Doing Things With Texts - essays in criticism and critical theory [first part]

72 Pages·012.758 MB·English

by  M. H. Abrams

- , , ABRAM
.
;
M. H. ABRAMS
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,
; This volume brings together for the first time ini1ucntiI essays and icviews
by one ofour most iniportant literary critics. Spanning three dccade, ih
y rciit
essays concern themselves with the most central devcIoj)WCnts ill
"N'reudin'
criticism, from the New Criticism to the mucli-debaied and
AND
'Ncw Historicism." ESSAYS iN CRITICISM
: 1\vo other essays discuss the eniergeuce of' th rciiiaikab}y iffiluciu ial .._'1 CIUTICAL THEORY
- modern 'iew that a work in thefine arts is an autonomous object. und
- another offers an extraordinary overview of the history o] ci iiisni Iroiri
k
Plato and Aristotle to Jacques l)errida and luul d 1an.
"One of the most respected liierary scholars alive, . . . Àl)rams stands for
understanding and conciliation, calling lbr a kind of huuiankni that can : ALit1 L,
-1sIiti'um
enbiace the good in all 1terai'y thcoi ics." ¡s1 ' ï
. -
iiN
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"Vtluable not only for its lucid explanations but a a history of recent
.' : debutcs aniong critical circles." --Líbrtirvfuu,nul : '
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.
-. M. 1-I. Abrams is Class of 1916 Profissor of Enlisli Lineritus Crnc1l ;, '
University, and the author of The !Íirror und i/u' L,anip, Aorural Super- 4ti jiJ
naiuralisìn, and Th' Correspwz1ent BrLez&'. J le ¡s the gencial editor of the
I distinguished Notion Ant/wiogy ()fElzglis/i Li!traure and recipknt of the . - ' I
1984 Award in Humanistic Studies from the American Academy of Arts 1&ij
; and Sciences. Michael Fischer is I)rofessor of Enli1i áh veisit' of
oSI!
NewMexico.
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ISBN O-393-3074 7-6
1 e
780393 307474 iii9
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Contents
FOREWORD
V"
/
I. Types and Uses of Critkal Theories
First published as a Norton paperback igi Types and Orientations of Critical Theories
CAPrloli nprtyiegrdihg thisn t rteChse e1 rU9v8en9dit .eb dy MSt.a tHes. oAfb Arammesr iacand. Michael Fischer BWAe Nhliaeotft' sea tnohdne tWUhesi teSt gouefsn pTsehtneeisonio rainzn iodn fgL D aitibesobraeurltyi et hfC er iAticritssm? 78383i
GTItahroleiuc t.pe .Cx to omfp thoissi tiboono ka nisd c ommapnousfeadc tiunr iBngas kbeyt -vTihllee, wMiathp ldei-sVpalaily Btyopoek sMet ainn uDfeaecptudreinnge II. Cultural !-hstoiy and the Histoty of Criticism
Rationality and Imagination in Cultural
History i
Art-as-Such: The Sociology of Modern
Library of Congress Aesthetics
Cataloging-in-publication Data
eAdbDirteaodmin sga, n tdMh in.w gHitsh. w (aMi tfheo yrteeerxw tsoH rodwe sbasyard yMs). i icn1h 9car1eit2li c-Fi simsc ahncdr .c-irsittic aeld .t heory. / by M. H. Abrams; aFnrodm th Ae dEdxiesomnp ltaor yK Aanrtt: Modern Aesthetics ii g35
p. cm.
i. Criticism, a. Literature-History and
criticism-Theory, etc.
PBNo8i'5.9.A5a-7d citgg 8g III. The New and Newer Criticism
ISBN
O-395-30747-6 Five Types of
Lycidas
WW.. WW.. NNoorrttoonn && CCoommppaannyy. LItndc. .. too Coo Fpitficth S Atrveeent.u eL,o nNdeown Y WorCk.i AN .Y¡P. Us os so Postscript to "Five Types ofLycidas" 2i 9112
234567890
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vi Contents
Positivism and the Newer Criticism
2 i 7
pøpa
1 Northrop Frye's Anatomy ofCriicisrn 223
_.4 Iv. Doing Thing.c with Texts: Theories of Newreadiug
Foreword
::
The Deconstructive Angel 237
I_J Behaviorism and Deconstruction 253
_J
How to Do Things with Texts 269
::: Construing and Deconstructing 97
A Colloquy on Recent Critical Theories 333 In contemporary literary study, many prominent critical the-
._.
