Literary criticism (or literary studies) is the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. Modern literary criticism is often influenced by literary theory, which is the philosophical discussion of literature's goals and methods. Though the two activities are closely related, literary critics are not always, and have not always been, theorists. Whether or not literary criticism should be considered a separate field of inquiry from literary theory is a matter of some controversy. For example, the ''Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism'' draws no distinction between literary theory and literary criticism, and almost always uses the terms together to describe the same concept. Some critics consider literary criticism a practical application of literary theory, because criticism always deals directly with particular literary works, while theory may be more general or abstract. Literary criticism is often published in essay or book form. Academic literary critics teach in literature departments and publish in

academic journal An academic journal or scholarly journal is a periodical publication in which scholarship relating to a particular academic discipline is published. Academic journals serve as permanent and transparent forums for the presentation, scrutiny, and ...

s, and more popular critics publish their reviews in broadly circulating periodicals such as ''

The Times Literary Supplement ''The Times Literary Supplement'' (''TLS'') is a weekly literary review published in London by News UK, a subsidiary of News Corp. History The ''TLS'' first appeared in 1902 as a supplement to ''The Times'' but became a separate publication ...

'', ''

The New York Times Book Review ''The New York Times Book Review'' (''NYTBR'') is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times'' in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely rea ...

'', '' The New York Review of Books'', the '' London Review of Books'', the '' Dublin Review of Books'', ''

The Nation ''The Nation'' is an American liberal biweekly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's '' The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper t ...

'', '' Bookforum'', and ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

''.

History

Classical and medieval criticism

Literary criticism is thought to have existed as far back as the classical period. In the 4th century BC

Aristotle Aristotle (; grc-gre, Ἀριστοτέλης ''Aristotélēs'', ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Peripatetic school of ...

wrote the '' Poetics'', a typology and description of literary forms with many specific criticisms of contemporary works of art. ''Poetics'' developed for the first time the concepts of mimesis and

catharsis Catharsis (from Greek , , meaning "purification" or "cleansing" or "clarification") is the purification and purgation of emotions through dramatic art, or it may be any extreme emotional state that results in renewal and restoration. In its lite ...

, which are still crucial in literary studies.

Plato Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...

's attacks on poetry as imitative, secondary, and false were formative as well. The Sanskrit '' Natya Shastra'' includes literary criticism on ancient

Indian literature Indian literature refers to the literature produced on the Indian subcontinent until 1947 and in the Republic of India thereafter. The Republic of India has 22 officially recognised languages. The earliest works of Indian literature were ...

and Sanskrit drama. Later classical and

medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...

criticism often focused on religious texts, and the several long religious traditions of

hermeneutics Hermeneutics () is the theory and methodology of interpretation, especially the interpretation of biblical texts, wisdom literature, and philosophical texts. Hermeneutics is more than interpretative principles or methods used when immediate ...

and textual

exegesis Exegesis ( ; from the Greek , from , "to lead out") is a critical explanation or interpretation of a text. The term is traditionally applied to the interpretation of Biblical works. In modern usage, exegesis can involve critical interpretation ...

have had a profound influence on the study of secular texts. This was particularly the case for the literary traditions of the three

Abrahamic religions The Abrahamic religions are a group of religions centered around worship of the God of Abraham. Abraham, a Hebrew patriarch, is extensively mentioned throughout Abrahamic religious scriptures such as the Bible and the Quran. Jewish tradition ...

: Jewish literature, Christian literature and

Islamic literature Islamic literature is literature written by Muslim people, influenced by an Islamic cultural perspective, or literature that portrays Islam. It can be written in any language and portray any country or region. It includes many literary forms incl ...

. Literary criticism was also employed in other forms of medieval

Arabic literature Arabic literature ( ar, الأدب العربي / ALA-LC: ''al-Adab al-‘Arabī'') is the writing, both as prose and poetry, produced by writers in the Arabic language. The Arabic word used for literature is '' Adab'', which is derived from ...

and Arabic poetry from the 9th century, notably by

Al-Jahiz Abū ʿUthman ʿAmr ibn Baḥr al-Kinānī al-Baṣrī ( ar, أبو عثمان عمرو بن بحر الكناني البصري), commonly known as al-Jāḥiẓ ( ar, links=no, الجاحظ, ''The Bug Eyed'', born 776 – died December 868/Jan ...

in his ''al-Bayan wa-'l-tabyin'' and ''al-Hayawan'', and by

Abdullah ibn al-Mu'tazz Abdallah ibn al-Mu'tazz ( ar, عبد الله بن المعتز, ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Muʿtazz; 861 – 17 December 908) was the son of the caliph al-Mu'tazz and a political figure, but is better known as a leading Arabic poet and the author o ...

in his ''Kitab al-Badi''.

Renaissance criticism

The literary criticism of the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ide ...

developed classical ideas of unity of form and content into literary neoclassicism, proclaiming literature as central to culture, entrusting the poet and the author with preservation of a long literary tradition. The birth of Renaissance criticism was in 1498, with the recovery of classic texts, most notably, Giorgio Valla's

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through ...

translation of

's ''Poetics''. The work of Aristotle, especially ''Poetics'', was the most important influence upon literary criticism until the late eighteenth century.

Lodovico Castelvetro Lodovico Castelvetro (ca. 1505–1571) was an important figure in the development of neo-classicism, especially in drama. It was his reading of Aristotle that led to a widespread adoption of a tight version of the Three Unities, as a dramat ...

was one of the most influential Renaissance critics who wrote commentaries on Aristotle's ''Poetics'' in 1570.

Baroque criticism

The seventeenth-century witnessed the first full-fledged crisis in modernity of the core critical-aesthetic principles inherited from

classical antiquity Classical antiquity (also the classical era, classical period or classical age) is the period of cultural history between the 8th century BC and the 5th century AD centred on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ...

