Literary Theory: An Overview

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Literary Theory An Overview

• Henderson

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Why study theory?

• If literature matters today, it is chiefly
  because it seems to many conventional critics one
  of the few remaining places where, in a divided,
  fragmented world, a sense of universal value may
  still be incarnate and where, in a sordidly
  material world, a rare glimpse of transcendence
  can still be attained.
• Terry Eagleton

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Approaching Theory

• None of the theories we will study will be
  entirely satisfactory to you.
• While the theorists themselves cling steadfastly
  to their respective approaches, we have the
  luxury of window-shopping lots of em.
• Incorporate bits and pieces of differing theories
  into your own developing philosophies of
  literature and life.

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One last thought before we begin

• Literary theory is not a disembodied set of ideas
  but a force in institutions. Theory exists in
  communities of readers and writers, as a
  discursive practice, inextricably entangled with
  educational and cultural institutions.
• Jonathan Culler

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Formalism

• Russian in origin emerged in the years
  immediately preceding the Bolshevik Revolution in
  1917, flourished in the 1920s until Stalin shut
  em up.
• Did not take into account feelings, ideas, social
  realities, etc.
• Focused on the objective parts of language,
  like a machine.

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Formalism

• Evaluated literature according to its use of
  devices -- sound, rhythm, imagery, syntax,
  meter, rhyme, etc -- and their ability to
  estrange the language.
• Estrangement the ability to draw attention to
  the language itself and make the everyday seem
  unfamiliar.

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Formalism

• Fine writing is strange writing.
• Applies linguistics to literature.

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Phenomenology

• Founded in the wake of WWI by Edmund Husserl.
• Rejected the natural attitude that we see the
  world as it really is and that we perceive
  objects objectively, as something existing
  outside our consciousness.

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Phenomenology

• Instead, Husserl believed that our thoughts were
  inherently related to an object.
• Phenomenological reduction we must reduce the
  external world to the contents of our
  consciousness alone.

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Phenomenology

• All realities must be treated as phenomena, as
  they appear in our mind, and that is as absolute
  as our knowledge can ever be.
• Perception is reality, and vice versa.
• However, phenomenology actually viewed all this
  as concrete, not abstract.

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Phenomenology

• The linguistic revolution of the 20th century is
  the assertion that readers create meaning based
  on their reception of the language.
• In literature, focus on the essential meaning of
  the work, not the language or construction.

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Phenomenology

• When analyzing literature according to this
  theory, focus on the reader-response.
• Describe the readers progressive movement
  through a text, analyzing how readers produce
  meaning by interacting with the text.

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Phenomenology

• But which is more valid what the author means,
  or what the text means to me?
• You are free to attach any meaning you want to
  the text, but what the text authentically means
  must stay within the probabilities of the
  authors intentions.

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New Criticism

• Originated in the United States in the 1930s and
  40s.
• Coincided with a rising emphasis on science and
  technology approaches literature scientifically.
• However, in approaching literature this way, the
  New Critics were hoping to replace religion
  (wholly rejected as a guiding force in everyday
  life) with poetry.

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New Criticism

• Focused on the parts with the intention of
  understanding the whole.
• Treated works as self-contained aesthetic objects
  rather than social or historical documents.
• Approach each work independently, analyzing
  irony, paradox, ambiguity, connotation, etc.

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New Criticism

• Great Men approach literature is created by
  extraordinary people, and as we decipher a poems
  meaning, we are trying to search for the authors
  original meaning. Every work is essentially
  autobiographical, a chance for us to obtain a
  glimpse of a Great Mans mind.

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New Criticism

• New Critics rejected the Great Men system of
  reading.
• Asserted that an authors intention was
  irrelevant to the text.
• Poems must be read without concern for context.
• Reduced the poem to a fetish.
• We are to read the poem with aloof detachment.

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Structuralism

• Asserts that writing is not a random,
  self-contained act or series of devices. Each
  work -- and all literature as a collective body
  of work -- is governed by a series of codes,
  archetypes, myths, and genres that acted as
  aesthetic laws.

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Structuralism

• Emphasizes that all meaning is relative and
  contextual.
• Hut derives its meaning from its placement
  between hovel and mansion.
• Terrorist and freedom fighter denote the same
  object but connote different meanings.

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Structuralism

• Moves from the particular to the general
  commentary focuses on how a work fits into a
  greater schema.
• The aim of structuralism is to arrive at a sense
  of unity.

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Structuralism

• In VERY basic terms, structuralism is happy!
  It recognizes the relativity of language but does
  not despair, and it seeks to critique language
  anyway. In such criticism, language arrives at
  something unified and harmonious.

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Deconstruction

• Method derived from post-structuralism.
• Deconstructionists begin with structuralist
  theory but then move beyond it and rebel against
  it.
• Deconstruction occurred immediately after and
  then alongside structuralism.

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Deconstruction

• There are no facts only perceptions.
• Friedrich Nietzsche

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Deconstruction

• Jacques Derrida created the concept and coined
  the term deconstruction.
• Argued that Western culture LOVES them some
  binary sets black vs. white, feminine vs.
  masculine, etc.
• These binary sets imply a hierarchy and mutually
  exclusive relationships.
• Deconstruction erases the boundary between these
  sets.

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Deconstruction

• Argues that if language really is relative and
  arbitrary, and there are no fixed points for
  reference, then all language and meaning is
  essentially one hot mess.
• We live in a decentered universe in which
  language and meaning have free play.

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Deconstruction

• Look for shifts and breaks at various levels of
  the work. Read against the grain so that the
  text betrays itself. A deconstructionist
  triumphantly finds ways in which an author
  accidentally contradicts himself so that meaning
  breaks down.

