scholarly journals New Formalism in the Classroom: Re-Forming Epic Poetry in Wordsworth and Blake

Humanities ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 100
Author(s):  
Matthew Leporati
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
Epic Poetry ◽  
New Criticism ◽  
Teaching Literature ◽  
New Formalism ◽  
Self In Relation ◽  
The Past ◽  
Response To Literature ◽  
Canonical Texts

Recent years have seen a resurgence of interest in “New Formalism,” a close attention to textual language and structure that departs from the outdated and regressive stances of old formalisms (especially “New Criticism”) by interrogating the connections between form, history, and culture. This article surveys the contributions of New Formalism to Romanticism studies and applies its techniques to two canonical texts, suggesting that New Formalism is useful both for literary criticism and teaching literature. Opening with a survey of New Formalist theory and practices, and an overview of the theoretical innovations within New Formalism that have been made by Romantic scholars, the article applies New Formalist techniques to William Wordsworth’s Prelude and William Blake’s Milton: a Poem. Often read as poems seeking to escape the dispiriting failure of the French Revolution, these texts, I argue, engage the formal strategies of epic poetry to enter the discourse of the period, offering competing ways to conceive of the self in relation to history. Written during the Romantic epic revival, when more epics were composed than at any other time in history, these poems’ allusive dialogue with Paradise Lost and with the epic tradition more broadly allows them to think through the self’s relationship to the past, a question energized by the Revolution Controversy. I explore how Wordsworth uses allusion to link himself to Milton and ultimately Virgil, both privileging the past and thereby asserting the value of the present as a means of reiterating and restoring it; Blake, in contrast, alludes to Milton to query the very idea of dependence on the past. These readings are intertwined with my experiences of teaching, as I have employed New Formalism to encourage students to develop as writers in response to texts. An emphasis on form provides students with concrete modes of entry into discussing literature and allows instructors to help students identify and revise the forms and structures of their own writing in response to literature.

STEPHEN GREENBLATT, NEW HISTORICISM, AND CULTURAL HISTORY, OR, WHAT WE TALK ABOUT WHEN WE TALK ABOUT INTERDISCIPLINARITY

2004 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 249-265 ◽  
Author(s):  
SARAH MAZA
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Cultural History ◽  
Social Practices ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
New Historicism ◽  
Literary Representations ◽  
Literary Critic ◽  
New Criticism ◽  
Canonical Texts ◽  
Historical Practices

Michael Warner, a literary critic with a keen sense of history, wrote in 1987 that “New Historicism is a label that historians don't like very much because they understand something different by historicism. But nobody's asking historians….” This essay is an answer to questions nobody asked me, questions about interdisciplinarity and the differences between literary critical and historical practices. A return to historically informed literary criticism, which many critics still consider a dominant trend in the profession, emerged in the early 1980s following the publication of Stephen Greenblatt's acclaimed Renaissance Self-Fashioning (1980). Reacting as it did against the decontextualized abstractions of New Criticism and Deconstruction, the movement soon labeled New Historicism sought to breathe new life into canonical texts by relating them to non-literary texts and social practices of their day. This historicist inclination should have formed the basis for a coming together of the movement's practitioners with historians interested in literary representations. But no such merger has occurred: New Historicists evince little interest in the systematic, archivally based study of history, and historians have at best shown indifference to the work of Greenblatt and his followers.

Critique and its discontents

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-76
Author(s):  
Robert T. Tally Jr.
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Ordinary Language ◽  
The United States ◽  
Literary Studies ◽  
New Formalism ◽  
The Past ◽  
The World ◽  
Contemporary Reality ◽  
Critical Resistance

AbstractIn her celebrated study The Limits of Critique (2015), Rita Felski asserts that literary criticism during the past 40 years or more has been beholden to “the hermeneutics of suspicion,” a paranoid approach to interpretation that seeks to uncover concealed or repressed meanings without due appreciation for the texts as it appears. Felski believes that “critique” is necessarily implicated in this suspicious reading, and she argues instead for a postcritical approach to literature that would eschew interpretation in favor of description, affect, and enjoyment. Felski’s argument draws upon related critiques of critique, including calls for “surface reading,” “reparative interpretation,” “thin description,” a “new formalism,” and “ordinary language.” In recent years, the advocacy for a postcritical approach and the critical resistance to that approach, and thus the affirmation of the value of critique itself, have formed one of the more animated debates within literary and cultural studies in the United States and elsewhere. At the same time, perhaps ironically, critique seems more necessary and desirable than ever in confronting contemporary reality in the U. S. In this presentation, Robert T. Tally Jr. will discuss current debates over postcritical approaches to literature, and he will argue for an empowered understanding and employment of critique suited both to literary studies and to the world we live in today.

On the specfics of postcolonial research in the conetmporary Ukrainian literary studies

2019 ◽  
pp. 446-461
Author(s):  
Ekaterina Baydalova
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Postcolonial Theory ◽  
Postcolonial Studies ◽  
Culture Studies ◽  
Self Presentation ◽  
Science Culture ◽  
The Past ◽  
Modus Vivendi ◽  
Ambivalent Attitude

The postcolonial studies have been under discussion in the Ukrainian historiography, social science, culture studies and literary criticism since 1990 years. They have originated from American, European, and Australian academic studies and became more and more popular in modern Ukrainian culture recently. The nation and the nationalism, Orientalism, multicultural and ambivalent individuality self-presentation, the search of cultural identity, the problem of ambivalent attitude to the past are in the paradigm of postcolonial studies. The problems of national identity, the totalitarian past, the interactions with neighboring countries especially Russia and Poland, the instable Ukrainian society’s condition are analyzed under the postcolonial ideas in the Ukrainian intellectual discourse. The postcolonial theory has become the main interpretative strategy of the Ukrainian researchers lately. Nevertheless, there is no unconditional modus vivendi in the Ukrainian academia about postcolonial conceptions, strategies and principles. One of the most important unsolved issues is the question of correlation of postcolonial and postmodern components of the Ukrainian national literature. The inclusion of the studies of trauma and anticolonial and posttotalitarian discourses into the framework of the postcolonial studies is the most distinguishing feature of postcolonial studies in the Ukraine.