, such as proportion, harmony, unity, decorum, that had long governed, guaranteed, and stabilized Western thinking about artworks. Although

Classicism Classicism, in the arts, refers generally to a high regard for a classical period, classical antiquity in the Western tradition, as setting standards for taste which the classicists seek to emulate. In its purest form, classicism is an aesthet ...

was very far from spent as a cultural force, it was to be gradually challenged by a rival movement, namely Baroque, that favoured the transgressive and the extreme, without laying claim to the unity, harmony, or decorum that supposedly distinguished both nature and its greatest imitator, namely ancient art. The key concepts of the

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including ...

aesthetic, such as " conceit' (''concetto''), "

wit Wit is a form of intelligent humour, the ability to say or write things that are clever and usually funny. Someone witty is a person who is skilled at making clever and funny remarks. Forms of wit include the quip, repartee, and wisecrack. For ...

" (''acutezza'', ''ingegno''), and " wonder" (''meraviglia''), were not fully developed in literary theory until the publication of

Emanuele Tesauro Emanuele Tesauro (28 January 1592 – 26 February 1675) was an Italian philosopher, rhetorician, literary theorist, dramatist, Marinist poet, and historian. Tesauro is remembered chiefly for his seminal work ''Il cannocchiale aristotelico' ...

's ''Il Cannocchiale aristotelico'' (The Aristotelian Telescope) in 1654. This seminal treatise – inspired by

Giambattista Marino Giovanni Battista was a common Italian given name (see Battista for those with the surname) in the 16th-18th centuries. It refers to " John the Baptist" in English, the French equivalent is "Jean-Baptiste". Common nicknames include Giambattista, G ...

's epic ''Adone'' and the work of the Spanish Jesuit philosopher

Baltasar Gracián Baltasar Gracián y Morales, S.J. (; 8 January 16016 December 1658), better known as Baltasar Gracián, was a Spanish Jesuit and baroque prose writer and philosopher. He was born in Belmonte, near Calatayud (Aragón). His writings were lauded ...

– developed a theory of

metaphor A metaphor is a figure of speech that, for rhetorical effect, directly refers to one thing by mentioning another. It may provide (or obscure) clarity or identify hidden similarities between two different ideas. Metaphors are often compared wi ...

as a universal language of images and as a supreme intellectual act, at once an artifice and an epistemologically privileged mode of access to truth.

Enlightenment criticism

In the

Enlightenment period The Age of Enlightenment or the Enlightenment; german: Aufklärung, "Enlightenment"; it, L'Illuminismo, "Enlightenment"; pl, Oświecenie, "Enlightenment"; pt, Iluminismo, "Enlightenment"; es, La Ilustración, "Enlightenment" was an intel ...

(1700s–1800s), literary criticism became more popular. During this time

literacy Literacy in its broadest sense describes "particular ways of thinking about and doing reading and writing" with the purpose of understanding or expressing thoughts or ideas in Writing, written form in some specific context of use. In other wo ...

rates started to rise in the public; no longer was reading exclusive for the wealthy or scholarly. With the rise of the literate public, the swiftness of printing and commercialization of literature, criticism arose too. Reading was no longer viewed solely as educational or as a sacred source of religion; it was a form of entertainment. Literary criticism was influenced by the values and stylistic writing, including clear, bold, precise writing and the more controversial criteria of the author's religious beliefs. These critical reviews were published in many magazines, newspapers, and journals. The commercialization of literature and its mass production had its downside. The emergent literary market, which was expected to educate the public and keep them away from

superstition A superstition is any belief or practice considered by non-practitioners to be irrational or supernatural, attributed to fate or magic, perceived supernatural influence, or fear of that which is unknown. It is commonly applied to beliefs ...

and prejudice, increasingly diverged from the idealistic control of the Enlightenment theoreticians so that the business of Enlightenment became a business with the Enlightenment. This development – particularly of emergence of entertainment literature – was addressed through an intensification of criticism. Many works of

Jonathan Swift Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish satirist, author, essayist, political pamphleteer (first for the Whigs, then for the Tories), poet, and Anglican cleric who became Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Du ...

, for instance, were criticized including his book '' Gulliver's Travels'', which one critic described as "the detestable story of the Yahoos".

19th-century Romantic criticism

The British Romantic movement of the early nineteenth century introduced new

aesthetic Aesthetics, or esthetics, is a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of beauty and taste, as well as the philosophy of art (its own area of philosophy that comes out of aesthetics). It examines aesthetic values, often expressed t ...

ideas to literary studies, including the idea that the object of literature need not always be beautiful, noble, or perfect, but that literature itself could elevate a common subject to the level of the sublime. German Romanticism, which followed closely after the late development of German

classicism Classicism, in the arts, refers generally to a high regard for a classical period, classical antiquity in the Western tradition, as setting standards for taste which the classicists seek to emulate. In its purest form, classicism is an aesthet ...

, emphasized an aesthetic of fragmentation that can appear startlingly modern to the reader of English literature, and valued ''Witz'' – that is, "wit" or "humor" of a certain sort – more highly than the serious Anglophone Romanticism. The late nineteenth century brought renown to authors known more for their literary criticism than for their own literary work, such as Matthew Arnold.

The New Criticism

However important all of these aesthetic movements were as antecedents, current ideas about literary criticism derive almost entirely from the new direction taken in the early twentieth century. Early in the century the school of criticism known as Russian Formalism, and slightly later the New Criticism in Britain and in the United States, came to dominate the study and discussion of literature in the English-speaking world. Both schools emphasized the

close reading In literary criticism, close reading is the careful, sustained interpretation of a brief passage of a text. A close reading emphasizes the single and the particular over the general, effected by close attention to individual words, the syntax, ...

of texts, elevating it far above generalizing discussion and speculation about either authorial intention (to say nothing of the author's psychology or biography, which became almost taboo subjects) or reader response. This emphasis on form and precise attention to "the words themselves" has persisted, after the decline of these critical doctrines themselves.

