LAWRENCESHARED WITH ELIOT AND POUNDa raging (tremendo)contempt (desprecio) for liberal and democratic values, aslavish (servil) submission to impersonal authoritywere moreor less edited out:

LAWRENCE WAS EFFECTIVELY RECONSTRUCTED AS A LIBERALHUMANIST, AND SLOTTED INTO PLACE AS THE TRIUMPHANTCULMINATION OF THE GREAT TRADITION of English fiction from JaneAusten to George Eliot, Henry James and Joseph Conrad.

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Additional Information:

He taught and studied for nearly his entire life at Downing College, Cambridge.Leavis has been frequently (but often erroneously) associated with the Americanschool of New Critics, a group which advocated close reading and detailed textual

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analysis of poetry over an interest in the mind and personality of the poet,sources, the history of ideas and political and social implications.

Although there are undoubtedly similarities between Leavis's approachto criticism and that of the New Critics (most particularly in that bothtake the work of art itself as the primary focus of critical discussion),Leavis is ultimately distinguishable from them, since he never adopted(and was explicitly hostile to) a theory of the poem as a self-contained

and self-sufficient aesthetic and formal artefact, isolated from thesociety, culture and tradition from which it emerged.

HE STRESSED THE IMPORTANCE OF AN INFORMED AND DISCRIMINATING,HIGHLY-TRAINED INTELLECTUAL ELITE WHOSE EXISTENCE WITHINUNIVERSITY ENGLISH DEPARTMENTS WOULD HELP PRESERVE THECULTURAL CONTINUITY OF ENGLISH LIFE AND LITERATURE.

As a critic of the novel, Leaviss main tenet stated that greatnovelists show an intense moral interest in life, and that this

moral interest determines the nature of their form in fiction.Authors within this tradition were all characterised by aserious or responsible attitude to the moral complexity of lifeand includedJane Austen, George Eliot, Henry James, JosephConrad, and D. H. Lawrence.

In The Great TraditionLeavis attempted to set out his conception ofthe proper relation between form/composition and moral interest/artand life.

THIS PROVED TO BE A CONTENTIOUS (CONTROVERTIDO/POLEMIC) ISSUEIN THE CRITICAL WORLD, AS LEAVIS REFUSED TO SEPARATE ART FROMLIFE, OR THE AESTHETIC OR FORMAL FROM THE MORAL.

He insisted that the great novelists preoccupation with form was amatter of responsibility towards a rich moral interest, and that works ofart with a limited formal concern would always be of lesser quality.

F.R. LEAVIS DOES NOT THINK THERE CAN BE GREAT (LITERARY) ARTWITHOUT SERIOUS MORAL PURPOSE.

So Flaubert and Turgenev, for example, are not the equal of George Eliot aswriters because they lack her moral seriousness. Likewise, Dickens does not enterthe Great Tradition of the novel in English because his genius was merely that of`a great entertainer'. Except in Hard Times, says Leavis, he assumes for themost part `no profounder responsibility as a creative artist than this descriptionsuggests'.

For Leavis, if a work of art is to alter the tradition to which it belongs, reshapingand giving a new meaning to the past from which it emerges then it must possessqualities of `Form' or `Style' which mark it out as `technically' original. But it can

only have these if its content is informed by serious purpose. So ofJane Austen,Leavis says that `without her intense moral preoccupation she wouldn'thave been a great novelist' , and goes on, `when we examine the formalperfection ofEmma, we find that it can be appreciated only in terms of the moral

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preoccupations that characterize the novelist's peculiar interest in life' . Ofcourse, though Leavis asserts that it is a necessarycondition of artistic greatnessthat the art be informed by `a vital capacity for experience, a kind of reverentopenness before life, and a marked moral intensity'.For Leavis, Joyce fails when compared to D.H. Lawrence. Leavis makes hiscomparison in terms of including the hostile use of the word `cosmopolitan' - It isworth quoting at some length:

It is this spirit, by virtue of which he [Lawrence] can truly say that what he writesmust be written from the depth of his religious experience, that makes him, inmy opinion, so much more significant in relation to the past and future, so muchmore truly creative as a technical inventor, an innovator, a master of language,than James Joyce . . . there is no organic principle determining, informing andcontrolling into a vital whole, the elaborate analogical structure, the extraordinaryvariety of technical devices, the attempts at an exhaustive rendering ofconsciousness, for which Ulysses is remarkable, and which got it accepted by acosmopolitan literary world as a new start. It is rather, I think, a dead end, or atleast a pointer to disintegration...

But Leavis's idea of an art enhancing vision is extremely limited, and in particularhe allows no place for the comic, the grotesque (the carnivalesque).Indeed, except in moderation, the carnivalesque repels him. So Dickens can beaccommodated as an entertainer, but Sterne is merely an `irresponsible'and nasty' trifler.

LEAVIS PROMOTED WHAT HE CALLED THE GREAT TRADITIONOF THE ENGLISH NOVEL, WHERE ORIGINALITY OF STYLE WASSUBSERVIENT TO THE PERCEIVED MORAL CONSCIOUSNESS OFTHE WRITER.

