1. The intentional fallacy refers to judging a literary work based on the author's intended meaning rather than analyzing what is presented in the text itself.
2. W.K. Wimsatt Jr. and Monroe Beardsley introduced the concept of the intentional fallacy in their 1954 essay to argue that an author's intentions are neither known nor important for literary analysis or criticism.
3. The intentional fallacy was an important concept in New Criticism, which emphasized close analysis of literary texts without consideration of authorial intent, biography, or historical context.
Poetry, he wrote in the Preface, originates from ‘the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings’ which is filtered through ‘emotion recollected in tranquillity’.
The concept of imagination in biographia literariaDayamani Surya
Samuel Taylor Coleridge in his Biographia Literature considered that the mind can be divided into two faculties called as imagination and fancy.
Imagination is further divided into two types namely Primary Imagination and Secondary Imagination.
Poetry, he wrote in the Preface, originates from ‘the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings’ which is filtered through ‘emotion recollected in tranquillity’.
The concept of imagination in biographia literariaDayamani Surya
Samuel Taylor Coleridge in his Biographia Literature considered that the mind can be divided into two faculties called as imagination and fancy.
Imagination is further divided into two types namely Primary Imagination and Secondary Imagination.
Literary Theory and Criticism
By Belachew Weldegebriel
Jimma University
College of Social Sciences and Humanities
Department of English Language and Literature
Matthew Arnold (24 December 1822 – 15 April 1888) was an English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools. He was the son of Thomas Arnold, the famed headmaster of Rugby School, and brother to both Tom Arnold, literary professor, and William Delafield Arnold, novelist and colonial administrator.
During this time Arnold wrote the bulk of his most famous critical works, Essays in Criticism (1865) and Culture and Anarchy (1869), in which he sets forth ideas that greatly reflect the predominant values of the Victorian era.
This Presentation is part of my M.A Study Paper about "Criticism and Indian aesthetic". Here my presentation is about Practical Criticism by I.A Richard.
Willing suspension of disbelief by samuel taylor coleridgeDayamani Surya
Willing suspension of disbelief is a term coined by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. It would mean suspend one's critical faculties and believe the unbelievable; sacrifice of realism and logic for the sake of judgement.
Literary Theory and Criticism
By Belachew Weldegebriel
Jimma University
College of Social Sciences and Humanities
Department of English Language and Literature
Matthew Arnold (24 December 1822 – 15 April 1888) was an English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools. He was the son of Thomas Arnold, the famed headmaster of Rugby School, and brother to both Tom Arnold, literary professor, and William Delafield Arnold, novelist and colonial administrator.
During this time Arnold wrote the bulk of his most famous critical works, Essays in Criticism (1865) and Culture and Anarchy (1869), in which he sets forth ideas that greatly reflect the predominant values of the Victorian era.
This Presentation is part of my M.A Study Paper about "Criticism and Indian aesthetic". Here my presentation is about Practical Criticism by I.A Richard.
Willing suspension of disbelief by samuel taylor coleridgeDayamani Surya
Willing suspension of disbelief is a term coined by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. It would mean suspend one's critical faculties and believe the unbelievable; sacrifice of realism and logic for the sake of judgement.
This is a brief presentation of the basic concepts introduced by Russian formalism. It might be considered as a suitable departing point to the understanding of this literary theory.
English 205Masterworks of English LiteratureHANDOUTSCritica.docxYASHU40
English 205:
Masterworks of English Literature
HANDOUTS
Critical Approaches to Literature
Plain text version of this document.
Described below are nine common critical approaches to the literature. Quotations are from X.J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia’s Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama, Sixth Edition (New York: HarperCollins, 1995), pages 1790-1818.
· Formalist Criticism: This approach regards literature as “a unique form of human knowledge that needs to be examined on its own terms.” All the elements necessary for understanding the work are contained within the work itself. Of particular interest to the formalist critic are the elements of form—style, structure, tone, imagery, etc.—that are found within the text. A primary goal for formalist critics is to determine how such elements work together with the text’s content to shape its effects upon readers.
· Biographical Criticism: This approach “begins with the simple but central insight that literature is written by actual people and that understanding an author’s life can help readers more thoroughly comprehend the work.” Hence, it often affords a practical method by which readers can better understand a text. However, a biographical critic must be careful not to take the biographical facts of a writer’s life too far in criticizing the works of that writer: the biographical critic “focuses on explicating the literary work by using the insight provided by knowledge of the author’s life.... [B]iographical data should amplify the meaning of the text, not drown it out with irrelevant material.”