_. On Political Readings ofLyrical Ballads 364 orists have also been students of Romantic poetry. I have in
_. mind not only Northrop Frye, who claimed to find the keys
to poetic thought in Blake, but also E. D. Hirsch, Hazard
_l. Adams, Harold Bloom, Geoffrey Hartman, Paul de Man, and
NOTES 393 M. H. Abrams (among others). üsting Abrams here may come
uu'
INDEX 42 1 as a surprise. He has not written a book specifically on his
I_l. theory ofcriticism, and he says very little about his own method
b
and theoretical assumptions in his best-known works, The
_.4
-.4 MBuirtr ohre a nhdas theex Lparmesps e(d i 9h5i3s) vainewd Noaf ltuhreaol rSyu pienr nntauumraelirsoinu s( ii 9n7fl1u)-.
-.4 ential articles and reviews, collected here for the first time.
-4 Spanning three decades, these essays touch on many of the
-4 most important developments in contemporary criticism,
-4 including the New Criticism of Cleanth Brooks, John Crowe
-4 Ransom, and W. K. Wimsatt; the "Newer Criticism" of
Northrop Frye and Philip Wheelwright; the "Newreading"
I--t4 championed by J. Hillis Miller, Harold Bloom, Stanley Fish,
and Jacques Den-ida; and the New Historicism practiced by
-4
Jerome J. McGann and Marjorie Levinson. In addition, one
-4 essay ("Types and Orientations of Critical Theories") offers
-4 an extraordinary overview of the history of criticism from
_., Plato and Aristotle to Derrida and Paul de Man. Two essays
... ("Art-as-Such: The Sociology of Modern Aesthetics" and
f "From Addison to Kant: Modern Aesthetics and the Exem-
I
-; plary Art") discuss in detail the emergence-as well as the
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F
t
and Orientations
Types
Critical Theories
of
rj HE IS NO uniquely valid way to classify theories
of poetry; that classification is best which best serves the pur-
pose in hand. The division of theories presented here is
adopted because it is relatively simple; because it stresses the
notable extent to which later approaches to poetry were
expansions-although under the influence of many new
philosophical concepts and poetic examples-of Greek and
Roman prototypes; and because it defines in a
provisional
way certain large-scale shifts of focus during 2,500 years of
Western speculation about the identity of poetry, its kinds
and relative status, the parts, qualities, and ordonnance
of a single poem, and the kinds of criteria by which poems
are to be evaluated. But like all general schemes, this one
must be supplemented and qualified in many ways before it
can do justice to the diversity of individual ways of treating
poetry.
Most theories take into account that poetry is a fabricated
thing, not found in nature, and therefore contingent on a
number of factors. A poem is produced by a poet, is related in
its subject matter to the universe of human beings, things, and
events, and is addressed to, or made available to, an audience
of hearers or readers. But although these four elements play
some part in all inclusive accounts of poetry, they do not play
an equal part. Commonly a critic takes one of these elements
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Doing Things with Texts
or relations as cardinal, and refers the poem to the external Types and Orientations of CTi&OJ Theories
w"thoerl ds,o ourrc eto, tahned a eunddie, nacned, otre stto othf ea rpt"o;e to ars apltreerpnoatnidveelrya,n thlye atattteri banudte st ot hteak oer ipgliena soufr ep oine trimy ittoa toiounrs ,n aantudr aglr ionusntidnsc ti nto l aimrgie-
considers the poem as a self-sufficient entity, best to be ana- part on the kinds of subjects that are imitated such essential
lyzed in theoretical isolation from the causal factors in the concepts as the different species of poetry, the unity of a poem
tuanstievse,r sceo nfvroicmti ownsh, icahn dt hree sppooenmse sd eorfi vthees aitus dmieantceeri atols ,w ohric hth iet w(shinoclee ")a,n ainmdi ttahteio pnr i"mmaucsyt oref pprleoste innt torangee dacyt i(ofno,r a" tcraogmepdlye ties
appeals, or the character, intentions, thoughts, and feelings essentially an imitation not of persons but of action and life").