To some extent, F. R. Leavis was a reactionary, disturbed bythe materialism of modern life, and what he saw as an assaultof low culture on high culture which must be defended by theliterary elite in their high tower. This elitism may be thereason why F. R. Leavis has been derided by some.

Leavis believed that popular mass culture was destroying the traditionalculture of Britain, and in a way of life that had existed hundreds of years

beforehand. He chose as his model the organic village community,where people had been freer from the universal tyranny of capitalism,where craftmanship had really meant something, and so on.

Indeed, as THE LEAVISITES SAW THEMSELVES AS PART OF THE ELITEMINORITY, WHO HAD TAKEN UPON THEMSELVES TO SAVE THE WHOLEOF BRITISH CULTURE, humility would have been an unwelcome hindrance.

They thought it was harder for the modern author to write, faced as he was bythe plurality of modern society. Yet, they recognised that there had alwaysbeen a minority elite, far removed from those who did indeed speak aplainer language.

Leavis' central criterion for great writing has "a vital capacity forexperience, a kind of reverent openness before life, and a marked moral

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intensity" is a clear reaction to an age characterised by the ideologies offascism and communism.

FOR LEAVIS, JANE AUSTEN IS GREAT NOT BECAUSE SHE HAS INDIVIDUALTALENT, BUT BECAUSE SHE SUCCESSFULLY CARRIED OUT THETRADITION, in the sense that she led to appearance of other great literaryfigures who learnt from her. She, together with George Eliot, Henry James,and Joseph Conrad, have a conveyed ideology that teaches the reader.

Their work is great because it is involved with the tradition ofMorality.Another element that helped those figure to attain greatness, inLeaviss stand, is their concern with form.ALL THE ABOVE-MENTIONED NOVELISTS WERE CHIEFLY CONCERNEDWITH FORM AS WELL AS THE QUESTION OF HOW MORALITY ISREVEALED THROUGH FORM. Charles Dickens was also a great writer;however his writings tend more to entertain than to teach morality.

Hence, THE OLD RELIGIOUS IDEOLOGY, WHICH HAD LOST FORCE, HAS

BEEN REPLACED BY THE ENTITY OF LITERATURE WHICH NOW PROVIDETHE READER WITH A MORALLY CORRECT IDEOLOGY, AIMING AT GUIDINGPEOPLE TOWARD UNIVERSAL HUMAN VALUES, AND THUS TO THETRUTH. Leaviss tradition has challenged the moral set up of aristocracy, andquestioned the assumptions of the upper classes.

ADDITIONAL DETAILS (FROM WIKIPEDIA):

Frank Raymond Leavis was born in Cambridge, England, in 1895, about adecade after T. S. Eliot, James Joyce, D.H. Lawrence and Ezra Pound.

Leavis was nineteen when Britain declared war on Germany in 1914. Notwanting to kill, he volunteered for the Friends' Ambulance Unit, FAU, working inFrance immediately behind the Western Front, and carrying a copy of Milton'spoems with him. His wartime experiences had a lasting effect on Leavis;mentally, he was prone to insomnia and suffered from intermittentnightmares, whilst exposure to poison gas permanently damaged hisphysical health, primarily his digestive system.

He soon founded Scrutiny, the critical quarterly that he edited until 1953,using it as a vehicle for the new Cambridge criticism, upholding rigorous

intellectual standards and attacking the dilettante (frivolous, superficial andamaterurish) elitism he believed to characterise the Bloomsbury Group.

Scrutiny provided a forum for (on occasion) identifying importantcontemporary work and (more commonly) reviewing the traditional canon byserious criteria.

He has been frequently (but often erroneously) associated with the Americanschool of New Critics, a group which advocated close reading and detailed textualanalysis of poetry over, or even instead of, an interest in the mind andpersonality of the poet, sources, the history of ideas and political and socialimplications. Although there are undoubtedly similarities between Leavis'sapproach to criticism and that of the New Critics (most particularly in that bothtake the work of art itself as the primary focus of critical discussion), Leavis isultimately distinguishable from them, since he never adopted (and was

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explicitly hostile to) a theory of the poem as a self-contained and self-sufficient aesthetic and formal artefact, isolated from the society,culture and tradition from which it emerged.

Leavis stressed the importance of an informed anddiscriminating, highly-trained intellectual elite whoseexistence within university English departments

would help preserve the cultural continuity of Englishlife and literature.In Education and the University(1943), Leavis arguedthat there is a prior cultural achievement of language; language is not adetachable instrument of thought and communication. It is the historicalembodiment of its communitys assumptions and aspirations at levelswhich are subliminal.

Leavis' proponents claimed that he introducedseriousness" into English studies

As a critic of the novel, Leaviss main tenet stated that great novelists show anintense moral interest in life, and that this moral interest determinesthe nature of their form in fiction. Authors within this "tradition" were allcharacterised by aserious or responsible attitude to the moral complexityof life and included Jane Austen, George Eliot, Henry James, Joseph Conrad, andD. H. Lawrence.

This proved to be a contentious issue in the critical world, as Leavisrefused to separate art from life, or the aesthetic orformal from the moral. He insisted that the great

novelists preoccupation with form was a matter ofresponsibility towards a rich moral interest, and thatworks of art with a limited formal concern wouldalways be of lesser quality.

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