In their essay, ‘The Intentional Fallacy’ (1946), William K. Wimsatt Jr. and Monroe C. Beardsley, two of the most eminent figures of the New Criticism school of thought of Literary Criticism, argue that the ‘intention’ of the author is not a necessary factor in the reading of a text. During the time-period when they authored this essay, the commonly held notion amongst people was that “In order to judge the poet’s performance, we must know what he intended.”, and this notion led to what is termed the ‘Intentional fallacy’. However, Wimsatt and Beardsley argue that the intention, i.e., the design or plan in the author’s mind, of the author is neither available nor desirable for judging the success of a work of literary art. It is not available because the author will most certainly not be beside the reader when he/she reads the text, and not desirable because intention as mentioned already is nothing but the author’s attitude towards his work, the way he felt while writing the text and what made him write that particular piece of writing and these factors might distract the reader from deciphering the meaning from the text. This method of reading a text without any biographical or historical background of either the poem or the poet practiced by the New Critics was known as ‘Closed Reading’. This stemmed from their belief in the autonomy of the text. The New Critics, just like Wimsatt and Beardsley put forward in their essay, also believed in the ‘organicity’ of the text. In the essay, they write, “A poem should not mean but be.” And, since the meaning of the poem or the text is the medium through which it can exist, and words, in turn, is the medium through which the meaning is expressed, the poem or the text b... ... middle of paper ... ...g conveyed better in the words of that language as opposed to in the English language. But, the linguistic element would in no way convey to me, as a reader, some meaning which wouldn’t come across to a non-Assamese speaker who reads the translated version of the poem. Thus, I read the poem keeping in mind the background information about the poem and the poet but that information did not distract me from deciphering the actual meaning of the text; it actually added to it. In other words, unlike the proposal of Wimsatt and Beardsley, I “consulted the oracle” and also uncovered the true meaning of the text. N.B.: ‘Shooting An Arrow’: translated by Pradip Acharya, former Professor of Cotton College, Guwahati, Assam. References: 1. http://www.bipuljyoti.in/poetry/hirenb.html 2. Wimsatt Jr., William K. and Beardsley, Monroe C., ‘The Intentional Fallacy’.
Critics of the period were hesitant to praise ‘Choise’. However, contemporary critic, J.B Steane, claimed the poem ‘seems worth reprinting both as a curiosity, and for what one can see as a certain charm and freshness. In its (not unimportant) way, it even does Nashe’s century some credit.’ The idea of ‘freshness’ in regards to the text is evident in the use emotive language to depict Tomalin’s amazement towards Francis, in the description ‘sweeping she coms, as she would brush the ground, / Hir ratling silke 's my sences doe confound.’ (Nashe, 65) The language here is more akin with love poetry than other sections of the text, and it is in part the fluctuation in language which situates ‘Choise’ as something oppositional to the expected. As Brown explains, Nashes ‘was the epitome of verbal facility and quick wit, who came to be identified with a particular kind of literary value.’ (Brown, 59) The originality of Nashe’s poetry, coupled with his lustful subject matter is reflected throughout the poem, such as: ‘first bare hir leggs, then creepe up to hir kneese. / From thence ascend unto hir mannely thigh.’ (Nashe, 65) ‘Choise’ therefore belongs to a segment of literature which presents lust ‘in a salacious,
Good poetry provides meaningful commentary. One indication of a poem’s success in this is the depth of thought the reader has as a result of the poem. The poems I anthologized may take different
Everett, Nicholas From The Oxford Companion to Twentieth-century Poetry in English. Ed. Ian Hamiltong. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994. Copyright 1994 by Oxford University Press.
The speakers and audience in poem are crucial elements of the poem and is also the case in these poems. In the poem Untitled, it can be argued that the poem is being written by Peter based on what his father might say to him...