Theory

In 1957

Northrop Frye Herman Northrop Frye (July 14, 1912 – January 23, 1991) was a Canadian literary critic and literary theorist, considered one of the most influential of the 20th century. Frye gained international fame with his first book, '' Fearful Symm ...

published the influential '' Anatomy of Criticism''. In his works Frye noted that some critics tend to embrace an ideology, and to judge literary pieces on the basis of their adherence to such ideology. This has been a highly influential viewpoint among modern conservative thinkers. E. Michael Jones, for example, argues in his ''Degenerate Moderns'' that Stanley Fish was influenced by his own adulterous affairs to reject classic literature that condemned adultery. Jürgen Habermas in ''Erkenntnis und Interesse''

968 Year 968 ( CMLXVIII) was a leap year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Byzantine Empire * Emperor Nikephoros II receives a Bulgarian embassy led by Prince Boris ( ...

(''

Knowledge and Human Interests ''Knowledge and Human Interests'' (german: Erkenntnis und Interesse) is a 1968 book by the German philosopher Jürgen Habermas, in which the author discusses the development of the modern natural and human sciences. He criticizes Sigmund Freud, ...

''), described literary critical theory in literary studies as a form of

: knowledge via interpretation to understand the meaning of human texts and symbolic expressionsincluding the interpretation of texts which themselves interpret other texts. Ferdinand de Saussure by Jullien Restored

Ferdinand de Saussure by Jullien Restored

In the British and American literary establishment, the New Criticism was more or less dominant until the late 1960s. Around that time Anglo-American university literature departments began to witness a rise of a more explicitly philosophical literary theory, influenced by structuralism, then post-structuralism, and other kinds of Continental philosophy. It continued until the mid-1980s, when interest in "theory" peaked. Many later critics, though undoubtedly still influenced by theoretical work, have been comfortable simply interpreting literature rather than writing explicitly about methodology and philosophical presumptions.

History of the book

Related to other forms of literary criticism, the

history of the book The history of books became an acknowledged academic discipline in the 1980s. Contributors to the discipline include specialists from the fields of textual scholarship, codicology, bibliography, philology, palaeography, art history, social hi ...

is a field of interdisciplinary inquiry drawing on the methods of bibliography,

cultural history Cultural history combines the approaches of anthropology and history to examine popular cultural traditions and cultural interpretations of historical experience. It examines the records and narrative descriptions of past matter, encompassing t ...

, history of literature, and

media theory Media studies is a discipline and field of study that deals with the content, history, and effects of various media; in particular, the mass media. Media Studies may draw on traditions from both the social sciences and the humanities, but most ...

. Principally concerned with the production, circulation, and reception of texts and their material forms, book history seeks to connect forms of textuality with their material aspects. Among the issues within the history of literature with which book history can be seen to intersect are: the development of authorship as a profession, the formation of reading audiences, the constraints of censorship and copyright, and the economics of literary form.

Current state

Today, approaches based in literary theory and continental philosophy largely coexist in university literature departments, while conventional methods, some informed by the New Critics, also remain active. Disagreements over the goals and methods of literary criticism, which characterized both sides taken by critics during the "rise" of theory, have declined. Many critics feel that they now have a great plurality of methods and approaches from which to choose. Some critics work largely with theoretical texts, while others read traditional literature; interest in the literary canon is still great, but many critics are also interested in nontraditional texts and

women's literature The academic discipline of women's writing is a discrete area of literary studies which is based on the notion that the experience of women, historically, has been shaped by their sex, and so women writers by definition are a group worthy of sepa ...

, as elaborated on by certain academic journals such as ''Contemporary Women's Writing'', while some critics influenced by cultural studies read popular texts like comic books or pulp/

genre fiction Genre fiction, also known as popular fiction, is a term used in the book-trade for fictional works written with the intent of fitting into a specific literary genre, in order to appeal to readers and fans already familiar with that genre. A nu ...

. Ecocritics have drawn connections between literature and the natural sciences.

Darwinian literary studies Darwinian literary studies (also known as literary Darwinism) is a branch of literary criticism that studies literature in the context of evolution by means of natural selection, including gene-culture coevolution. It represents an emerging tr ...

studies literature in the context of

evolutionary Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variati ...

influences on human nature. And postcritique has sought to develop new ways of reading and responding to literary texts that go beyond the interpretive methods of critique. Many literary critics also work in

film criticism Film criticism is the analysis and evaluation of films and the film medium. In general, film criticism can be divided into two categories: journalistic criticism that appears regularly in newspapers, magazines and other popular mass-media outle ...

or media studies. Some write intellectual history; others bring the results and methods of social history to bear on reading literature.

Key texts

The Classical and medieval periods

: ''Ion'', ''Republic'', ''Cratylus'' *

: ''Poetics'', ''Rhetoric'' * Horace: ''Art of Poetry'' * Longinus: ''On the Sublime'' * Plotinus: ''On the Intellectual Beauties'' *

St. Augustine Augustine of Hippo ( , ; la, Aurelius Augustinus Hipponensis; 13 November 354 – 28 August 430), also known as Saint Augustine, was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Afr ...

: ''On Christian Doctrine'' *

Boethius Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, commonly known as Boethius (; Latin: ''Boetius''; 480 – 524 AD), was a Roman senator, consul, ''magister officiorum'', historian, and philosopher of the Early Middle Ages. He was a central figure in the t ...