of the poet who brings it into being. These varied orienta- But Aristotle's use of the term imitation sharply differentiates
tions give us, in a preliminary way, four broad types of poetic his theory of poetry from that of Plato. In Aristotle's scheme,
theory, which may be labeled mimetic, pragmatic, expres- the forms of things do not exist in an otherworldly realm,
sive, and objective. but are inherent in the things themselves, so that it is in no
way 4rogatory to point out that poetry imitates models in
the world of sense. On the contrary, poetry is more
sophic than history, because it imitates the form of philo-
MIMETIC THEORIES and so achieves statements in the mode of "universals, whtheirnegass
those of history are singulars." Furthermore imitation in Ans-
In Plato's Republic io, Socrates said that poetry is mimesis, or totle is a term specific to the arts, distinguishing poems from
ma"pimiprreiotaarrt aionthnc,ae"t ,ao nft dua lrlni lesluedns tsrriaobtuleend dt hi tisna gnrsed.l aPtrioloaunton tdtoh, utchsae nb uenqpiurvoeedartushece edb yat ona eathxllep iolro thioteiwnrn ga ccstyirvistiteteirmeisaa taoicnfad lv lypa rluosedu ucahcn tdsd iasrstei anasc octinloa nsfsso ora fsb oebtihnjeegc .t ksA inhndadsv inboygf
later theorists a preoccupation with the relation of poetry to objects imitated, the media and manner of imitation, and the
that which it imitates, and also the persistent analogy of the variety of emotional effects on an audience, Aristotle imple-
rceofslmecicto rs tarsu cdteufrien inugn dtehrel yninatgu rPe laotfo 'sth adti arleelcattiico, nt. hBe ust einns itbhlee fmoer ndtsi shtiisn cgounissihdienrga tiaomn oonfg p otehtery paso eptoice trkyi bnyd psr-ofvoird ienxga mmepalnes,
universe is itself an imitation, or appearance, of the eternal tragedy, comedy, epic-and for discriminating the particular
Ideas which are the locus of all value, while all other human parts, internal r.elations, power of giving a specific kind of
knowledge and products are also modes of imitation. A poem pleasure, and standards of evaluation proper to each type of
therefore turns out to be the rival of the work of the artisan, poem.
the statesman, the moralist, and the philosopher, but under Later the eclectic Cicero (Ad M. Bruum Orator and Plo-
the inescapable disadvantage of being an imitation of an imi- tinus (Enneads 5.8) demonstrated that it was possible2 )t o assume
tation, "thrice removed from the truth," and composed not a world-scheme that includes Platonic Ideas, yet to allow th.
by art and knowledge but by inspiration, at a time when the artist to short-circuit the objects of sense so as to imitate, in
poet is not in his right mind (Ion). Plato thus forced many Plotinus's phrase, "the Ideas from which Nature itself derives."
