Michael Sharp wrote:
Not to quibble academic terms too much, but New Critics
actually are infamous for (according to their critics)
ignoring moral issues, of thinking of the text as a world
unto itself, an artifact insulated from the issues of the
broader culture (incl the author) that produced it. I don't
think of New Critics as, paradigmatically, focusing on
literature's moral questions -- more on its structure and
composition.
************* Charles Bressler in Literary Criticism:
"New Criticism begins by assuming the the study of
imaginative literature is valuable; to study poetry or any
literary works is to engage in an aesthetic experience (the
effects produced on an individual when contemplating a work
of art) that can lead to truth."
Nothing about morals in that, I guess. Just truth. Let's try
this one, a quote from Eagleton's Literary Theory, concerning
the Leavis' Scrutiny, considered one of the first texts of
the New Criticism:
"Scrutiny was the title of the critical journal launched in
1932 by the Leavises, which has yet to be surpassed in its
tenacious devotion to the moral centrality of English
studies, their crucial relevance to the quality of social
life as a whole."
We're probably just having troubles with terminology. Your
description of the New Critics comes closer to what I think
of as the Formalists. Six of one, half dozen of the
other...
miker
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