· Historical Criticism: This approach “seeks to understand a literary work by investigating the social, cultural, and intellectual context that produced it—a context that necessarily includes the artist’s biography and milieu.” A key goal for historical critics is to understand the effect of a literary work upon its original readers.
· Gender Criticism: This approach “examines how sexual identity influences the creation and reception of literary works.” Originally an offshoot of feminist movements, gender criticism today includes a number of approaches, including the so-called “masculinist” approach recently advocated by poet Robert Bly. The bulk of gender criticism, however, is feminist and takes as a central precept that the patriarchal attitudes that have dominated western thought have resulted, consciously or unconsciously, in literature “full of unexamined ‘male-produced’ assumptions.” Feminist criticism attempts to correct this imbalance by analyzing and combatting such attitudes—by questioning, for example, why none of the characters in Shakespeare’s play Othello ever challenge the right of a husband to murder a wife accused of adultery. Other goals of feminist critics include “analyzing how sexual identity influences the reader of a text” and “examin[ing] how the images of men and women in imaginative literature reflect or reject the social forces that have historically kept th ...
Take the quiz to discover what poem you have been assigned to discus.docxbriankimberly26463
Take the quiz to discover what poem you have been assigned to discuss this week;
"On Being Brought From Africa to America" By: Phillis Wheatley
2.Look through the critical approaches in the Week 4 lesson, and CHOOSE 2 that you think could be used to analyze the poem you chose.
Literary Critical Theory:
Interpretive Strategies
1. Historicism considers the literary work in light of "what really happened" during the period reflected in that work. It insists that to understand a piece, we need to understand the author's biography and social background, ideas circulating at the time, and the cultural milieu. Historicism also "finds significance in the ways a particular work resembles or differs from other works of its period and/or genre," and therefore may involve source studies. It may also include examination of philology and linguistics. It is typically a discipline involving impressively extensive research.
2. New Criticism examines the relationships between a text's ideas and its form, "the connection between what a text says and the way it's said." New Critics/Formalists "may find tension, irony, or paradox in this relation, but they usually resolve it into unity and coherence of meaning." New Critics look for patterns of sound, imagery, narrative structure, point of view, and other techniques discernible on close reading of "the work itself." They insist that the meaning of a text should not be confused with the author's intentions nor the text's affective dimension--its effects on the reader. The objective determination as to "how a piece works" can be found through close focus and analysis, rather than through extraneous and erudite special knowledge.
3. Archetypal criticism "traces cultural and psychological 'myths' that shape the meaning of texts." It argues that "certain literary archetypes determine the structure and function of individual literary works," and therefore that literature imitates not the world but rather the "total dream of humankind." Archetypes (recurring images or symbols, patterns, universal experiences) may include motifs such as the quest or the heavenly ascent, symbols such as the apple or snake, or images such as crucifixion--all laden with meaning already when employed in a particular work.
4. Psychoanalytic criticism adopts the methods of "reading" employed by Freud and later theorists to interpret what a text really indicates. It argues that "unresolved and sometimes unconscious ambivalences in the author's own life may lead to a disunified literary work," and that the literary work is a manifestation of the author's own neuroses. Psychoanalytic critics focus on apparent dilemmas and conflicts in a work and "attempt to read an author's own family life and traumas into the actions of their characters," realizing that the psychological material will be expressed indirectly, encoded (similar to dreams) through principles such as "condensation," "displacement," and "symbolism."
5. Femini.
Int. to Literary Theory & Literary Criticism
Compiled By Belachew W/Gebriel (bellachew@gmail.com)
Jimma University
CSSH
Department of English Language and Literature
These are the readings that need to be chosen fromYou can find.docxchristalgrieg
These are the readings that need to be chosen from
You can find them online via Google
The first one has already been pasted for you
Week One: Identity and Post - Civil War Poetry
1. Emily Dickinson," I'm Nobody! Who Are You?"
I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us — don't tell!
They'd banish us, you know.
How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!
2. Walt Whitman: Author Bio
3. Walt Whitman, "Song of Myself"
4. Walt Whitman, "A Noiseless Patient Spider"
Week Two: Social Realism, gendered/feminist criticism, and how to write about literature.