: ''The Consolation of Philosophy'' *

Aquinas Thomas Aquinas, OP (; it, Tommaso d'Aquino, lit=Thomas of Aquino; 1225 – 7 March 1274) was an Italian Dominican friar and priest who was an influential philosopher, theologian and jurist in the tradition of scholasticism; he is known ...

: ''The Nature and Domain of Sacred Doctrine'' *

Dante Dante Alighieri (; – 14 September 1321), probably baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri and often referred to as Dante (, ), was an Italian poet, writer and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', originally called (modern Italian: ' ...

: ''The Banquet'', ''Letter to Can Grande Della Scala'' * Boccaccio: ''Life of Dante'', ''Genealogy of the Gentile Gods'' * Christine de Pizan: ''The Book of the City of Ladies'' * Bharata Muni: ''Natya Shastra'' * Rajashekhara: ''Inquiry into Literature'' * Valmiki: ''The Invention of Poetry'' (from the ''

Ramayana The ''Rāmāyana'' (; sa, रामायणम्, ) is a Sanskrit epic composed over a period of nearly a millennium, with scholars' estimates for the earliest stage of the text ranging from the 8th to 4th centuries BCE, and later stages ...

'') *

Anandavardhana Ānandavardhana (c. 820–890 CE) was the author of ''Dhvanyāloka'', or ''A Light on Suggestion'' (''dhvani''), a work articulating the philosophy of "aesthetic suggestion" (''dhvani'', ''vyañjanā''). The philosopher Abhinavagupta (c. 950 – 1 ...

: ''Light on Suggestion'' *

Cao Pi Cao Pi () ( – 29 June 226), courtesy name Zihuan, was the first emperor of the state of Cao Wei in the Three Kingdoms period of China. He was the second son of Cao Cao, a warlord who lived in the late Eastern Han dynasty, but the eldest s ...

: ''A Discourse on Literature'' * Lu Ji: '' Rhymeprose on Literature'' * Liu Xie: '' The Literary Mind'' *

Wang Changling Wang Changling (; 698–756) was a major Tang dynasty poet. His courtesy name was Shaobo (). He was originally from Taiyuan in present-day Shanxi province, according to the editors of the '' Three Hundred Tang Poems'', although other sources c ...

: ''A Discussion of Literature and Meaning'' *Sikong Tu: ''The Twenty-Four Classes of Poetry''

The Renaissance period

: ''The ''Poetics'' of Aristotle Translated and Explained'' *

Philip Sidney Philip, also Phillip, is a male given name, derived from the Greek (''Philippos'', lit. "horse-loving" or "fond of horses"), from a compound of (''philos'', "dear", "loved", "loving") and (''hippos'', "horse"). Prominent Philips who popularize ...

: ''An Apology for Poetry'' *

Jacopo Mazzoni Jacopo Mazzoni (Latinized as Jacobus Mazzonius) (27 November 1548 – 10 April 1598) was an Italian philosopher, a professor in Pisa, and friend of Galileo Galilei. His first name is sometimes reported as "Giacomo". Biography Giacopo (Jacopo) Ma ...

: ''On the Defense of the Comedy of Dante'' * Torquato Tasso: ''Discourses on the Heroic Poem'' *

Francis Bacon Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban (; 22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626), also known as Lord Verulam, was an English philosopher and statesman who served as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England. Bacon led the advancement of both ...

: ''The Advancement of Learning'' * Henry Reynolds: ''Mythomystes'' *John Mandaville: ''Composed in the mid-14th centurymost probably by a french physician''

The Enlightenment period

Thomas Hobbes Thomas Hobbes ( ; 5/15 April 1588 – 4/14 December 1679) was an English philosopher, considered to be one of the founders of modern political philosophy. Hobbes is best known for his 1651 book '' Leviathan'', in which he expounds an influ ...

: ''Answer to Davenant's preface to ''Gondibert * Pierre Corneille: ''Of the Three Unities of Action, Time, and Place'' *

John Dryden '' John Dryden (; – ) was an English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who in 1668 was appointed England's first Poet Laureate. He is seen as dominating the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the p ...

: ''An Essay of Dramatic Poesy'' * Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux: ''The Art of Poetry'' *

John Locke John Locke (; 29 August 1632 – 28 October 1704) was an English philosopher and physician, widely regarded as one of the most influential of Enlightenment thinkers and commonly known as the "father of liberalism". Considered one of ...

: ''An Essay Concerning Human Understanding'' *

John Dennis John Dennis may refer to: *John Dennis (dramatist) (1658–1734), English dramatist *John Dennis (1771–1806), Maryland congressman * John Dennis (1807–1859), his son, Maryland congressman * John Stoughton Dennis (1820–1885), Canadian surveyor ...

: ''The Advancement and Reformation of Modern Poetry'' *

Alexander Pope Alexander Pope (21 May 1688 O.S. – 30 May 1744) was an English poet, translator, and satirist of the Enlightenment era who is considered one of the most prominent English poets of the early 18th century. An exponent of Augustan literature, ...

: ''An Essay on Criticism'' *

Joseph Addison Joseph Addison (1 May 1672 – 17 June 1719) was an English essayist, poet, playwright and politician. He was the eldest son of The Reverend Lancelot Addison. His name is usually remembered alongside that of his long-standing friend Richar ...

: ''On the Pleasures of the Imagination'' (''Spectator'' essays) * Giambattista Vico: ''The New Science'' *

Edmund Burke Edmund Burke (; 12 January NS.html"_;"title="New_Style.html"_;"title="/nowiki>New_Style">NS">New_Style.html"_;"title="/nowiki>New_Style">NS/nowiki>_1729_–_9_July_1797)_was_an_NS.html"_;"title="New_Style.html"_;"title="/nowiki>New_Style">N ...

