RUSSIAN FORMALISM

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=We5gheHWB4s&t=18s

          Russian formalism is the critical practice of strict adherence to prescribed forms as in religion and giving attention to arrangement, style and artistic means, free from its background, period and even the author.  So, to the formalists, the literary study should deal not with the author, the reader or the historical context but with the specific text at hand.  It emerged in Russia and Poland in 1910s.  The Moscow linguistic circle and the society for the study of poetic language (opojaz) reacted against the methods of literary theories of, 19^th and early 20^th century.  Formalists viewed literature as a distinct and separate entity, unconnected to historical or social causes or effects.  They gave greater importance to metaphor and other linguistic devices.  So, they can be said to be the fore runners of structuralists.

          The important formalists are Roman Jacobson, Viktor Shklovsky and Boris Eikhenbaum.  In 1921 Jacobson declared that ‘literariness’ that makes given work, a literary work.  Literature is really ‘foregrounding the utterances’, a feature that distinguishes literature from other human creations, which is made of certain artistic techniques or devices employed in literary works such as metaphor, rhyme and other patterns of sound and repetition.  The sum total of all the stylistic devices employed in it is to be taken into account.  Actually, these devices became the primary object of the formalist analysis.  It is to focus on ‘form’ of literary work and not on the content.  To the formalists the form is device and the content is material.

          Boris Eikhenbaum in his ‘Theory of formal Method’, (1926) surveys formalists’ history and their central theoretical concepts, he emphasizes Viktor Shklovsky’s role as the intellectual leader of the formalist movement and his most influential concept ‘defamiliarization’.  Defamiliarization is one of the important devices of the formalists.  According to Victor Shklovsky (1893-1984) defamiliarization is a typical device of all literature and art that presents a familiar phenomenon in an uncommon fashion for the purpose of renewed and prolonged aesthetic perception.  It is a literary device where ordinary and familiar objects are made to look different.  The Russian formalists believed that how something is said is more important than what is said.  No doubt, this concept has influenced the post modernism and epic theatre later in the 20^th century.  Shklovsky illustrates defamiliarization through Tolstoy’s ‘Kholstomer’, where the story is narrated by a horse at its point of view.  Thus the content of the story becomes unfamiliar.  The purpose of defamiliarization is making the reader question their perception of reality and as a result ultimately redefine it.  It helps them to see the strange aspects in the familiar and the unusual in the ordinary things of life.

          However, in 1920s, due to the Stalinist pressure the Russian Formalists had to accept the notions of literary evolution. Literary change and evolution was explained by them that the modifications of literary tradition, the development of art forms are all related to the aspects of culture, which brought gradual shifts in the laws of literary process.  Thus formalists skillfully examined the notion of literary history and pointed out the mechanics of continuity in the development of literature.  But the Russian Formalists were attacked by Russian Marxists, who saw literature as an integral, not a separate part of social forces.  So, by 1930, the formalist in Russia had been silenced. Though the formalists talked about the aesthetic function of poetic language and had a detailed study of sound and its role in poetry, their emphasis on form at the expense of thematic content was not well received after the Russian Revolution of 1917.  Moreover the Russian Formalism could not survive because of its neglecting the social world with which the human beings who wrote and read literature were brought up. So the Russian  formalism had to get absorbed in other systems of thought and lost its identity as a separate literary movement.

----Thulasidharan V

NEW CRITICISM

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4bu4eQBsQo

The new critics of 1930s insisted on the intrinsic values of a work of art and focused their attention on the individual work alone as an independent unit of meaning. They never considered the biological, sociological, and historical background of the work of art for the interpretation of the work. I.A. Richards (1893-1979) is a staunch advocate of a close textual and verbal study and analysis of a work of art. In order to ascertain the responses of fairly cultured readers, he distributed among his Cambridge students, printed sheets containing twelve poems and invited their comments. The names of the poets and all other information about them were carefully with-held. Having analysed their comments, he also gave his comments, interpretations, and conclusions. They were all included in the third part of his book, ‘The Practical Criticism’. That book became a landmark in the history of literary criticism. Thus, I.A. Richards has made literary criticism factual, scientific, and complete. Actually, these factual and scientific methods of critical analysis influenced a lot of the new critics on both sides of the Atlantic.