e later critical theorists into a posture of defense, in a context In accordance with this strategy, later critics used building
e ebinne atweurthpyir,c ihas enpsdo, eagtnorodyd inns eetocsse b.s seajruidlyg ecdom bpy eutensiv weristha l aclrl itoetrhiae ro hf utrmutahn, bcesolotu calkdms rofarniosgme h puPomleattaorny's cefonrosdmmeao vsP oltaorts oc.' osTn ihsnterfu eccrliato iamre s pttohhseaittti icpo noth eettoor yrtih eiesm whithiagitchehs-
In Aristotle's Poetics the various kinds of poetry are also the eternal Forms was developed by Italian Neoplatonists in
defined as "modes of imitation" of human actions. Aristotle the sixteenth century, occasionally echoed by neoclassic cnt-
e ics (including, in England, Dennis, Hurd, and Reynolds) and
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6 Doing Things wUh Texts Types and Orientations of Critica! Theories
ppcllhaaiiylmoessd o afp ohprer orpsmo seiutncreyhn ata ssp Saacrpht peinrlol itxnhigem awanrtdiint iNgnog vvs aeolrifist G.i eDes rimvbeearynsoe n Rcdoo gmsneaintnistveiec- tidtae tsdieoutn c,ot"iu vtie 7 tto5h ise )uo. brAisentsidt uo Ltfe eB saasnit nteignu'sdx u caclantsidvs ieco tLmhaeeortkh ocooodnn (tf eoi m7r 6pt6ho)er, aabrliltaehtsoa, nustgtliyhll
experience are also found in the English Romantic critics discovered the "essence" of poetry and painting to be imita-
BopfrlPoakomeei,f sryiCn, ogdl eeNrmideoognpes,l atartanotdne iscC tathhrleey otrere.yd .Su hScetiinlvlceeey ,ta eilnnl dgheoinso cdeyl opoqofue aemnns t u Dinmecfioetanmtcee- tciooSmni,n pcaeent edtnh tde eteori igvimhetdiet eatnthete hf rbcooemunn tutdhrsye odthfi fetfh emer eismnucbeetjiesc c itdnso ttchhteraiitnr eem ahceahds i aabr.e te ins
the same Forms, and since these Forms, as the residence of more narrowly employed by proponents of artistic realism,
all values, are the models for all other human activities and or in theories limited to the mope realistic literary genres. In
products as well, Shelley's essay all but annuls any essential the Renaissance there had been many echoes of the saying
differences between poem and poem, between poetic kind Donatus had attributed to Cicero that dramatic comedy is
aitnhn edv approoieoetturiscy pkolifan cadel,ls ,bo eathtnweder ebmne tepwno eewemnhs o p wo"ereixmttpesrn ew sisrn i ttvhteaisnr i oiinnu dsw etsiomtrrduescs taaibnnldde pthreaucdtu hsl.i"ua prIleynr s"tehad ece odepa yrcl oyom fn eliidnfyee, t eaase mnthtihre r ocprer niomtfu arcryuy,s twvoemhhe,in ca l epr eroofflse ecr etfiaioclintsi moon,f
order," including institutors of laws, founders of civil society, Stendhal put the mimetic mirror on wheels: "a novel," he
inventors of the arts of life, and teachers of religion. In our said, "is a mirror riding along a highway." Since that time
ofowunn dd aaym ao nfgo rtmhea lc rpitaicras lwlehl ot,o asfutecrhj ucnrigti,c aml aminotaniinsm th aist tgor ebaet rneepnrtes soenf tnaatitounraalli stthice ofricietiso nh aavned biemeang visot icpeode tmrya,i nalsy wbeyl l eaxsp boy-
pthoee mcos,l lelickteiv em uynthcso, ndsrceiaomuss,- ovri seiolsnes , oaf ntdh eo gtheenre rpicro idmuacgtsi noa-f Mleaasrtx oisut gchrtit itcos rwefhloec ct)la tihme t"hoabtj egcrteivaet "l irteearalittuyr eo f" roeuflre bctosu" r(goero aist
trieopnr ocdoumcpee lal eldim biyte de nsdeut roinf ga rhcuhmetaynp anl epeadrsa daingdm sd,e sainrde su-latil-l eraT. he mimetic approach to literature, accordingly, has been
mcyactleel yo tfh eth we hsoelaes oorn sp aarnt do f othf adt eaartchh eatynpde roefb airrcthh.e ty(Speees,, tfhoer uresfeidn etdo ijduesatliifsym atrot isthtiec rpawroecset drueareliss mra. nWgihnagt tfhreo mva rtihoeu s mthoes-t
eFxryaem bpelelo, wth oen repvaigeewss 2 o1f7 -P3h3i.l)i p Wheelwright and Northrop oorfl ethse h gaivvee ni nu cnoivmemrsoe na si st hteh ec ltueen dtoe nthcey ntoa tuloroek o tfo ptoheet rnya, taunrde
