For education purpose

1. Marxist Criticism

2. Prepared by Gayatri Nimavat
Roll No. :6
M.A. semester 3 Batch : 2022-24
Paper 204: Criticism 2
Email id : gayatrinimavat128@gmail.com
Enrollment no. : 4069206420220019
Submitted to the Department of English, MKBU

3. Road Map Of Presentation
The Influence of
Althusser
What Marxist Critics
do?
Conclusion
References
Karl Marx
FriedrichEngels
What is Marxism
DefinitionsofTerms
Marxist Literary Criticism
1. ‘Engelsian’MarxistCriticism
2. ‘Leninist’marxistcriticism

4. Marxist cultural theory originates in the work of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in the
nineteenth century. The Marx-Engels analysis of society and the conditions of production
spilled over into an analysis of culture. (Nayar)
Marxist criticism is a mode of literary and cultural analysis that views works of art as products
of their historical and material contexts.
Drawing on the theories of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Marxist critics examine the ways
in which literature reflects, reinforces, or challenges the social, economic, and political
structures of a given era.
Introduction

5. Karl Heinrich Marx, (born May 5, 1818, Trier, Rhine province, Prussia
(Germany)- died March 14, 1883, London, England), revolutionary,
sociologist, historian and economist. He was a bourgeois Jew from a
predominantly Catholic city within a country whose official religion was
evangelical Protestantism.
In October 1997, The New Yorker billed Karl Marx as 'the next big thinker',
a man with much to teach us about political corruption, monopolisation,
alienation, inequality and global markets.
Even this intended compliment serves only to diminish him. Karl Marx was
a philosopher, a historian, an economist, a linguist, a literary critic and a
revolutionist. Although he may not have had a 'job' as such, he was a
prodigious worker: his collected writings, few of which were published in
his lifetime. (Wheen)
Who Started It? -> Karl Marx

6. But we can’t have Marx without Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels, (born Nov. 28 1820 Barmen, Rhine province Prussia
died Aug 5, 1895, London, Eng), was a German socialist and
philosopher.
Frederick Engels is often referred to as the world's first Marxist Nothing
can be farther from the truth, Engels was a collaborator of Marx,
contributing in equal measure to the evolution of the Marxist world
outlook.
However, with his characteristic self-effacing modesty.
Engels may have proudly accepted this status, Marx and Engels jointly
wrote prefaces to every new edition of the Communist Manifesto on its
frequent republication in several languages To the 1883 German
edition, published soon after Marx's death. (Yechury)

7. What is Marxism?
Marxism is a general theory of the world in which we live, and of human
societyasapartofthatworld.
IttakesitsnamefromKarlMarx(1818-1883),who,togetherwithFriedrich
Engels (1820-1895), worked out the theory during the middle and latter
partoflastcentury.(Burns)
The philosophy of Marxism is materialism. It analyzes class struggle and
advocates for a transition to a classless society through the abolition of
private property and the means of production. Marxism is grounded in
materialismandthecritiqueofpoliticaleconomy.
AccordingtoLeninthereareThreeSourcesandThreeComponentPartsof
Marxism: materialist philosophy, critique of political economy and
socialistpolitics.(Lenin)

8. Bourgeois:
The class of people in bourgeois society who own the social means of production as
their Private properties i.e., as capital.
Capitalism:
The socio-economic system where social relations are based on commodities for
exchange, in particular private ownership of the means of production and on the
exploitation of wage labour.
Proletariat:
The proletariat is that class in society which lives entirely from the sale of its labour
power and does not draw profit from any kind of capital; whose weal and woe,
whose life and death,whose sole existence depends on the demand for labour.
(Marx: The Communist Manifesto)
Definitions of Terms

9. The Marxist criticism of literature begins, naturally enough, with Karl Marx, although he himself wrote
comparatively little specifically on literature. Its theoretical basis is the relationship of literature to society
definedbyMarxintheIntroduction to the Critique of Political Economy.(Hyman)
In the preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy Karl Marx sets forth one of
thebasicnotionsofMarxistliterarycriticism,thenotionofthe"superstructure".(Lisman)
The apparent discrepancy between the relative autonomy of art and economic determinism has been
problematic for Marxism. Mainstream Marxist literary criticism attempts to reconcile this discrepancy by
maintainingthat worksof literature do not immediately reflect ideological and economic factors, butrather
are the result of a whole series of "levels" which "mediate" between the literary work and the capitalist
economy.
Marxist Literary Criticism

10. Similarly, proletarian literature, or the committed literature of the Marxist, is considered to be not
merely a passive reflection of proletarian social relations. The proletarian writer reflects economic
and social reality not merely by showing the effects of economic and social injustice upon individual
personalities, but by creating characters who typify the historic plight that many proletariats
experience.
TwofundamentalassumptionsofMarxistliterarytheorymustbeexaminedmoreclosely:
(1)allculturalproductionismediatedbythesub-structure;
(2)thebestliteratureactivelyattemptstopromotesocialchange.(Lisman)
Two main streams of Marxist criticism, of the 1960s and of the 1970s, The Engelsian Marxist criticism,
which stresses the necessary freedom of art from direct political determinism. The Leninist Marxist
criticisminsistsontheneedforarttobeexplicitlycommittedtothepoliticalcauseoftheLeft.(Barry)