A poet wants to communicate and so he writes. The language he uses is the means of that communication. Language is made of words and hence a study of words is all important to understand the work of art. According to I.A. Richards, words carry four kinds of meaning. They are sense, feeling, tone and intention. By sense is meant something that is communicated by the plain literal meaning of the words. ‘Feeling’ refers to emotions, emotional attitude, will, desire, pleasure, unpleasure and the like. By ‘tone’ is meant the writer’s attitude to his reader. Actually, ‘feeling’ is only a state of mind. It won’t imply an object. But ‘intention’ has an object. It is actually, the writer’s aim which may be conscious or unconscious. It refers to the effect the writer wants to produce. Really this purpose modifies the expression. It draws attention to something of importance.

Though I. A. Richards, William Empson and T. S. Eliot had their contributions to this critical approach, it was John Crowe Ransom’s ‘The New Criticism’ gave the name to it. Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren too had their contributions to it. The new critics set out to define and formalize the qualities of poetic thought and language. They utilize the technique of close reading with special emphasis on the connotative and associative values of words. They also focused on the multiple functions of figurative language like symbol, metaphor, and image in the work. They are also of the opinion that the poetic form and content should not be separated, since the experience of reading the particular words of a poem, including its unresolved tensions, is the poem’s ‘meaning’.

Though T.S. Eliot sneered at the ‘verbal analysis’ as ‘lemon squeezing, many new critics including John Crowe Ransom and William Empson used this tool and techniques on an extensive scale. Moreover, William Empson came out with his book ‘Seven Types of Ambiguity’ in 1930, where he identified seven different types of verbal difficulty (ambiguity) in poetry and gave, examples of them with work analysis.

According to Cleanth Brooks, ‘The language of poetry is the language of Paradox’. So, the paradox is also a central concern of many new critics. It is actually used by almost all poets. Though it seems to be self-contradictory, it turns out to have a valid meaning. It is evident that the paradoxical utterance ‘Death’s death’ of John Donne in his ‘Death, be not proud’ has made the poem unique. It happened only when the new critics came out with their new approach. Metaphysical poets were totally neglected earlier. Similarly, irony, ambiguity, tension, affective fallacy and intentional fallacy are all having their inevitable contribution to poetry. They were all excellently identified and interpreted by the new critics between 1930 and 1970, in which period the practical criticism or the new criticism had a dominant role to play both in Britain and America.

--Thulasidharan V

 

 

PLATO’S CONCEPT OF ART AND HIS CRITICISM OF DRAMA AND POETRY (Criticism 2)

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5bQLfCyR0A

      Though Homer (8th century BC) and Aristophanes (5thC BC) had several passages of penetrating critical inquiry here and there in their works, it was only with Plato that criticism became a vital force in the ancient world.  Plato was the first conscious literary critic who has put his ideas in a systematic way in his ‘Dialogues’. Plato is recognised as a master of the dialogue form and as one of the greatest prose stylists of the Greek language. 

Plato was born in 427 BC.  Plato was introduced to Socrates when he was a young boy.  He first started writing poems but destroyed them under the influence of Socrates and developed interest in philosophy and mathematics.  He founded his ‘Academy’ in 387 BC and taught his pupils philosophy, mathematics, natural science, Juris prudence and practical legislations.  He wrote his great books then, The Dialogues, Ion, Symposium and The Republic.  He died in 347 BC.

Though Plato’s views on art and literature are scattered all over his ‘Ion’ and ‘Republic’ they are of at length and forceful.  His views on ‘Poetic Inspiration’, ‘Imitation’ and ‘Condemnation of poetry are also of great historical significance.  Many of his utterances are of a challenging nature and thus he gave a stimulus to literary criticism.  His glowing fancy, his idealism, the subtle irony and humour of his style are beyond praise.

Plato was an idealist.  He believed that the phenomenal world (usual, known through senses) is but an objectification of the ideal world.  The ideal world is real; the phenomenal world is but a shadow of this ideal reality.  So, it is fleeting and unreal.

Plato describes poet as ‘a light and winged and holy thing’ and the poetic inspiration as something that happens in poet ‘by power divine’.  God takes away the minds of poets and uses them as his ministers as he also uses diviners and holy prophets.  So, we who hear the priceless words of the poets, in a state of unconsciousness, hear the words of God.  As the poet speaks divine truth, poetry is not a craft which can be learned and practiced at will.  This is the most elaborate presentation in the ancient world of the notion of poetry that survives even today with modifications.

