as a lay person, who never studied literature beyond A level, and who loves books and literature. I read criticism because it illuminates what I love. I like Henry and his substack because he is comprehensible to a lay person. So much literary criticism to me is like reading Klingon, or a stern political instruction panel. So as a lay person, I liked Nabokov's lectures, in which he said we should approach the novel and understand it in terms of its spatial terms, chronology, geography, events, objects etc. And then re-read the novel. And to be wary of reducing it to an 'idea'. This is all very practical. But when you do that, I find, you notice many other things. He also said that re-reading is most important. At its best, literary criticism is like a best friend to the text and the person reading the criticism. It says, did you notice this? Not bad, is it?
This erudition at its best and very welcome. Thank you. I shall keep this by me for further study. I enjoy close analysis but always bear in mind Archibald MacLeish's dictum 'A poem should not mean but be...' Happy reading all!
Thank you for a very illuminating essay. I am not schooled in English Literature, but had some experience with the Psychology of Narrative and Narratology (especially Gérard Genette) in my earlier years. In my retirement, I am a voracious reader, primarily of fiction. The best literary criticism that I read starts with the magic, and then gives consideration to the ways that the spell is created. I often find this nice combination in literate book reviews: I read the first half of the review to see if I will be charmed; if so, I read the book, saving the second half of the review for later in the hope that it will open up further insights about the how. (I just wish such reviewers would take your division seriously, placing their reviews into two sections, labelled Introduction and Epilogue, or Before and After, or Magic and Means).
"What encompasses it all, of course, is Common Sense criticism. Once we accept that there is no role for criticism to do the work of philosophy—if we really wish for the truth, we must either enlist a philosopher, or practice philosophy in our criticism—criticism is free to be informal. We do not have to ordain a method, because we do not have a method-specific goal in mind."
Precisely. Wasn't it T.S. Eliot who said the best method is to be intelligent?
Just the manifesto we need! I suspect a great many people are thinking along these lines.
The word “text” may be at the heart of the matter. I’ve never felt moved, inspired, or exalted by a “text,” the way I am by a poem, novel or an essay. Did any writer ever start a work by thinking: “I have to write a text?” An unpleasant-sounding word, further degraded by its association with texting.
To me, the best literary criticism is summarized nicely in your own words: It is always saying Look! Look at what you did not know you could see!
as a lay person, who never studied literature beyond A level, and who loves books and literature. I read criticism because it illuminates what I love. I like Henry and his substack because he is comprehensible to a lay person. So much literary criticism to me is like reading Klingon, or a stern political instruction panel. So as a lay person, I liked Nabokov's lectures, in which he said we should approach the novel and understand it in terms of its spatial terms, chronology, geography, events, objects etc. And then re-read the novel. And to be wary of reducing it to an 'idea'. This is all very practical. But when you do that, I find, you notice many other things. He also said that re-reading is most important. At its best, literary criticism is like a best friend to the text and the person reading the criticism. It says, did you notice this? Not bad, is it?
This erudition at its best and very welcome. Thank you. I shall keep this by me for further study. I enjoy close analysis but always bear in mind Archibald MacLeish's dictum 'A poem should not mean but be...' Happy reading all!
Thank you for a very illuminating essay. I am not schooled in English Literature, but had some experience with the Psychology of Narrative and Narratology (especially Gérard Genette) in my earlier years. In my retirement, I am a voracious reader, primarily of fiction. The best literary criticism that I read starts with the magic, and then gives consideration to the ways that the spell is created. I often find this nice combination in literate book reviews: I read the first half of the review to see if I will be charmed; if so, I read the book, saving the second half of the review for later in the hope that it will open up further insights about the how. (I just wish such reviewers would take your division seriously, placing their reviews into two sections, labelled Introduction and Epilogue, or Before and After, or Magic and Means).
You would appreciate Nabokov on the art, the magic, the pictures, the pleasure, the “tingle.”
"What encompasses it all, of course, is Common Sense criticism. Once we accept that there is no role for criticism to do the work of philosophy—if we really wish for the truth, we must either enlist a philosopher, or practice philosophy in our criticism—criticism is free to be informal. We do not have to ordain a method, because we do not have a method-specific goal in mind."
Precisely. Wasn't it T.S. Eliot who said the best method is to be intelligent?
yes though I prefer Bloom, “the only method is the self”
Just the manifesto we need! I suspect a great many people are thinking along these lines.
The word “text” may be at the heart of the matter. I’ve never felt moved, inspired, or exalted by a “text,” the way I am by a poem, novel or an essay. Did any writer ever start a work by thinking: “I have to write a text?” An unpleasant-sounding word, further degraded by its association with texting.
I loved this piece (though wanting to qualify it or question some of the names here and there).
Samuel Johnson, as used as an epigraph by Leavis for one of his books, 'What I have here not dogmatically but deliberately written...'