: ''A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origins of Our Ideas of the Sublime and the Beautiful'' *

David Hume David Hume (; born David Home; 7 May 1711 NS (26 April 1711 OS) – 25 August 1776) Cranston, Maurice, and Thomas Edmund Jessop. 2020 999br>David Hume" '' Encyclopædia Britannica''. Retrieved 18 May 2020. was a Scottish Enlightenment ph ...

: ''Of the Standard of Taste'' * Samuel Johnson: ''On Fiction'', ''Rasselas'', ''Preface to ''Shakespeare *

Edward Young Edward Young (c. 3 July 1683 – 5 April 1765) was an English poet, best remembered for ''Night-Thoughts'', a series of philosophical writings in blank verse, reflecting his state of mind following several bereavements. It was one of the mo ...

: ''Conjectures on Original Composition'' * Gotthold Ephraim Lessing: ''Laocoön'' * Joshua Reynolds: ''Discourses on Art'' * Richard "Conversation" Sharpbr>Letters & Essays in Prose & Verse
* James Usher :''Clio: or a Discourse on Taste (1767)'' *

Denis Diderot Denis Diderot (; ; 5 October 171331 July 1784) was a French philosopher, art critic, and writer, best known for serving as co-founder, chief editor, and contributor to the '' Encyclopédie'' along with Jean le Rond d'Alembert. He was a promi ...

: ''The Paradox of Acting'' *

Immanuel Kant Immanuel Kant (, , ; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works in epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and ...

: '' Critique of Judgment'' *

Mary Wollstonecraft Mary Wollstonecraft (, ; 27 April 1759 – 10 September 1797) was a British writer, philosopher, and advocate of women's rights. Until the late 20th century, Wollstonecraft's life, which encompassed several unconventional personal relationsh ...

: '' A Vindication of the Rights of Woman'' * William Blake: ''The Marriage of Heaven or Hell'', ''Letter to Thomas Butts'', ''Annotations to Reynolds' Discourses'', ''A Descriptive Catalogue'', ''A Vision of the Last Judgment'', ''On Homer's Poetry'' * Friedrich Schiller: ''Letters on the Aesthetic Education of Man'' * Friedrich Schlegel: ''Critical Fragments'', ''Athenaeum Fragments'', ''On Incomprehensibility''

The 19th century

* William Wordsworth: ''Preface to the Second Edition of ''Lyrical Ballads * Anne Louise Germaine de Staël: ''Literature in its Relation to Social Institutions'' *

Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling (; 27 January 1775 – 20 August 1854), later (after 1812) von Schelling, was a German philosopher. Standard histories of philosophy make him the midpoint in the development of German idealism, situating him b ...

: ''On the Relation of the Plastic Arts to Nature'' *

Samuel Taylor Coleridge Samuel Taylor Coleridge (; 21 October 177225 July 1834) was an English poet, literary critic, philosopher, and theologian who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lak ...

: ''Shakespeare's Judgment Equal to His Genius'', ''On the Principles of Genial Criticism'', ''The Statesman's Manual'', ''Biographia Literaria'' *

Wilhelm von Humboldt Friedrich Wilhelm Christian Karl Ferdinand von Humboldt (, also , ; ; 22 June 1767 – 8 April 1835) was a Prussian philosopher, linguist, government functionary, diplomat, and founder of the Humboldt University of Berlin, which was named afte ...

: ''Collected Works'' * John Keats: letters to Benjamin Bailey, George & Thomas Keats, John Taylor, and Richard Woodhouse *

Arthur Schopenhauer Arthur Schopenhauer ( , ; 22 February 1788 – 21 September 1860) was a German philosopher. He is best known for his 1818 work ''The World as Will and Representation'' (expanded in 1844), which characterizes the phenomenal world as the prod ...

: ''The World as Will and Idea'' * Thomas Love Peacock: '' The Four Ages of Poetry'' * Percy Bysshe Shelley: ''

A Defence of Poetry "A Defence of Poetry" is an essay by the English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, written in 1821 and first published posthumously in 1840 in ''Essays, Letters from Abroad, Translations and Fragments'' by Edward Moxon in London. It contains Shelley's ...

'' *

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German poet, playwright, novelist, scientist, statesman, theatre director, and critic. His works include plays, poetry, literature, and aesthetic criticism, as well as t ...

: ''Conversations with Eckermann'', ''Maxim No. 279'' *

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (; ; 27 August 1770 – 14 November 1831) was a German philosopher. He is one of the most important figures in German idealism and one of the founding figures of modern Western philosophy. His influence extends ...

: ''The Philosophy of Fine Art'' *

Giacomo Leopardi Count Giacomo Taldegardo Francesco di Sales Saverio Pietro Leopardi (, ; 29 June 1798 – 14 June 1837) was an Italian philosopher, poet, essayist, and philologist. He is considered the greatest Italian poet of the nineteenth century and one of ...

: ''Zibaldone'' (notebooks) * Francesco De Sanctis ''Critical Essays; History of the Italian Literature'' *

Thomas Carlyle Thomas Carlyle (4 December 17955 February 1881) was a Scottish essayist, historian and philosopher. A leading writer of the Victorian era, he exerted a profound influence on 19th-century art, literature and philosophy. Born in Ecclefechan, ...

: ''Symbols'' * John Stuart Mill: ''What is Poetry?'' *

Ralph Waldo Emerson Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803April 27, 1882), who went by his middle name Waldo, was an American essayist, lecturer, philosopher, abolitionist, and poet who led the transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. He was seen as a cham ...