Among mimetic theorists proper, however, the concept that to assign to the subject matter that is represented-or that
art reproduces aspects of the sensible world has been much ought to he represented-the primary role in determining
more common than the Neoplatonic or transcendental var- the aims, kinds, constitution, and criteria of poems. The key
¡ant. The doctrine that poetry and the arts are essentially imi- word in mimetic definitions of poetry, if not imiiasion, is another
tations of this world, in a variety of systematic applications, predicate that aligns the poem in the same direction: the poem
flourished through the Renaissance and well into the eight- is an image, reflection, feigning, counierfeiting, co/rj, or represen-
eenth century. In Les Beaux Arts réduits à un même principe talion. The underlying parallel for a poem, which often comes
(th1e7 4"7c),l eCarh aarnleds dBisattitnecutx idfoeau"n df rionm t hwe hpicrihn chipel eu nodf eirmtoitoakti otno t"oa tshpee askuirnfagc pe iacstu arne ,"e xoprr eas sp hcoomtopgarraipsohnic, ipsl aPtlea.t oT'sh em ifrorcours, oorf
deduce the nature and the rules of the various arts. The attention is thus on the relation between the imitable and the
Ewnitghl iAshrmisatond Re iacnhdar dth He uGrrde dekec clarirteicds th(iaft f"oarll spoo eptlrayin, toa sppoeiankt inmaittuarteio,"n o, ra "ntdr utthhe t op rreimaliatryy." aIens tphuerteicly crreipterreisoenn tiast i"otnrault hth eto-
authorities bç thought wanting) is, properly, imilation ... orles, the patent discrepancies between the world as it is and
having all creation for its object" ("Discourse on Poetical Imi- the world as it is represented in poems tend to be explained
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Doing Things wilh Texts Types and OTienIdtiønF of Critical Theories g
noarort t,t obb ytuh tre eb fcyeo rnreevnfecenerte itnoocn tesh aeto np dtsh yienc htkeoirlnnodagsly rooerfq tauhsiepre epmcotsee nto tofs r or etfha ale i twryeo atrodk e boref, wAbeoreirsnldt o.t thlFeeo hrma tsho esbt e peirnnaf glmumeoanrtetii cao lof trceirneint iqtcauatloi oteenxd, e, embxupptll oaHrit oiinrnag c ttehh ehe aWms oeinds tefe arocnft
irmesietanttesd t.h Te rpaonesct'es nidnetunittaiol nths eoofr imstso dmealsi netxaiisnt inthga ti np otheetriyr orewpn- rHeoarsaocnei'nsg s hanodrt mepainsytl eo, fd tohme cinoantceedp tlsit earnadr yt ocpriictisc ipsrmes ethnrtoeudg ihn
sreupprreasmenutnsd, aonre s hspoaucled. Trehpisre-wseonrltd, lay ctohmeoproisstist ec loafim th eth baet apuoteifturyl tmhea dRe efnraeiqsusaenncte r eaanpdp meaorsatn ocfe sth eev eeri gshintecee.n th century and has
atinstdic aml oarvaelr aagspee octfs a obfi othloinggicsa, l ofro r"mla, boerl lteh en autnuirvee,"rs oalr, tthyep isctaal-, de"cAlamre dp-r"oPdoeestsse wvioslhu net,i thaeurt tod eliencsttarurec t poore tatoe ,"p lHeaosreac"e-
and generically human, or the quotidian, the particular, the although pleasure turns out to be the ultimate end, with
unique, and "the characteristic," or the conditions of bour- instruction requisite only because the graver readers will not
geols reality. In all these instances, however opposed, the be pleased without moral mauer. Later critics added from
ostbitjuectitosn o orf qthuea luitnieivse arsree, caonndc tehiev egde ntoiu sb eo fi tnhhee preonett iisn e xthpel acinoend- hrheaedtoitriigcs ao ft hinirsdtr utecrtimon, , meomveortei,o nto, asnudm p luepas uurned tehre tehfefe cthtsr eoef
primarily by his acuity of observation, enabling him to dis- poetry on its audience. Most Renaissance humanists, like Sid-
cover aspects of reality hitherto unregarded, and by his anis- ney, made moral profit the ultimate aim of poetry; but from
tic ingenuity, enabling him to select and arrange even the Dryden through the eighteenth century it became increas-
more familiar elements into novel combinations which, ingly common to subordinate instruction and emotion to the