As Plato was an idealist, he believed that ideas alone are true.  According to him all the earthly things like beauty goodness and justice are mere types of copies of the ideal beauty, goodness and justice which exists in heaven.  He regards “imitation’ as mere mimesis (copy) or representation of these ideal forms and not expression, which is creative.  The reality lies not in individual objects but in general ideas or forms.  A painter only imitates what he sees.  He does not know how to make or to use what he sees.  He can paint a bed but can't make one.  Similarly, the poets imitate reality without necessarily understanding it. 

Plato was a teacher and had his own ‘Academy’.  So, his ideal was to turn out young men of well-formed personalities fit to be the leaders and rulers of an ideal State.  His literary criticism is frankly Utilitarian (more good to more people) that of educating the youth and forming them into good citizens of his ideal State.  It is from this practical point of view that he judges poetry.  So, he had no other way except attacking poets and poetry.  Education was in a sorry state in Athens, then.  The epics of Homer formed an essential part of the school curriculum.  They were venerated by the Greeks almost like the bible.  But in Homer there are many stories which represent the Gods in an unfavourable light.  Allegorical interpretations of these stories were considered unconvincing and difficult to understand.  Moreover, the wonderful flowering time of Greek art and literature was over, and the creative impulse had practically died away.  So, there was a degradation.  As a result, philosophers and orators were regarded as superior to poets and artists.  So, much of his criticism is thus in the nature is governed by the social and political conditions of his age.

Plato’s published writings consist of some, twenty-six dramatic dialogues on philosophical and related themes.  In, almost all the dialogues Socrates is the main and Plato's mouthpiece, but Plato's Socrates is not the historical Socrates. Plato's dialogue does not always present a straightforward argument. The questions of Plato's Socrates towards his interlocutors Adeimantus in book two and Glaucon in book three of 'The Republic', revolve round the role that literature should play in the education meant for the 'Guardians', the future rulers. Thus, it becomes a discussion on the quarrel between philosophy and poetry. Actually, 'Ion' examines poetry as a kind of divine madness.  Whereas in Republic he argues for an ideal, well-regulated community in which the educational curriculum should promote respect for law, reason, authority, self-discipline and piety.  To him literature should teach goodness and grace.

Though Plato’s Socrates loves and regularly cites Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, he calls for the censorship of many passages in these works that represent sacrilegious, sentimental unlawful and irrational behaviour.  Actually, many of the stories of Greek Gods were thought by Xenophanes (570-480BC) the pre-Socratic philosopher, to be possibly lies. So, here Plato's Socrates mentions the story of Uranus who hated his children and kept them packed in their mother Earth's womb. And how the mother Earth made one of her children Cronus Castrate his father and became the Lord of creation and how later his son Zeus, with the help of his mother over-threw Cronus and established himself as the king of all Gods.  Plato’s Socrates also says that similarly the story of horrific kidnap of Helen by Theseus and Pirithous, who were respectively the sons of Poseidon and Zeus is unbelievable and intolerable.  Such stories fail to teach goodness and grace.  He also insists that the Gods are not shape shifting wizards and do not mislead the people by lying in what they say or do, as they are presented in many of the stories.

According to Plato as the epic, lyric or tragedy, the literature that he has mentioned through Socrates are fictional and made up, they are dangerous.  Since they are too inferior to be accepted as a Mimesis, a copy of a copy, he insists everyone should be aware of what in literature should be allowed and what should be censored.  According to him good literature, cultural studies should lead the younger generation to become ideal men and women.  It must represent a world in which virtue is rewarded and even the punishment of evil serves virtuous ends. 

Plato condemns poetry in Republic X (book 10), that they feed and water the passions instead of drying them up and let them rule instead of ruling them.  The poets with their emotional frenzies and lack of moral restraint can afford no safe moral and intellectual guidance.  Thus, Plato attacks poetry on intellectual, emotional, utilitarian and moral grounds and demonstrates its uselessness and its corrupting influences.  He also condemns the ridiculous mixture of tragic and comic effects that were a feature of contemporary drama.  He emphasises for the first time that organic unity is essential for success in all arts. 

He ends his charges against poetry by saying that in an ideal state, “no poetry should be admitted, save hymns to the Gods and panegyrics on famous men”.  According to him the poets are to be honoured but they are to be banished from his ideal state.

 

----Thulasidharan V