Literary Theory

"Poetry, the workings of genius itself, which…has been called Inspiration, and held to be mysterious and inscrutable, is no longer without its scientific exposition. The building of the lofty rhyme is like any other masonry or bricklaying: we have theories of its rise, height, decline and fall…”

Thomas Carlyle, "Signs of the Times” 1829

"Literary criticism can be no more than a reasoned account of the feeling produced upon the critic by the book he is criticizing. Criticism can never be a science: it is, in the first place, much too personal, and in the second, it is concerned with values that science ignores. The touchstone is emotion, not reason. We judge a work of art by its effect on our sincere and vital emotion, and nothing else. All the critical twiddle-twaddle about style and form, all this pseudoscientific classifying and analyzing of books in an imitation-botanical fashion, is mere impertinence and mostly dull jargon"

D.H. Lawrence, "Phoenix” 1936

What makes this literary?

• Did Emily Dickens wake up one day and say “I am going to write a classic”?

• Is Harry Potter a classic? Author Stephen King? Charlaine Harris? John Grisham?

• Some texts are born literary, some achieve literariness, and some have literariness thrust upon them.

Star Trek Video

What makes this literary?

• Literary theory is: The tools we use to

attempt to understand a text in a logical manner

• Critcism is: The analysis,

description, or interpretation of a literary work

• Theories provide the rationale, or defense, for the focus of the criticism

New Criticism theory

• An objective, scientific study of motifs, devices, and techniques to explain the meaning

• The text is viewed independent from its history, author and the reader

• How do paradox, tensions, ambiguities unify the work

• One correct interpretation

New Criticism questions

• What conflicts can you see in the text?

• What idea unifies the work, resolving these ambiguities?

• What elements like imagery, symbolism and setting work together to support this resolution?

Marxism theory

• “People for the most part… don’t know how to think, they only learn words by heart.” – John Lenin

• Created by Karl Marx

• Believes that history and culture are largely a reflection of the struggle between economic classes

• Literature reflects the beliefs and attitudes of the dominating culture/class

Some Marxist questions…

• What social classes do the characters represent?

• How do characters from different classes interact or conflict?

• How do characters overcome oppression?

New Historicism theory

• Examines work in cultural and historical context of both the work AND the author

• Uses multiple texts including music, newspapers and advertisements from time period

Harper Lee…•grew up in a small town•was the youngest of four children•was the daughter of a lawyer who owned part of newspaper and was member of Alabama state legislature•was a tomboy

•What language/ characters/ events present in the work reflect the current events of the author’s day?•How does the literary text function as part of a continuum with other historical/cultural texts from the same period?

30s stewardess

Reader Response theory

• Readers create the meaning of a text through their own values and experiences

• Readers don’t passively absorb the material they read; YOU are constantly judging and analyzing the text as you read

• Types of response: Initial emotional response Interpretive Analysis Questions Summary Arguing with author (believability of text) Intertextuality Rethinking one part of text after reading another.

Some Reader Response questions• What does the text

have to do with you personally?

• How does the text agree or clash with your world view?

• What images and events in the story are you already conditioned to approve or disapprove?

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