The paper discusses the sound of the poem and how those certain words, said aloud, help to emphasize the meaning. Looking at the form of a poem in this way gave me a new way of looking at the text and finding the meaning. Personally, I have not had much familiarity looking at the sound of a text, but now see how the sound can be valuable when looking for the meaning of a text. I like to look at the imagery that is utilized in a text because I believe it works well in giving the reader a look into the text and bringing the text to life. What I have discovered reading about the formalist approach is to look at the overall form and how the text itself affects the meaning. Looking at the imagery and symbols helps me personally find the meaning in a text, so learning that the form of the text also can contribute to the meaning was
...m must fall short of the original. And if his talent cannot be used to add to the glory of the classics, then it might as well be used to condemn the moderns. If all writing is ultimately a corruption of that which preceded it, as the narrator seems to believe, then it is better to write of something that is despised rather than revered.
The essays used in this book have been chosen by Harold Bloom, being that they are still by different essayists than the last two sources mentioned and considering Bloom is not one of them, it is still not bias. This source shed some light on the context of the two poems that were analyzed, but minimal observations on the poem itself and its correlation to the themes. Given this, there was only bare to little use of this secondary source.
Louise Rosenblatt’s groundbreaking work in Literature as Exploration (1938/1995) and later refinement of her original thesis in The Reader, the Text, the Poem (1978), rejects the idea that there is a single, fixed meaning inherent in a literary work as was common thought in the formalist theories of New Criticism, but rather that the individual creates meaning through a transaction with the text
The notion of the author has often been disputed when it comes to critical literary studies. The argument centers around one basic question: Should the author be considered when looking at a text? There are numerous reasons given as to why the author is important or why the ...
...vocal statement about the ?organic? possibilities of poetry than optimistic readers might have expected. ?Mayflies? forces us to complicate Randall Jarrell?s neat formulation. Here Wilbur has not just seen and shown ?the bright underside of? a ?dark thing.? In a poem where the speaker stands in darkness looking at what ?animate[s] a ragged patch of glow? (l.4), we are left finally in a kind of grayness. We look from darkness into light and entertain an enchanting faith that we belong over there, in the immortal dance, but we aren?t there now. We are in the machine-shop of poetry. Its own fiat will not let us out completely.
Elegy in a Country Courtyard, by Thomas Gray, can be looked at through two different methods. First the Dialogical Approach, which covers the ability of the language of the text to address someone without the consciousness that the exchange of language between the speaker and addressee occurs. (HCAL, 349) The second method is the Formalistic Approach, which allows the reader to look at a literary piece, and critique it according to its form, point of view, style, imagery, atmosphere, theme, and word choice. The formalistic views on form, allow us to look at the essential structure of the poem.
It is this moment of recollection that he wonders about the contrast between the world of shadows and the world of the Ideal. It is in this moment of wonder that man struggles to reach the world of Forms through the use of reason. Anything that does not serve reason is the enemy of man. Given this, it is only logical that poetry should be eradicated from society. Poetry shifts man’s focus away from reason by presenting man with imitations of objects from the concrete world.
His first statement is that “Literary criticism is a description and evaluation of its object” (Brooks 19). The literary critic reports on the work that he is criticizing and picks out the meaning that he deems important, which might be different from what the next critic would pick out. To describe the work it is therefore already a subjective exercise, such as in Doctor Faustus, in the A-version of the text, some people ...
The concept of ‘the Death of the Author’ was proposed by, French philosopher and literary theorist, Roland Barthes in his essay with the same title. He proposed a paradigm shift in the way that authorship should be viewed by the ‘Critic’. In opposition to the classical model of critique, Barthes proposed that the focus should be on the readers experience and interpretation; he proposed the idea of ‘readerly’ and ‘writerly’ texts. Rather than focusing on the author’s intent, his or her past building up to the text and the singularity of his or her intent, he suggested that once a text has been committed to written words it transcends into a ‘tissue of signs’ and ‘immense dictionary from which he [the writer] draws a writing that can know no halt’ [Barthes 1977, 147] and the only thing of importance to the critique of the work would be the experience of the reader. He proposed that ‘the work’ itself is merely a string of words that, without a reader, would be void of meaning. He also suggests that these two polar opposites were mutually exclusive of one another and that ‘the birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the Author’ [Barthes 1977, 148]. The discussion that follows will be based on Stephen Heath’s French-to-English translation of Barthes work from the compilation of essays, ‘Image – Music – Text’, translated and compiled in 1977 (three years before Roland Barthes’ death).
1. Being too traditional or simply just following traditions in writing is looked down upon