Formalism-New-Criticism-Approach.pptx

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1. Formalism New Criticism Approach

2. Formalism “Formalism” is, as the name implies, an interpretive approach that emphasizes literary form and the study of literary devices within the text. The name “formalism” was chosen by opponents of the literary movement who considered the approach controversially structured and formal.

3. “Formalism,” like “structuralism,” sought to place the study of literature on a scientific basis through objective analysis of the motifs, devices, techniques, and other “functions” that comprise the literary work. Neither author nor context was essential for the formalists; it was the narrative that spoke, the “hero-function,”

4. Definition of New Criticism N ew Criticism emphasizes explication, or "close reading " of "the work itself" . It rejects old historicism 's attention to biographical and sociological matters. Instead, 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. New Criticism, incorporating Formalism, examines the relationships between a text's ideas and its form, between what a text says and the way it says it. New Critics "may find tension, irony, or paradox in this relation, but they usually resolve it into unity and coherence of meaning"

5. Leading Critics (Formalism ) Formalist theory emerged from the meetings, discussions, and publications of the Opojaz (The Society for the Study of Poetic Language) and the Moscow Linguistic Circle. They were dissatisfied with the ways of studying literature in the academe. Opojaz was based on St. Petersburg, dates back to 1914, and dissolved in 1923. Its nucleus was formed by Sklovsky, Eikhenbaum, Brik, Tynyanov.

6. Roman Jakobson Leading Critics (Formalism) Roman Jakobson was a bridge between Russian formalism and structuralism. He was a founder member of the Moscow Linguistic Circle and his all writings reveal the centrality of linguistic theory in his thought and especially the influence of Saussure. He was also an enthusiastic supporter of experimental poets. Apart from his linguistic research, Jakobson gained respect for his very precise linguistic analyses of classic works of literature. Jakobson attempted the daunting task of trying to define “literariness” in linguistic term.

7. Leading Critic (New Criticism) Ivor Armstrong Richards was an influential literary critic and rhetorician who is often cited as the founder of an Anglophone school of Formalist criticism that would eventually become known as the New Criticism. Richards’ books, especially The Meaning of Meaning, Principles of Literary Criticism, Practical Criticism, and The Philosophy of Rhetoric, were seminal documents not only for the development of New Criticism, but also for the fields of semiotics, the philosophy of language, and linguistics. Moreover, Richards was an accomplished teacher, and most of the eminent New Critics were Richards’ students at one time or another.

8. Formalism New Criticism Formalism is a literary theory that was spearheaded by two main bodies – Russian Formalists and New Critics – which focused on understanding the literary text through the text itself. Its principles posed a great shift from the traditional approaches during its time, and so it sparked a movement in the field of literary studies that would adopt new perspectives and ideas. While Formalism received much criticism due to its dubious methods of the closed reading of a text, its lack of a solid theory of language, and so on, it was also able to establish the notion of literary study being a partly scientific, objective process, and its framework would serve as a starting point and a great influence for future ideas and theorists to come.

9. New Criticism aims to classify, categorize, and catalog works according to their formal attributes. Along the way, New Criticism wants to pull out and discuss any universal truths that literary works might hold concerning the human condition. These truths are considered by New Critics to be static, enduring, and applicable to all humanity Formalists value poetry rich in ambiguity, irony, and intention, and want to make literary criticism a science. This last projection introduces the concept of expert readers into interpretive theory. Current theorists tend to criticize Formalism for this and other symptoms of narrow-mindedness.

10. How does the work use imagery to develop its own symbols? (i.e. making a certain road stand for death by constant association) What is the quality of the work's organic unity "...the working together of all the parts to make an inseparable whole..." (Tyson 121)? In other words, does how the work is put together reflect what it is? How are the various parts of the work interconnected? How do paradox, irony, ambiguity, and tension work in the text ?

11. How do these parts and their collective whole contribute to or not contribute to the aesthetic quality of the work? How does the author resolve apparent contradictions within the work? What does the form of the work say about its content? Is there a central or focal passage that can be said to sum up the entirety of the work? How do the rhythms and/or rhyme schemes of a poem contribute to the meaning or effect of the piece?

12. How is the work structured or organized? How does it begin? Where does it go next? How does it end? What is the work’s plot? How is its plot related to its structure? What is the relationship of each part of the work to the work as a whole? How are the parts related to one another ?

13. Who is narrating or telling what happens in the work? How is the narrator, speaker, or character revealed to the readers? How do we come to know and understand this figure? Who are the major and minor characters, what do they represent, and how do they relate to one another? What are the time and place of the work- its setting? How is the setting related to what we know of the characters and their actions?

14. What kind of language does the author use to describe, narrate, explain, or otherwise create the world of the literary work? More specifically, what images, similes, metaphors, symbols appear in the work? What is their function? What meanings do they convey? ( For poetry) How does the work use imagery to develop its own symbols? (i.e. making a certain road stand for death by constant association) What is the quality of the work's organic unity "...the working together of all the parts to make an inseparable whole..." (Tyson 121)? In other words, does how the work is put together reflect what it is?

15. How are the various parts of the work interconnected? How do paradox, irony, ambiguity, and tension work in the text? How do these parts and their collective whole contribute to or not contribute to the aesthetic quality of the work? How does the author resolve apparent contradictions within the work? What does the form of the work say about its content? Is there a central or focal passage that can be said to sum up the entirety of the work? How do the rhythms and/or rhyme schemes of a poem contribute to the meaning or effect of the piece?