: ''The Poet'' *

Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve (; 23 December 1804 – 13 October 1869) was a French literary critic. Early life He was born in Boulogne, educated there, and studied medicine at the Collège Charlemagne in Paris (1824–27). In 1828, he s ...

: ''What Is a Classic?'' *

James Russell Lowell James Russell Lowell (; February 22, 1819 – August 12, 1891) was an American Romantic poet, critic, editor, and diplomat. He is associated with the fireside poets, a group of New England writers who were among the first American poets that r ...

: ''

A Fable for Critics ''A Fable for Critics'' is a book-length satirical poem by American writer James Russell Lowell, first published anonymously in 1848. The poem made fun of well-known poets and critics of the time and brought notoriety to its author. Overview The ...

'' *

Edgar Allan Poe Edgar Allan Poe (; Edgar Poe; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic. Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre. He is wid ...

: ''

The Poetic Principle "The Poetic Principle" is an essay by Edgar Allan Poe, written near the end of his life and published posthumously in 1850, the year after his death. It is a work of literary criticism, in which Poe presents his literary theory. It is based on a ...

'' * Matthew Arnold: ''Preface to the 1853 Edition of ''Poems, ''The Function of Criticism at the Present Time'', ''The Study of Poetry'' *

Hippolyte Taine Hippolyte Adolphe Taine (, 21 April 1828 – 5 March 1893) was a French historian, critic and philosopher. He was the chief theoretical influence on French naturalism, a major proponent of sociological positivism and one of the first practitio ...

: ''History of English Literature and Language'' *

Charles Baudelaire Charles Pierre Baudelaire (, ; ; 9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist and art critic. His poems exhibit mastery in the handling of rhyme and rhythm, contain an exoticism inherited fr ...

: ''The Salon of 1859'' *

Karl Marx Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...

: '' The German Ideology'', '' Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy'' * Søren Kierkegaard: ''Two Ages: A Literary Review'', ''The Concept of Irony'' *

Friedrich Nietzsche Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (; or ; 15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher, prose poet, cultural critic, philologist, and composer whose work has exerted a profound influence on contemporary philosophy. He began his ...

: '' The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music'', ''Truth and Falsity in an Ultramoral Sense'' * Walter Pater: ''Studies in the History of the Renaissance'' * Émile Zola: ''The Experimental Novel'' * Anatole France: ''The Adventures of the Soul'' * Oscar Wilde: ''

The Decay of Lying "The Decay of Lying – An Observation" is an essay by Oscar Wilde included in his collection of essays titled ''Intentions'', published in 1891. This is a significantly revised version of the article that first appeared in the January 1889 issue o ...

'' *

Stéphane Mallarmé Stéphane Mallarmé ( , ; 18 March 1842 – 9 September 1898), pen name of Étienne Mallarmé, was a French poet and critic. He was a major French symbolist poet, and his work anticipated and inspired several revolutionary artistic schools of ...

: ''The Evolution of Literature'', ''The Book: A Spiritual Mystery'', ''Mystery in Literature'' *

Leo Tolstoy Count Lev Nikolayevich TolstoyTolstoy pronounced his first name as , which corresponds to the romanization ''Lyov''. () (; russian: link=no, Лев Николаевич Толстой,In Tolstoy's day, his name was written as in pre-refor ...

: ''

What is Art? ''What Is Art?'' (russian: Что такое искусство? ''Chto takoye iskusstvo?'') is a book by Leo Tolstoy. It was completed in Russian in 1897 but first published in English due to difficulties with the Russian censors. Tolstoy cites ...

The 20th century

* Benedetto Croce: ''Aesthetic'' * Antonio Gramsci : ''Prison Notebooks'' * Umberto Eco: ''The Aesthetics of Thomas Aquinas; The Open Work'' * A. C. Bradley: ''Poetry for Poetry's Sake'' *

Sigmund Freud Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating pathologies explained as originating in conflicts i ...

: ''Creative Writers and Daydreaming'' * Ferdinand de Saussure: ''Course in General Linguistics'' *

Claude Lévi-Strauss Claude Lévi-Strauss (, ; 28 November 1908 – 30 October 2009) was a French anthropologist and ethnologist whose work was key in the development of the theories of structuralism and structural anthropology. He held the chair of Social Anthr ...

: ''The Structural Study of Myth'' *

T. E. Hulme Thomas Ernest Hulme (; 16 September 1883 – 28 September 1917) was an English critic and poet who, through his writings on art, literature and politics, had a notable influence upon modernism. He was an aesthetic philosopher and the 'fathe ...

: ''Romanticism and Classicism''; ''

Bergson Henri-Louis Bergson (; 18 October 1859 – 4 January 1941) was a French philosopherHenri Bergson. 2014. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved 13 August 2014, from https://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/61856/Henri-Bergson

's Theory of Art'' * Walter Benjamin: ''On Language as Such and On the Language of Man'' * Viktor Shklovsky: ''Art as Technique'' * T. S. Eliot: ''Tradition and the Individual Talent''; ''Hamlet and His Problems'' *

Irving Babbitt Irving Babbitt (August 2, 1865 – July 15, 1933) was an American academic and literary critic, noted for his founding role in a movement that became known as the New Humanism, a significant influence on literary discussion and conservative thou ...

: ''Romantic Melancholy'' *

Carl Jung Carl Gustav Jung ( ; ; 26 July 1875 – 6 June 1961) was a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who founded analytical psychology. Jung's work has been influential in the fields of psychiatry, anthropology, archaeology, literature, ph ...

: ''On the Relation of Analytical Psychology to Poetry'' *

Leon Trotsky Lev Davidovich Bronstein. ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky; uk, link= no, Лев Давидович Троцький; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trotskij'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky''. (), was a Russian ...