Mark Twain: Author Bio
Mark Twain, War Prayer
Charlotte Perkins Gilman: Author Bio
Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Yellow Wallpaper:
Robert Frost: Author Bio
Robert Frost: "Mending Wall"
Edwin Arlington Robinson: Author Bio
Edwin Arlington Robinson: Richard Cory
Edwin Arlington Robinson, Miniver Cheevy
Edith Wharton: Author Bio
Edith Wharton, Roman Fever
PLUS:
Mark Twain The Story of the Bad Little Boy
APUS
Assignment
Rubric
Lower Level
U/G
100-200
Courses
EXEMPLARY
LEVEL
A
18-20
ACCOMPLISHED
LEVEL
B
16-17
DEVELOPING
LEVEL
C
14-15
BEGINNING
LEVEL
D
11-13
Points
Earned
Purpose and
Audience
(20 Points)
The writing
engages the
reader with an
original approach
to the subject. It
may encompass
conflicting ideas
and inspires the
reader to
contemplate the
relationship of
complex ideas.
The writing
clearly goes
beyond the
minimum
requirements of
the assignment.
It attempts to
engage the
reader through
originality and
presentation of
complex ideas.
The writing
meets the
minimum
requirements of
the assignment.
It offers insight
into the subject
through basic
logic and the
presentation of
ideas based on
some evidence.
The writing fails
to meet the
minimum
requirements of
the assignment.
It offers little
insight into the
subject and has
serious flaws in
logic and
omissions in
evidence.
/20
Thesis and
Support
(20 Points)
The writing has a
clearly articulated
original thesis
and subordinate
ideas supported
by reliable and
relevant evidence
based on original
research. Main
ideas are not lost
in surrounding
supporting
evidence.
The writing has a
clearly articulated
thesis supported
by appropriate
evidence and
sound logic.
Minor gaps in
logic and
argument may
appear. Main
ideas can be
distinguished
from supporting
evidence with
some effort.
The writing has a
clear thesis and
related
subordinate ideas
supported by
clear thinking and
appropriate
evidence. Logical
arguments may
be one-sided or
incomplete.
The writing may
need a more
clearly articulated
thesis and/or
appropriate
related
subordinate
ideas. Fuzzy logic
may be evident
and adequate
supporting
evidence is
lacking.
/20
Organization
(20 Points)
The writing flows ...
1. Intentional Fallacy
INTRODUCTION
Intentional fallacy,(a false idea that many
people believe is true) term used in 20th-
century literary criticism to describe the
problem inherent in trying to judge a work of
art by assuming the intent or purpose of the
artist who created it.
2. Introduced by W.K. Wimsatt, Jr., and
Monroe C.Beardsley in The Verbal Icon
(1954), the approach was a reaction to the
popular belief that to know what the author
intended—what he had in mind at the time of
writing—was to know the correct
interpretation of the work.
The intentional fallacy forces the literary
critic to assume the role of cultural
historian or that of a psychologist who
must define the growth of a particular
artist’s vision in terms of his mental and
physical state at the time of his creative
3. They asserted that an author’s intended
aims and meanings in writing a literary
work—whether these are asserted by the
author or merely inferred from our
knowledge of the author’s life and
opinions—are irrelevant to the literary
critic, because the meaning, structure
and value of a text are inherent within
the finished, free standing, and public
work of literature itself.
4. Reference to the author’s supposed
proposes, to the author’s personal
situation and state of mind is held to be
harmful mistake, because it diverts our
attention to such external matters, and
thus may cause the neglecting of the
internal constitution and inherent value of
the literary product.
5. Origin of Intentional Fallacy
As New Criticism develops in 1920s-1930s, the
critics do not consider the reader's response,
author's intention, or historical and cultural
contexts. In 1954 “The intentional fallacy” was
published, it argued strongly against any
discussion of an author's intention, or "
intended meaning." As the words on the page
were all that mattered; importation of meanings
from outside the text was quite irrelevant, and
potentially distracting.
6. Definition of an Intentional Fallacy.
M.H. Abrams : “A Glossary of Literary Terms”.
(page No: 175)
They asserted that an author's intended aims
and meanings in writing a literary work—
whether these are asserted by the author or
merely inferred from our knowledge of the
author's life and opinions—are irrelevant to the
literary critic, because the meaning, structure,
and value of a text are inherent within the
finished, freestanding, and public work of
literature itself.