nevertheless, surprise us by their truth. delight of the reader, as the defining end of a poetic corn-
position. Samuel Johnson, however, continued to insist that
"the end of poetry is to instruct by pleasing," and that "it is
PRAGMATIC THEORIES always a writer's duty to make the world better" (Preface to
Shakespeare). In the nineteenth century the influential reviewer
Tshhipe, prraeggmaradtiincg s cthheem em saetttse ra paonedm mina na nmere anosf- einmdi traetiloanti onas- Ftinor apthnliecsai ssp eJr eotfhcferee dlyue ardseet lchiobeme hrmaatseo lbnye jdeunesn tfiofomilelodinw waetrdoi rti nogf l painute bsrlu icc ht aas twe,a ayn oadsf
i"nPsotersuym tehnetraelf otorew,"a rdde calcahrieedv iSnigr cPehritlaipin S eidffneecyt si ni na tthyep icreala dfoerr-. tfiostrsm, uhloawe efvoerr ,a jcuhsiteivfiiendg tphoep suolaprh issutciccaetsesd. b Nyp eroecfelarsespnicec depsdr laoegrfms t hae-
mteviniodudnel,,ad t"t iotiosh n eta e nwac cohahnir ctc haeo npafdt sui smaidmlei tlifaliragtaithometns.e " m. aA. inm.n dace ismseipsna etn taoyrk h iaoen ftgpo trrphaiicegca mttlue arrtethmi:ec so w orfiryotih re pnttrthhoaii--ss ctlitohlianeasstgs itocshfaue lrslmvyei avtanraca lci ionpnrre dodgev edceno ewtnrhniaetlohi r i(s tJahsodeehua lnrpisstte oaortnafi'o rstynh " eqctiuoro a motlhiwmtein eoa sdne oa sftyrh e webatyodi rcetk rhps"e r)w o,c chlaaloinivsmde-
atop perfofaeccht tpoe rpsoueatsriyo,n f,o ra nitd w aths ehreel dw tahsa tw thidee a iamg roefe mrheentot ri(cfo isr tthhea t bweostr kcs hwanrcitete nto ine nadcucorerd. aTnhcee wrietnho twhenseed pmrinasctieprlse,s Jhoahvne
ebyx aimnfpolrem Cinicge,r ow, inDnei nOgr,o Jaonred 2m.2o8v) inthga tt hteh iasu ednitdo ri.s bBeustt tahceh igerveeadt Dwerontnei st os atihde, iwr rfoeltleo wno-ct ittoiz epnlesa osef tohnel yu nthiveeirr sceo,u tno uayllm ceonu;n "trthieesy,
prototype for the pragmatic view of poetry was Horace's Ars and to all ages."
PoeEi.ca, with its persistent emphasis that the aim of the poet, We recognize pragmatic critics of poetry, whatever their
aonf dth teh ec omnteeamsupróer aorfy p oReotimc asunc caeusdsi,e ins cteh ea npdle oasfu proes atenrdit ya papsr owvealll. mmaandye dobivjeecrgt,e tnhcee sp, robdy utchte oirf taenn daertn coyr ctora rfet,g warhdic ah p(aofetemr adsu ea
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'Fi,
io Doing Things with Texts Typed and Orientations of CntiCOJ Thories i i
allowance for the play of natural talent, inspired moments, pragmatic critics responded by shifting the emphasis from
and felicities beyond the . reach of art) is still, for the most the nature of the world to the nature of man, and by redefin-
part, deliberately designed to achieve foreknown ends; we ing poetic probability as anything that succeeds in evoking
recognize them also by their tendency to derive the rationale, the pleasurable responsiveness of the reader. "The end of
the chief determinants of elements and forms, and the norms poetry is to please," Beanie wrote in his Essays on Poetiy and
of poetry from the legitimate requirements and springs of Music (i 776), and "greater pleasure is . . . to be expected from
pleasure in the readers for whom it is written. Thus the ars it, because we grant it superior indulgence, in regard to fic-
poetica looms large in this theory, and for centuries was often tion," than if it were "according to real nature." Later Thomas
codified as a system of prescriptions and "rules." "Having Twining justified for poetry "not only impossibilities, but even
thus shown that imitation pleases," as Dryden summarized absurdities, where that end [of yielding pleasure] appears to
the common line of reasoning, "it follows, that some rules of be better answered with them, than it would have been with-
imitation are necessary to obtain the end; for without rules out them" (Preface to Aristotle's Treatise on Poetry, i 789).