: ''The Formalist School of Poetry and Marxism'' *

Boris Eikhenbaum Boris Mikhailovich Eikhenbaum ( rus, Борис Михайлович Эйхенбаум, p=ɨjxʲɪnˈbaʊm; 16 October 1886 – 2 November 1959) was a Russian Empire and Soviet literary scholar and historian of Russian literature. He is a repre ...

: ''The Theory of the "Formal Method"'' * Virginia Woolf: ''A Room of One's Own'' * I. A. Richards: ''Practical Criticism'' * Mikhail Bakhtin: ''Epic and Novel: Toward a Methodology for the Study of the Novel'' *

Georges Bataille Georges Albert Maurice Victor Bataille (; ; 10 September 1897 – 9 July 1962) was a French philosopher and intellectual working in philosophy, literature, sociology, anthropology, and history of art. His writing, which included essays, novels ...

: ''The Notion of Expenditure'' *

John Crowe Ransom John Crowe Ransom (April 30, 1888 – July 3, 1974) was an American educator, scholar, literary critic, poet, essayist and editor. He is considered to be a founder of the New Criticism school of literary criticism. As a faculty member at Kenyon ...

: ''Poetry: A Note in Ontology''; ''Criticism as Pure Speculation'' * R. P. Blackmur: ''A Critic's Job of Work'' * Jacques Lacan: ''The Mirror Stage as Formative of the Function of the I as Revealed in Psychoanalytic Experience''; ''The Agency of the Letter in the Unconscious or Reason Since Freud'' * György Lukács: ''The Ideal of the Harmonious Man in Bourgeois Aesthetics''; ''Art and Objective Truth'' * Paul Valéry: ''Poetry and Abstract Thought'' * Kenneth Burke: ''Literature as Equipment for Living'' * Ernst Cassirer: ''Art'' * W. K. Wimsatt and

Monroe Beardsley Monroe Curtis Beardsley (; December 10, 1915 – September 18, 1985) was an American philosopher of art. Biography Beardsley was born and raised in Bridgeport, Connecticut, and educated at Yale University (B.A. 1936, Ph.D. 1939), where he re ...

: ''The Intentional Fallacy'', ''The Affective Fallacy'' * Cleanth Brooks: ''The Heresy of Paraphrase''; ''Irony as a Principle of Structure'' * Jan Mukařovský: ''Standard Language and Poetic Language'' *

Jean-Paul Sartre Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre (, ; ; 21 June 1905 – 15 April 1980) was one of the key figures in the philosophy of existentialism (and phenomenology), a French playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and lite ...

: ''Why Write?'' * Simone de Beauvoir: ''The Second Sex'' *

Ronald Crane Ronald Salmon Crane (January 5, 1886 – July 12, 1967) was a literary critic, historian, bibliographer, and professor. He is credited with the founding of the Chicago School of Literary Criticism. Early life Ronald Crane was born in Tecumseh, Mi ...

: ''Toward a More Adequate Criticism of Poetic Structure'' * Philip Wheelwright: ''The Burning Fountain'' * Theodor Adorno: ''Cultural Criticism and Society''; ''Aesthetic Theory'' * Roman Jakobson: ''The Metaphoric and Metonymic Poles'' *

: ''Anatomy of Criticism''; ''The Critical Path'' * Gaston Bachelard: ''The Poetics of Space'' *

Ernst Gombrich Sir Ernst Hans Josef Gombrich (; ; 30 March 1909 – 3 November 2001) was an Austrian-born art historian who, after settling in England in 1936, became a naturalised British citizen in 1947 and spent most of his working life in the United Ki ...

: ''Art and Illusion'' *

Martin Heidegger Martin Heidegger (; ; 26 September 188926 May 1976) was a German philosopher who is best known for contributions to phenomenology, hermeneutics, and existentialism. He is among the most important and influential philosophers of the 20th centu ...

: ''The Nature of Language''; ''Language in the Poem''; '' Hölderlin and the Essence of Poetry'' * E. D. Hirsch, Jr.: ''Objective Interpretation'' *

Noam Chomsky Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American public intellectual: a linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky i ...

: ''Aspects of the Theory of Syntax'' * Jacques Derrida: ''Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences'' *

Roland Barthes Roland Gérard Barthes (; ; 12 November 1915 – 26 March 1980) was a French literary theorist, essayist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. His work engaged in the analysis of a variety of sign systems, mainly derived from Western pop ...

: ''The Structuralist Activity''; ''The Death of the Author'' * Michel Foucault: ''Truth and Power''; ''What Is an Author?''; ''The Discourse on Language'' *

Hans Robert Jauss Hans Robert Jauss (german: Jauß; 12 December 1921 – 1 March 1997) was a German academic, notable for his work in reception theory (especially his concept of horizon of expectation) and medieval and modern French literature. His approach was d ...

: ''Literary History as a Challenge to Literary Theory'' *

Georges Poulet Georges Poulet (; 29 November 1902 – 31 December 1991) was a Belgian literary critic associated with the Geneva School. Best known for his four-volume work ''Studies in Human Time'', Poulet rejected formalist approaches to literary criticism a ...

: ''Phenomenology of Reading'' *

Raymond Williams Raymond Henry Williams (31 August 1921 – 26 January 1988) was a Welsh socialist writer, academic, novelist and critic influential within the New Left and in wider culture. His writings on politics, culture, the media and literature contrib ...