7. Reference to the author's supposed
purposes, or else to the author's personal
situation and state of mind in writing a
text, is held to be a harmful mistake,
because it diverts our attention to such
"external" matters as the author's
biography, or psychological condition, or
creative process, which we substitute for
the proper critical concern with the
"internal" constitution and inherent value
of the literary product.
8. In C. Hugh Holman’s A Handbook to
Literature, it is similarly said that in
contemporary criticism the term is “used to
describe the error of judging the success and
the meaning of a work of art by the author’s
expressed or ostensible (apparent) intention
in producing it.” But it is also noted therein
that “Wimsatt and Beardsley say, ‘The
author must be admitted as a witness to the
meaning of his work.’ It is merely that they
would subject his testimony to rigorous
scrutiny in the light of the work itself”
9. J. A. Cuddon’s A Dictionary of Literary
Terms, we read: “The error of criticizing
and judging a work of literature by
attempting to assess what the writer’s
intention was and whether or not he has
fulfilled it rather than concentrating on
the work itself”.
10. William Kurtz Wimsatt, Jr. (November
17, 1907 – December 17, 1975) was an
American professor of English, literary
theorist, and critic. Wimsatt is often
associated with the concept of the
intentional fallacy, which he developed
with Monroe Beardsley in order to
discuss the importance of an author's
intentions for the creation of a work of
art.
11. Life and career
Wimsatt was born in Washington D.C.,
attended Georgetown University and,
later, Yale University, where he received
his Ph.D. In 1939, Wimsatt joined the
English department at Yale, where he
taught until his death in 1975. During his
lifetime, Wimsatt became known for his
studies of eighteenth-century literature
(Leitch et al. 1372).
12. He wrote many works of literary theory
and criticism such as The Prose Style of
Samuel Johnson (1941) and Philosophic
Words: A Study of Style and Meaning in
the "Rambler" and "Dictionary" of
Samuel Johnson (1948; Leitch et al.
1372).
13. His major works include The Verbal
Icon: Studies in the Meaning of Poetry
(1954); Hateful Contraries (1965) and
Literary Criticism: A Short History
(1957, with Cleanth Brooks). Wimsatt
was considered crucial to New Criticism
(particularly New Formalist Criticism;
1372).
14. Perhaps Wimsatt’s most influential theories
come from the essays “The Intentional
Fallacy” and “The Affective Fallacy” (both are
published in Verbal Icon) which he wrote with
Monroe Beardsley. Introduced by W.K.
Wimsatt, Jr., and Monroe C. Beardsley in The
Verbal Icon (1954), the approach was a
reaction to the popular belief that to know
what the author intended—what he had in
mind at the time of writing—was to know the
correct interpretation of the work.
15. Why learning Intentional Fallacy
It reminds the readers to read the
“text” with different views, by
reading at content level and as well
with the author’s or narrator’s view.
So the readers will fully understand
the real meaning of the “text.”
16. I
1
The CLAIM of the author's "intention"
upon the critic's Judgment has been
challenged in a number of recent
discussions, notably in the debate entitled
The Personal Heresy, between Professors
Lewis and Tillyard.
17. Behind the critical observation of a literary
work lurks (to wait somewhere secretly,
especially because you are going to do
something bad or illegal) the desire to hang on
to the ‘intention’ of its author, to locate its
discernible (detect, visible, apparent) presence
and drag it to the centre – stage of inquiry.
Prof. Lewis and Tillyard have tried to
debunk (expose, to show that an idea, a
belief, etc, is false: to show that
something is not as good as people think)
this practice, to question its validity, but a
great deal yet remain to be done.
18. W.K. Wimsatt jr. & M.C. Beardsley firs tried
to discuss it in a Dictionary,(Dictionary of
World Literature, ed. Joseph T. Shipley
(New York, 1942), pp. 326-29)but constrains
of scope did not allow a fuller treatment;
however, the present essay takes up the debate
in all its dimensions. The fundamental point
stressed by them in the Dictionary and here in
the essay, is that the author’s intention or
design, ‘the author’s attitude to his work, the
way he felt, what made him write’ and scores
of related questions are not really relevant nor
desirable for judging for judging whether the
work is successful or not.
19. If we divide the critical attitude into two
large categories on this basic, namely the
classical imitation and romantic
experience, we will find that author’s
intention forms the central point around
which discussion is developed. The
primary goal is to arrive at the precise
intention of the author capable of opening
all doors to a proper understanding of his
work.