there can be no art" (Parallel of Poetrj and Painting). These
rules were justified inductively as essential properties
abstracted from works that have appealed to the natural
EXPRESSIVE THEORIES
preferences of mankind over the centuries; in the eighteenth
century, especially in such systematic theorists as Beauie, Hurd,
and Kames, they were also warranted by a confident appeal The mimetic poet is the agent who holds the mirror up to
to the generic psychological laws governing the responses of nature; the pragmatic poet is considered mainly in terms of
the reader. Through the neodassic period, most critics the inherent powers ("nature") and acquired knowledge and
assumed that the rules were specific for each of the fixed skills ("art") he must possess to construct a poetic object intri-
genres, or kinds, but these poetic kinds in turn were usually cately adapted, in its parts and as a whole, to its complex
discriminated and ranked, from epic and tragedy at the top aims. In the expressive orientation, the poet moves into the
down to the "lesser lyric" and other trifles at the bottom, by center of the scheme and himself becomes the prime gener-
the special moral and pleasurable effects each kind is most ator of the subject matter, attributes, and values of a poem.
competent to achieve. Poetic deviations from the truth of fact, The chief historical source for this point of view was the trea-
which in strictly mimetic theories are justified by their con- tise On the Sublime attributed to Longinus. In this treatise the
formity to objects, forms, and tendencies in the constitution stylistic quality of sublimity is defined by its effect of eksasis,
of the universe, are warranted pragmatically by the reader's or transport, and is traced to five sources in the powers of
moral requirements, and even more emphatically by his native the author. Of these sources, three have to do with expres-
inclination to take delight only in a selected, patterned, sion, and are amenable to art; but the two primary sources
heightened, and "ornamented" reality. are largely innate and instinctive, and are constituted by the
In 65 I Davenant (Preface lo Gondibert) attacked the tradi- author's greatness of conception and, most important of all,
tional use of pagan machinery and supernatural materials on by his "vehement and inspired passion." Referring the major
the mimetic assumption that the poet undertakes to "repre- excellence of a work to its genesis in the author's mind, Lon-
sent the world's true image"; a point of view Hobbes at once ginus finds it a reflection of its author: "Sublimity is the echo
abetted by proscribing all poetic materials that go "beyond of a great soul." g,o i.. -'
the conceived possibility of nature" (Answer to Davenant). To The influence of Longinus's essay, after it became
this mimetic interpretation of poetic probability as corre- ally known in the third quarter of the seventeenth c4ntir1, '
.
spondence t the empirical constitution and order of events, was immense, and its emphasis on thought and passiot, ot-
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a z Doing Things with Texts Types and Oii'n1o2ïon.i ofCritieal Theorie.c
inally used to explain a single stylistic quality, was expanded century of developments in this mode of thinking, and became
and applied to poetry as a whole. The effect on poetic theory the single most important pronouncement of the emotive
was supplemented by primitivistic concepts of the natural theory of poetry. His key formulation, twice uttered, is that
origins of language and poetry in emotional exclamations and poetry "is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings."