11. From the 1930s, however, a rich variety of 'Engelsian' Marxist criticism flourished,
either in exile, or in suppressed or underground form. The group now called the
Russian formalists had flourished in the 1920s, until disbanded by the Party, and
should be mentioned here, even though their work is not strictly Marxist in spirit.
The most prominent members of the group were Victor Shklovsky, Boris
Tomashevsky,andBorisEichenbaum.
Shklovsky's concept of 'defamiliarization' or 'making strange' (expounded in the
essay 'Art as Technique'), holds that one of the main effects of the language in
literature is the achievement of making the familiar world, to look as a world
totallynewforus.
Aswiththeconceptofdefamiliarization,thereisacarefuldistinctionherebetween
reality itself and its verbal representation in a work of literature, so that we are
steered away from any notion that literature simply mirrors reality in a
documentaryway. (Barry)
‘Engelsian’ Marxist Criticism

12. The significance of Lenin'sstrategic andtactical writingsfor the struggle of the
working class has been recognized by proletarian parties and movements the
world over. Hence the ideology of the revolutionary proletariat is termed
Marxism-Leninism. "Leninism is Marxism of the era of imperialism
and the proletarian revolution. To be more exact, Leninism is
the theory and tactics of the proletarian revolution in general,
the theory and tactics of the dictatorship of the proletariat in
particular"(Stalin). This simple truth has evaded Andersen in his search for a
"Western"Marxism.
Marxism-Leninism identifies the state as a special apparatus for the
systematic use of force by one class against another in order to extend the
relations of domination and subordination existing at the level of relations of
production to all spheres of social life. "The State is a product and
manifestationoftheirreconcilabilityofclassantagonisms".(Prasad)
‘Leninist’ Marxist Criticism

13. Much recent Marxist thinking on literature has been influenced by the work of the
French Marxist theoretician Louis Althusser (1918-1990), and his contribution will
becomeclearifweoutlinesomeofthekeytermsandconceptsheintroduced.
For instance: overdeterminism, Ideology, repressive structures,
relative autonomy, decentering, ideological structures,etc.
His Engelsian announcements, do not censure Marxist tendency to imprison art
and literature with economics. Nevertheless, it is intended to release literature in
ahighdegree.
Due to both: his innovative perspective and reformulation of the Marxist vision of
literature,AlthussercouldbeconsideredarevisionistofMarxism.(Barry)
The Influence of Althusser

14. 1. They divide the literary work content in: overt (surface) and covert (hidden). Then they
make a relation between the hidden subject of the literary work with elemental
Marxist topics such as class struggle, clashes of large historical forces, conflicts
betweensocialclassesandsoforth.
2. Another method used by Marxist critics is to relate the context of a work to the social-
classstatusoftheauthor.
3. A thirdMarxistmethodistoexplain thenatureof a wholeliterary genreintermsof the
socialperiodwhich'produced'it.
4. A fourth Marxist practice is to relate the literary work to the social assumptions of the
time in which it is 'consumed', a strategy which is used particularly in the later variant
ofMarxistcriticismknownasculturalmaterialism.
5. A fifth Marxist practice is the 'politicisation of literary form', that is, the claim that
literaryformsarethemselvesdeterminedbypoliticalcircumstance.(Barry)
What Marxist Critics do?

15. Conclusion
In summary, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels' work laid
the foundation for Marxism, a theory encompassing
philosophy, economics, and literary criticism. Their
influence is evident in fields like political economy and
the analysis of literature. Marxist literary criticism
delves into the hidden dimensions of literary works,
connecting them to class struggle, historical forces, and
social contexts. While different branches of Marxism
exist, they share the core principles of materialism,
critique of political economy, and socialist politics,
shaping our understanding of society, economics, and
literature.

16. References
Anderson, Perry. Considerations on Western Marxism. Verso Books, 1979.
Barry, Peter. Beginning Theory: An Introduction to Literary and Cultural Theory. Manchester University Press, 2002. P.
156
Burns, Emile. What is Marxism? CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 1939.
Hyman, Stanley Edgar. “The Marxist Criticism of Literature.” The Antioch Review, vol. 7, no. 4, 1947, pp. 541–68.
JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/4609242. Accessed 20 Oct. 2023.
Lenin, Vladimir Ilyich. “The Three Sources and Three Component Parts of Marxism.” Marxists Internet Archive,
https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1913/mar/x01.htm. Accessed 21 October 2023.
Lisman, C. David. “Marxist Literary Theory: A Critique.” Journal of Aesthetic Education, vol. 22, no. 2, 1988, pp. 73–85.
JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/3333124. Accessed 20 Oct. 2023.

17. Marx, Karl. A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy. C. H. Kerr, 1904.
Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels. The Communist Manifesto. Edited by David McLellan, translated by Samuel
Moore, OUP Oxford, 2008.
Nayar, Pramod K. An Introduction to Cultural Studies. Viva Books, 2008. P. 59
Prasad, Madhu. “Leninism and ‘Western Marxism’: A Critique of Perry Andersen.” Social Scientist, vol. 10, no. 4,
1982, pp. 3–12. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/3520325. Accessed 20 Oct. 2023.
Shklovsky, Viktor. “‘Art as Technique.’”
https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/english/currentstudents/undergraduate/modules/fulllist/first/en122/lecturelist-
2015-16-2/shklovsky.pdf. Accessed 21 October 2023.
Stalin, Joseph. The Foundations of Leninism. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2011.
Wheen, Francis. Karl Marx: A Life. Norton, 2000.
Yechury, Sitaram. “Frederick Engels: Co-Founder of Marxism.” Communist Party of India (Marxist),
https://cpim.org/content/frederick-engels-co-founder-marxism. Accessed 20 October 2023.

18. Thank You