: ''The Country and the City'' * Lionel Trilling: ''The Liberal Imagination''; * Julia Kristeva: ''From One Identity to Another''; ''Women's Time'' * Paul de Man: ''Semiology and Rhetoric''; ''The Rhetoric of Temporality'' * Harold Bloom: '' The Anxiety of Influence''; ''The Dialectics of Poetic Tradition''; ''Poetry, Revisionism, Repression'' * Chinua Achebe: ''Colonialist Criticism'' * Stanley Fish: ''Normal Circumstances, Literal Language, Direct Speech Acts, the Ordinary, the Everyday, the Obvious, What Goes Without Saying, and Other Special Cases''; ''Is There a Text in This Class?'' * Edward Said: ''The World, the Text, and the Critic''; ''Secular Criticism'' * Elaine Showalter: ''Toward a Feminist Poetics'' *

Sandra Gilbert Sandra M. Gilbert (born December 27, 1936) is an American literary critic and poet who has published in the fields of feminist literary criticism, feminist theory, and psychoanalytic criticism. She is best known for her collaborative critical wor ...

and

Susan Gubar Susan D. Gubar (born November 30, 1944) is an American author and distinguished Professor Emerita of English and Women's Studies at Indiana University. She is best known for co-authoring the landmark feminist literary study '' The Madwoman in ...

: ''Infection in the Sentence''; ''The Madwoman in the Attic'' *

Murray Krieger Murray Krieger (November 27, 1923 – August 5, 2000) was an American literary critic and theorist. He was a professor at the University of Minnesota, the University of Iowa from 1963, and then the University of California, Irvine. In 1999, ...

: ''"A Waking Dream": The Symbolic Alternative to Allegory'' * Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari: ''

Anti-Oedipus ''Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia'' (french: Capitalisme et schizophrénie. L'anti-Œdipe) is a 1972 book by French authors Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, the former a philosopher and the latter a psychoanalyst. It is the first vol ...

: Capitalism and Schizophrenia'' * René Girard: ''The Sacrificial Crisis'' * Hélène Cixous: ''The Laugh of the Medusa'' * Jonathan Culler: ''Beyond Interpretation'' * Geoffrey Hartman: ''Literary Commentary as Literature'' *

Wolfgang Iser Wolfgang Iser (22 July 1926 – 24 January 2007) was a German literary scholar. Biography Wolfgang Iser was born in Marienberg, Germany. His parents were Paul and Else (Steinbach) Iser. He studied literature in the universities of Leipzig and ...

: ''The Repertoire'' *

Hayden White Hayden V. White (July 12, 1928 – March 5, 2018) was an American historian in the tradition of literary criticism, perhaps most famous for his work '' Metahistory: The Historical Imagination in Nineteenth-Century Europe'' (1973/2014). Career ...

: ''The Historical Text as Literary Artifact'' *

Hans-Georg Gadamer Hans-Georg Gadamer (; ; February 11, 1900 – March 13, 2002) was a German philosopher of the continental tradition, best known for his 1960 '' magnum opus'', '' Truth and Method'' (''Wahrheit und Methode''), on hermeneutics. Life Family ...

: '' Truth and Method'' *

Paul Ricoeur Paul may refer to: * Paul (given name), a given name (includes a list of people with that name) * Paul (surname), a list of people People Christianity * Paul the Apostle (AD c.5–c.64/65), also known as Saul of Tarsus or Saint Paul, early Ch ...

: ''The Metaphorical Process as Cognition, Imagination, and Feeling'' * Peter Szondi: ''On Textual Understanding'' * M. H. Abrams: ''How to Do Things with Texts'' *

J. Hillis Miller Joseph Hillis Miller Jr. (March 5, 1928 – February 7, 2021) was an American literary critic and scholar who advanced theories of literary deconstruction. He was part of the Yale School along with scholars including Paul de Man, Jacques Derri ...

: ''The Critic as Host'' * Clifford Geertz: ''Blurred Genres: The Refiguration of Social Thought'' * Filippo Tommaso Marinetti: ''The Foundation and Manifesto of Futurism'' *

Tristan Tzara Tristan Tzara (; ; born Samuel or Samy Rosenstock, also known as S. Samyro; – 25 December 1963) was a Romanian and French avant-garde poet, essayist and performance artist. Also active as a journalist, playwright, literary and art critic, comp ...

: ''Unpretentious Proclamation'' * André Breton: ''The Surrealist Manifesto''; ''The Declaration of January 27, 1925'' * Mina Loy: ''Feminist Manifesto'' * Yokomitsu Riichi: ''Sensation and New Sensation'' *

Oswald de Andrade José Oswald de Souza Andrade (January 11, 1890 – October 22, 1954) was a Brazilian poet, novelist and cultural critic. He was born, spent most of his life and died in São Paulo. Andrade was one of the founders of Brazilian modernism and a m ...

: ''Cannibalist Manifesto'' * André Breton,

and Diego Rivera: ''Manifesto: Towards a Free Revolutionary Art'' *

Hu Shih Hu Shih (; 17 December 1891 – 24 February 1962), also known as Hu Suh in early references, was a Chinese diplomat, essayist, literary scholar, philosopher, and politician. Hu is widely recognized today as a key contributor to Chinese libera ...

: ''Some Modest Proposals for the Reform of Literature'' * Octavio Paz: ''The Bow and the Lire''

References

External links

''Dictionary of the History of Ideas'':
Literary Criticism

Award Winners
Internet Public Library: Literary Criticism
Collection of Critical and Biographical Websites

(University of Zaragoza)
How to Do Literary Analysis: An Experimental Reflection Based on the Yellow Wall-Paper
{{DEFAULTSORT:Literary Criticism Aesthetics New Criticism Interpretation (philosophy)

History

Classical and medieval criticism

Renaissance criticism

Baroque criticism

Enlightenment criticism

19th-century Romantic criticism

The New Criticism

Theory

History of the book

Current state

Key texts

The Classical and medieval periods

The Renaissance period

The Enlightenment period

The 19th century

The 20th century

See also

References

External links