effusions, as well as by the rise to high estate of "the greater The metaphor "overflow," like the equivalent terms in the
lyric," or Pindaric ode, which critics (following the lead of definitions of Wordsworth's contemporaries-'expression,"
Cowley) treated in Longinian terms. By 1725 the boldly spec- "uttering forth," "projection"-faces in an opposite direction
ulative Giambattista Vico combined Longinian doctrines, the from "imitation," and indicates that the source of the poem
Lucretian theory of linguistic origins. and travelers' reports is no longer the external world, but the poet himself; and
about the poetry of culturally primitive peoples into his major the elements which, externalized, become the subject matter
thesis that the first language after the flood was dominated of the poem are, expressly, the poet's "feelings." The word
by sense, passion. and imagination, and was therefore at once overflow also exemplifies the water-language in which feelings
emotional, concrete, mythical, and poetic. In Vico is to be are usually discussed, and suggests that the dynamics of the
found the root concept of the common expressive origins poetic process consists in the pressure of fluid feelings; later
and nature of poetry. myth, and religion which was later J oho Keble converted the water to steam, and described the
exploited by such influential theorists as Herder, Croce, and poetic process as a release, a "safety valve," for pent-up feel-
Cassirer; this mode of speculation is still recognizable in the ings and desires. The poetic process, therefore, as Words-
recent theories of Suzanne Langer and Philip Wheelwright, worth says, is not calculated, but "spontaneous." Wordsworth
among many others. still allows for the element of "art" by regarding the success
In the course ofthe eighteenth century there was a grow- of spontaneous composition to be attendant upon prior
ing tendency to treat poetry, although still within a generally thought and practice, and takes the audience into account by
pragmatic frame, as primarily an emotional, in contrast to a insisting that "poets do not write for poets alone, but for men."
rational, use of language, especially among such Longinian But in the more radical followers and successors of Words-
enthusiasts as John Dennis, Robert Lowth, and Joseph War- worth, including Kehle, Mill, and Carlyle, the art of affecting
ton (see, for example, Warton's Essay . . . on Pope, 1750-82). an audience, which had been the defining attribute of poetry
By the latter part of the century, unqualifiedly expressive in pragmatic theory, becomes precisely the quality that inval-
theories of poetry as grounded in the faculties and feelings idates a poem. "Poetry," wrote John Stuart Mill, "is feeling,
of the poet are to be found in Sir William Jones's "Essay on confessing itself to itself in moments of solitude." And when
the Arts Called Imitative" (1772), J. G. Sulzer's Allgemeine the utterance "is not itself the end, but a means to an end . .
Theorie der schönen Künste ( i 77 1 74), and Hugh Blair's "Nature of making an impression upon another mind, then it ceases
of Poetry" (Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Leures, i 783). Ger- to be poetry, and becomes eloquence" ("What is Poetry?"
man Romantic theorists such as the Schlegels, Schleier- 833). Later writers adapted the concept of poetry as emo-
macher, and Tieck formulated the expressive view in the Uve expression to a communicative, or pragmatic, frame of
terminology of post-Kantian idealism; Novalis, for example, reference. That poetry is emotional communication is the basic
said that "poetry is representation of the spirit, of the inner principle of Tolstoy's "infection theory" of art (What is Art?
world in its totality" (Die Fragmenl4. In France Mme. de Stal I 898), as well as of the earlier writings of I. A. Richards, who
announced the new outlook on poetry in DeL'A11emae ( i 8 i claimed that emotive language is "used for the sake of the
and in Italy it manifested itself, later on. in some of Leopar- effects in emotion and attitude produced by the reference it
di's speculations on lyrical poetry. occasions," and that poetry "is the supreme form of emotive
Wordsworth's "Preface" to Lyrical Ballads is the heir to a language" (Principles ofLiterarj Criticism, i 924).
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14 Doing Things with Texts and
Feelings overflow into words, so that it is characteristic of qualities it shares withT yiptess authOorrie: ntations ofCñticcJ Theories
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tory, or the narration of events that have actually happened. temperament and moral natusrein ogfu ltahre degree essays on the
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demand that poetry be "sincere"; it was in this period that development is that of t(hAex eG1se nCeav4ale S, cih 9o3o6l) .o Af nother recent
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according to Carlyle, "are so many windows, through which quotation reveals the extent to which self-development." The
wineg lsye,e tha eg leilmempseen tosf c tohnes wtitourtlidn gth aa tp oweams ibn ehciomm."e Cino rlarergspe opnadrt athleth pouhgilho seompphleory iHngu spsheerln, oims eronootleodg icinac l otchnoesn ccRieoopumtssn adenestrsiic-vc eridt icfrisomm,
concep-
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