English Literary Criticism: History and Timeline

English Literary Criticism: History and Timeline

James Madison Gathered these Facts

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Literature and art can be enjoyed in two ways: arbitrarily, as a lay man enjoys it, and methodically as a trained person does. While an untrained consumer of an artistic product will derive pleasure, seldom aware of the constructs that are at play in producing the effect; a trained individual will derive jouissance -a kind of ecstasy- in deriving the manifold meanings that are at play in a work, delving into the possible interpretations, its origins, historical and sociological impacts et al. It is the latter mode of reading a text that is called literary criticism.

English literary criticism per se began as late as the sixteenth century. It was only after the Renaissance, when the Greek and Latin treatises on criticism became available to the English scholars did they apply their critical skills to literary texts. The foundations however, had already been laid by the Greek and the Roman writers in the fifth century B.C

Background: The Foundations and History of Literary Criticisms

The history of literary criticism can be dated back to ancient Greece approx. fifth century B.C. The aim of criticism is to interrogate and closely scrutinize the work under discussion and thus it required an atmosphere which allowed a free play of critical ideas. The fifth century Athens was a period of intellectual awakening when scholars debated freely on all subjects and thus opened a platform for literary criticism to flourish. Some of the important fonder literary critics are Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Socrates, Aristophanes- dramatists and critics who lived during this period.

A Brief Timeline: Influential Literary Critics and their Critical Tenets

Although literary criticism in England came into practice in the sixteenth century, the influence of the following Greek and Roman Masters have remained overpowering ever since. When stating a timeline of English literary criticism, it therefore becomes vital to state the influences and work onwards to the present day English Literary criticism.

The Greek Influence: Important Influential Literary Critics and their Critical Tenets

Plato (427 B.C. -348 B.C.)
Theory of Ideas: “Art is twice removed from reality”

· Condemns Poetry

· Mimesis

Aristotle (384 B.C- 322 B.C)
Observations on Poetry

· Poetry is more philosophical and nobler than history

· Defence of Poetry with respect to Plato’s attack on Poetry

Observations on Tragedy

· Hamartia

· Peripetia

· Anagnorisis

· Hubris

· Catharsis

The Roman Influence: Important Influential Literary Critics and their Critical Tenets

Horace (65 B.C.-8 B.C)

· Classicism

· Observations on Poetry, Drama and Satire

Quintillian

· Observation on Style

Longinus (The First Romantic Critic)

· Sublimity

English Literary Criticism: Sixteenth Century to Twentieth Century

Sixteenth Century: The Elizabethan Era

The Tudor Trio/ ‘Cambridge School’
The first regular critics to apply critical tenets to literature were three Cambridge friends, Sir John Cheke, Roger Ascham and Thomas Wilson. Their criticism followed a dual trend as they were devoted scholars of the Greek classics but in practice wanted to purge English from the influence of foreign tongue. Although they wanted to model their texts on the classics but at the same time did not want to denationalize their vernacular by excessive borrowings.

The ‘Areopagus’ (1579)
It was a literary circle of critics who were devoted classicists and wanted to ‘reform’ English verse by substituting the Greek and Latin system of prosody for the English. The main critics associated with the group were Sir Philip Sidney, Gabriel Harvey, Spencer and Edward Dyer.
Stephen Gosson (1555-1624)

· Attack on Poetry in the work “School of Abuse’ (1579)

Sir Philip Sidney (1554-1586)

· Apologie for Poetrie, a reply to Gosson’s School of Abuse (1580)

· Dramatic Unities of Time, Place and Action

· Condemnation of Tragi-comedy

Ben Jonson (1573-1637)

· Advocacy of Classical Principles and models

· Concept of Humours

· Observations on Style

· Lays down the qualifications of a good critic “To judge poets is only the faculty of poets”

Seventeenth Century: The Neo-Classical Era

Dryden (Dr. Johnson called him The Father of English Criticism) (1631-1700)

· Defence of Roman poets and dramatists

· Defence of French Poets and dramatists

· Defence of English dramatists of the Elizabethan era

· Views on Satire

Addison (1672-1719)

· True wit and False wit

· Concept of Imagination

· Appraisal of John Milton’s Paradise Lost

Alexander Pope( 1688- 1744)

· Concept of Nature

· Concept of Judgement in Literary Criticism

· Concept of Wit

Dr. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784)

· Historical Approach to Criticism

· Views on Drama and Art

Eighteenth Century: The Romantic Era

William Wordsworth( 1770-1850)

· Theory of Poetic Language

· Condemnation of the use of Poetic diction in poetry

· Views on Universality of poetry and its moral force

S.T.COLERIDGE(1772-1834)< strong>

· Theory of Imagination

· Concept of Poetic Genius

· Criticism of Wordsworth’s theory of Poetic Language

Shelley( 1792-1822)

· A Defence of Poetry with respect to Thomas Love Peacock’s attack on poetry in Four Ages of Poetry

John Keats

· Negative Capability

Nineteenth Century: The Victorian Period

Mathew Arnold (1822-1888)

· Touchstone Method of Criticism

· Poetry as a ‘criticism of life’

· Concept of Grand Style

· Views on Creative and Critical Literature

Walter Pater (1839- 1894)

· Theory of Art : “Art for Art’s sake”

· Views on Style

Twentieth Century: Modernism

Thomas. Stearns. Eliot (1888- 1965)

· Impersonal Theory of Poetry

· Theory of Objective Co-relative

· Dissociation of Sensibility

· Views on Impressionistic School of Criticism, called it “Imperfect Criticism”

I.A.Richards (1893- 1979)

· Theory of Poetic Communication

· Harmonization of Impulses

· Uses of Language of Poetry: Referential and Emotive

· Tenor and Vehicle

· Stock Responses

· Pseudo-Statements

· Referent, reference and referential

· Apprentices and Aversions

Resources about Literary Criticism

Online Literary Criticism Guide: Website

An Annotated List of Reference Websites: Website

Literary Criticism practice questions: Website

Internet Public Library Literary Criticism: Website

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