20. 2
We argued that the design or intention of
the author is neither available nor
desirable as a standard for judge the
success of a work of literary art, and it
seems to us that is a principle which goes
deep into some differences in the of
critical attitudes. It is a principle which
accepted or rejected points to the polar
opposites of classical ‘imitation’ and
romantic expression.
21. It entails (make necessary) many specific
truths about inspiration, authenticity,
biography, literary history and
scholarship, and about some trends of
contemporary poetry, especially its
allusiveness. There is hardly a problem of
literary criticism in which the critic's
approach will not be qualified by his
view of "intention."
22. "Intention," as we shall use the term,
corresponds to what he intended in a
formula which more or less explicitly has
had wide acceptance. "In order to judge
the poet's performance, we must know
what he intended." Intention is design or
plan in the author's mind. Intention has
obvious affinities for the author's attitude
toward his work, the way he felt, what
made him write.
23. "Intention," as we shall use the term,
corresponds to what he intended in a
formula which more or less explicitly has
had wide acceptance. "In order to judge
the poet's performance, we must know
what he intended." Intention is design or
plan in the author's mind. Intention has
obvious affinities for the author's attitude
toward his work, the way he felt, what
made him write.
24. 2
The concepts of “intentional fallacy” and
“affective fallacy” began with W.K.
Wimsatt and Monroe Beardsley's essay
“The Intentional Fallacy” 1946). Literary
criticism at that time was heavily reliant on
author-biography approaches, and Wimsatt
and Beardsley put forward the radical idea
that for literary works arguments about
interpretation are not settled by consulting
the oracle that is the author.
25. The meaning of a work is not what the writer
had in mind at some moment during
composition of the work, or what the writer
thinks the work means after it is finished, but,
rather, what he or she succeeded in embodying
in the work. The “affective fallacy” (from an
essay published three years later in 1949) is
the idea that subjective effects or emotional
reactions a work provokes in readers are
irrelevant to the study of the verbal object
itself, since its objective structure alone
contains the meaning of the work
26. 2
According to a famous argument by W. K.
Wimsatt and Monroe Beardsley, the intention
of the author is neither available nor desirable
as a standard by which to judge the success of
a work of literary art. The author's intention is
not available as a standard by which to judge a
work's success, it is argued, because "If the
poet succeeded in doing it [the intention], then
the poem itself shows what he was trying to
do. And if the poet did not succeed, then the
poem is not adequate evidence, and the critic
must go outside the poem."
27. The intentional fallacy is part of the arguments of
American New Criticism, which holds that the
proper object of literary study is literary texts and
how they work rather than authors' lives or the
social and historical worlds to which literature
refers. The “intentional fallacy” names the act of
delimiting the object of literary study and
separating it from biography or sociology. The
meaning resides in the literary work itself, and not
in statements regarding his or her intention that
the author might make. These statements become
separate texts that may become subject to a
separate analysis
28. The New Critics used the method of
“close reading” to arrive at interpretation
of a text. Close reading is the elucidation
of the way literature embodies or
concretely enacts universal truth. These
truths were called “concrete universals”.
Of course this method has since been
questioned and challenged on many
grounds, particularly the neglect of
context and the belief in universal truth.
29. "Intention," as we shall use the term,
corresponds to what he intended in a
formula which more or less explicitly has
had wide acceptance. "In order to judge
the poet's performance, we must know
what he intended." Intention is design or
plan in the author's mind. Intention has
obvious affinities for the author's attitude
toward his work, the way he felt, what
made him write.
30. Intentional fallacy is a literary term that
asserts that the meaning intended by the
author of a literary work is not the only,
and perhaps not the most important,
meaning of the piece. The term was first
used by W.K. Wimsatt and Monroe
Beardsley in their essay "The Intentional
Fallacy." The notion has become central
to modern literary criticism and is an
important part of what is known as the
New Criticism.
31. When writing an author must call upon
both their understanding of the language
in which they write and their personal
experiences about reality to create a
work. Even the most escapist fantasy
must appeal to some shared
understanding in the reader to be
intelligible at all. A reader must also call
upon their understanding of language and
personal experiences in order to decode
meaning in a work
Editor's Notes
Some critics believe that each text display several meanings, while the other critics believe that each text has one and only one meaning.
Information from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Criticism