New Criticism

1. New Criticism AnoushkaCaraballo Prof. Evelyn Lugo Morales

2. What Is New Criticism? • A literary movement that started in the late 1920s and 1930s and originated in reaction to traditional criticism that new critics saw as largely concerned with matters extraneous to the text, with the biography or psychology of the author or the work's relationship to literary history. New Criticism proposed that a work of literary art should be regarded as autonomous, and so should not be judged by reference to considerations beyond itself.

3. Mayor Figures • I. A. Richards • CleanthBrooks • William Empson • John Crowe Ransom • Allen Tate • Robert Penn Warren • Rene Wellek

4. Terms • Intentional Fallacy- equating the meaning of a poem with the author's intentions. • Affective Fallacy- confusing the meaning of a text with how it makes the reader feel. A reader's emotional response to a text generally does not produce a reliable interpretation. • Heresy of Paraphrase- assuming that an interpretation of a literary work could consist of a detailed summary or paraphrase. • Close reading - "a close and detailed analysis of the text itself to arrive at an interpretation without referring to historical, authorial, or cultural concerns".

5. Important Facts • The movement is named after John Crowe Ransom's 1941 book The New Criticism. • They do not consider the reader's response, author's intention, or historical and cultural contexts. • In New Criticism, the text had to be considered as an object of literature, complete within itself. If the reader began to extrapolate to his or her interpretation outside of the text, he or she had strayed from New Criticism. • The critic should be free from his or her own feelings or emotional response when reading the text.

6. References • http://www.kristisiegel.com/theory.htm#newcriticism • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Criticism • http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-new-criticism.htm