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Literary Criticism

This introduction to literary criticism explains the concepts of archetypal, formalist, and feminist approaches and their impact on the interpretation of texts. It provides definitions, key terms, historical context, strengths, and weaknesses for each approach.

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Literary Criticism

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  1. Literary Criticism • An Introduction

  2. What is literary criticism? • Think of it as a lens through which one views a text. Depending on the lens one uses, and the way in which that lens is focused, our attention is drawn to a particular aspect of the text more so than others. • Different schools of literary criticism offer different ways of seeing and interpreting a text.

  3. Archetypal Literary Criticism

  4. Historical Context • Based on works of Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell (and myth itself) • Popular in 1950s and ‘60s due to Canadian, Northrop Frye

  5. Definition • Archetypal critics believe that literature is based on recurring images, characters, narrative designs and themes. • Origins of western literature in Judeo-Christian scripture and Greco-Roman mythology

  6. What is an archetype? • Arche “first” and typos “form” • An original model or pattern from which copies are made

  7. Fundamental Plot Archetype THE JOURNEY • Protagonist moves from innocence to experience • Begins in familiar environment • Descent into danger • Battle “monsters” in underworld (task) • Return home (reunion, marriage)

  8. Key Terms • Anima • Animus • Collective Unconscious • Persona • Shadow

  9. Common Archetypal Figures • The Child • The Hero • The Great Mother • The Wise old man • The Trickster or Fox

  10. Frye vs Jung • Frye sees archetypes as recurring patterns in literature; in contrast, Jung views archetypes as primal, ancient images/experience that we have inherited.

  11. Objections • Limits personal interpretation • Only analyses one aspect of literature (archetypes

  12. Story time In the fairy tale, Hansel and Gretel are loved by their father but resented by their step-mother, who insists on a journey into the woods with the intent of losing them. In the woods, the children meet evil in the guise of a witch who tries to kill them. But they outwit her, kill her, and return to their father. Their step-mother in some versions dies mysteriously at the same time as the witch. Familiar order is restored.

  13. Re-write • In groups of 3-4, write a modern version of this fairy tale. Make sure your modern tale does not alter the original theme or message. Note how you used the archetypes within this tale. Be prepared to present to the rest of the class.

  14. Formalist Literary Criticism

  15. History • 1920s and 1930s one school of Formalist literary criticism developed called “New Criticism.” It is still the major form of literary criticism applied to analysing texts in secondary schools.

  16. Definition a form of literary criticism in which the text is viewed as a complete, isolated unit. Meaning is found by studying one or more key elements.

  17. Explanation It focuses on the elements of fiction and emphasizes how these elements work together to create, in a work of quality, a coherent whole: unity of plot, theme, and character, through use of tone, point of view, imagery, purposeful action, dialogue, and description.

  18. Key Elements • Language • Imagery • Point of View • Plot Structure • Character Development and Motivation

  19. Strengths • Reader does not need any additional knowledge other than what’s provided in the text for interpreting the work.

  20. Weaknesses • It ignores the author’s intentions • It assumes that “good” literature is “coherent” and that a text that is not coherent by its standards is not “good” literature. • it divorces literature from its larger cultural context • it assumes that readers can refrain from investing emotionally in their reading and can/should respond objectively to texts

  21. Feminist Literary Criticism

  22. History • Launched in the twentieth century with Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own (1929) • 1969 Kate Millett examined how women are represented in text by famous men in Sexual Politics

  23. Feminist critics examine • How women write their own experiences and representations • How women read about themselves • How to make feminist readings visible to readers • How women writers have fared in given eras • How traditional texts by women are subversive of the social order

  24. Key terms • Ecriture Feminine: “women’s writing” • Patriarchy: male dominated power structures

  25. Strengths • For centuries, women in literature, the roles of men and women, and how they were represented was not a focus in literary criticism

  26. Weaknesses • If this is the only theory applied to a text, it can be very limiting

  27. Archetypal Literary Criticism

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