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Deconstruction

• In very basic terms, deconstruction reveals
  anxieties about language and seeks to find
  disunity in the text that reflects disunity in
  our existence.
• More on structuralism and deconstruction in
  another power point!

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Psychoanalysis

• Established by everybodys favorite
  phallus-obsessed psychiatrist.
• Focuses on a meta-language in which the reader
  seeks out whats really going on in the text.

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Modernism

• Parallel movements in fine arts Dadaism, Cubism,
  Surrealism.
• In literature, a rejection of traditional realism
  in favor of experimentation.
• High modernism, 1910-1930.

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Modernism

• New emphasis on impressionism and subjectivity
  HOW we see it is more important than WHAT we see.
• Movement away from devices that convey
  objectivity, such as omniscient 3rd person
  narration, clear-cut moral conclusions.
• An affinity for fragmented forms

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Modernism

• Attitude is self-conscious and nostalgic.
• Through its fragmentation, celebrates a by-gone
  era when circumstances precipitated continuity in
  form and style.
• Laments its own fragmentation in simplest terms,
  modernism is sad.

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Postmodernism

• In simplest terms, is happy.
• Is not a subsequent, chronological step
  co-existed with modernism and demonstrates a
  shift in attitude.
• While modernism was ascetic (hence ugly
  box-shaped houses), postmodernism did not
  distinguish between high culture and pop
  culture. Celebrated gaudiness.

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Postmodernism

• Baudrillard examined a hyperreality, or the
  loss of the real. (Martin Scorsese capitalized
  on this concept in Gangs of New York.)
• Pervasive influences of TV, film, other media
  have blurred the lines between reality and
  illusion, surface and depth.
• In terms of semiotics, a sign is recognized as
  such, with an unclear connection to the reality
  of the signified. Ex Disneyland IS reality.

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Postmodernism

• Focus on intertextuality -- the close
  relationship between several works, seen through
  allusion, parody, etc.
• Focus on irony.

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New Historicism

• Conduct a parallel reading of literary and
  historical texts from the same period puts both
  forms on equal footing
• Rejects the more traditional approach of using
  historical texts as a backdrop for literature.
• Culture is not simply a reflection of the
  economic and political system, but it cannot be
  independent from those systems.

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Postcolonialism

• Undermines the universal standard for judging
  the greatness of literature, as universal
  inevitably leads to dead-European/white-male
  perspective.
• An effect of Orientalism was to place everything
  other in an inferior position. At the same
  time, the East became the repository for the
  Wests hidden self

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Postcolonialism

• projected human cruelty, indulgence, laziness,
  and sensuality onto the Orient.
• At the same time, the West was fascinated by the
  East and perceived it as exotic, mystical, and
  seductive.

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Postcolonialism

• Phases of postcolonialism writing
• ADOPT begin with an unquestioning acceptance of
  European models.
• ADAPT adapt Western form to Eastern subject
  matter.
• ADEPT reject Western forms and return to more
  nativepre-colonial forms.

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Marxist criticism

• Some basic tenets of Marxism
• Founded by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
• Considered themselves Communists instead of
  Marxist in particular.
• Supported state ownership vs. private ownership.

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Marxist criticism

• Is a materialist theory looks for concrete,
  observable facts to determine the limits of
  reality, as opposed to
• Idealist philosophy believes in another,
  spiritual world, as part of reality.
• Progress comes about through class struggle.
  History should be measured this way instead of as
  a series of dynasties or as a progression toward
  sovereignty.

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Marxist criticism

• Base material means of production, distribution,
  exchange.
• Superstructure cultural world of arts,
  religion, law, etc.
• Economic determinism the belief that the base
  dictates the nature of the superstructure.

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Marxist criticism

• Individual genius doesnt really exist artists
  and their works are formed by their social
  contexts.
• The Soviets hijacked Marxism Lenin insisted that
  literature must be an instrument of the Party.
• All literature became propaganda literary
  complexity couldnt rise above an Uncle Toms
  Cabin level.

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Marxist criticism

• Modern adaptations of Marxism
• Althusser identifies repressive structures
  institutions like law courts, police forces, etc.
  that impose state control by external force.
• State ideological structures maintain state
  control through political parties, schools,
  churches, and the arts

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Marxist criticism

• Hegemony internalized form of social control
  that make certain views seem natural,
  invisible, the way things are.
• Makes us feel like free agents with the ability
  to choose and determine our lives.

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Feminist theory

• Rethink the canon, rediscover feminine texts.
• Challenge literary representations of other.
• Seek out patriarchy in literature politically
  and socially aimed connotations that perpetuate a
  male outlook on the world.

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Feminist theory

• Feminine phase women writers imitated dominant
  male artistic form and style
• Feminist phase radical and separatist positions
  dominate womens writing.
• Female phase focuses on female writing and the
  female experience.

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Feminist theory

• Male language is prose more linear, didactic,
  structured.
• Female language is poetry more fluid,
  flexible, changing.
• Men read and write through symbolism women read
  and write through semiotics.

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Feminism Psychoanalysis

• Redefines Freuds penis envy.
• Feminist critics argue that the envy isnt for
  the organ itself (or even the symbolic nature of
  it) but for the varieties of power it represents
  (the semiotics).
• Sexual identity is a cultural construct. Female
  is biological feminine is social.

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Lesbian/Gay Criticism

• At this point, lesbian criticism is simply an
  extension of feminist criticism.
• Gay criticism, commonly called queer theory,
  looks for gay episodes in mainstream works
  redefining cults of friendship in literature.
  (Look at WWI poetry again.)
• Metaphorically gay reading of literature
  connotes any blurring of social boundaries.

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Guess what

• Its over!!