Seeing the Caesar in Germanicus: Reading Tacitus’ Annals with Lucan’s Bellum Civile

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-126
Author(s):  
Megan M. Daly
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Epic Poetry ◽  
Alexander The Great ◽  
Bellum Civile ◽  
The Past ◽  
Similar Images ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The City ◽  
Roman Epic ◽  
Northern Frontier

AbstractThe recognition of the similarities between Roman epic poetry and historiography have led to valuable studies such as Joseph’s analysis of the relationship between Lucan’s Bellum Civile and Tacitus’ Histories. Traces of Lucan’s Bellum Civile can also be observed in Tacitus’ Annals 1 and 2, causing the beginning of Tiberius’ reign to look like a civil war in the making. The charismatic Germanicus sits with a supportive army on the northern frontier, much like Caesar, causing fear for Tiberius at Rome. Germanicus denies his chance to become the next Caesar and march on the city, but he exhibits other similarities with Lucan’s Caesar, including an association with Alexander the Great. Although at some points Germanicus seems to be repeating the past and reliving episodes experienced by Caesar in Bellum Civile, he prevents himself from fully realizing a Caesarian fate and becoming Lucan’s bad tyrant. The similar images, events, and themes presented by both authors create messages that reflect experiences from the authors’ own lives during dangerous times.

scholarly journals Glasnost in Soviet literary criticism: current debates on the Russian national character (1988-1990)

Literator ◽  
1991 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 89-102
Author(s):  
H. Mondry
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Heritage ◽  
Literary Criticism ◽  
National Character ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
The Past ◽  
Political Reforms ◽  
Leading Role

Re-evaluation of the cultural heritage of the past has been an integral part of Soviet literary criticism. From 1987 up to the present, literary criticism has played a leading role in the promotion of the economic, social and political reforms of perestroika. Literary critics use the methodology of social deconstruction in the interpretation of the literary texts of the past, actualising the problematics of the texts in accordance with their relevance to contemporary Soviet issues.

Feeling Like It Wasn't

2018 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 99-103
Author(s):  
Rae Greiner
Keyword(s):  
French Revolution ◽  
Historical Fiction ◽  
Historical Novel ◽  
Georg Lukacs ◽  
The Past ◽  
Two Cities ◽  
Renaissance Italy ◽  
Or History ◽  
The Way ◽  
The French Revolution

In “Is There a Problem with Historical Fiction (or with Scott's Redgauntlet)?”—an essay, as it happens, on Sir Walter Scott's great counterfactual novel—Harry E. Shaw calls on literary critics more fully to register “the remarkable variety of things history can do in novels, by short-circuiting the assumption that the representation of history in fiction is really always doing the same sort of work, or should be.” History might be a source of imaginative energy, a sort of launching pad for a book about timeless truths, as in Charles Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities (“ultimately about individual sacrifice and transcendence, not about the French Revolution in the way in which Scott's Waverley is about the Forty-Five”); or the past might function as “a pastoral,” which is to say, as a field onto which authors project the concerns of their own times, as in Romola (depicting problems “in definitively Victorian terms and then project[ing them] back on to Renaissance Italy,” where they would have been understood quite differently [176–77]). Or history, what Shaw calls “objective history,” might be a work's actual subject (180). An historical novel of this last sort tells it like it was, or tries to. But even that novel is only doing so much, only making a use of history. Georg Lukács is therefore wrong in thinking that “a sufficiently dialectical mode of representation could capture everything” (Shaw 175). No one mode can capture all of even a highly delimited history at once.

scholarly journals Literature in EFL/ESL Classroom

2011 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 201 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammad Khatib ◽  
Saeed Rezaei ◽  
Ali Derakhshan
Keyword(s):  
Teaching Practice ◽  
Language Teaching ◽  
Communicative Language Teaching ◽  
Translation Method ◽  
Teaching Material ◽  
Review Of Literature ◽  
Approaches To Teaching ◽  
Teaching Literature ◽  
The Past ◽  
Language Classes

This paper is a review of literature on how literature can be integrated as a language teaching material in EFL/ESL classes. First, it tracks down the place of literature in language classes from the early Grammar Translation Method (GTM) to Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) era. The paper then discusses the reasons for the demise and resurrection of literature as an input for language classes. After that the reasons for and against the use of literature in EFL/ESL classes are enumerated and discussed. For so doing, the researchers draw upon recent ideas on language teaching practice and theories. Finally in a practical move, this paper reviews the past and current approaches to teaching literature in language teaching classes. Five methodological models for teaching literature are proposed.

scholarly journals The Concept of Victorianism in A. S. Byatt’s “Posession”

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Victorian Novel ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Victorian England ◽  
Victorian Era ◽  
English Novel ◽  
The Past ◽  
Russian Literary ◽  
Postmodern Novel ◽  
Current Research Interest

The late 1990s – early 2000s was a time of numerous projects dedicated to the Victorian age and the Victorian novel as a specific phenomenon that inspires the modern novel development. The English postmodern novel with its typical narrative, time transferal to Victorian England, weaving of time layers, invokes current research interest. The relevance of this study is caused by considerable interest of researchers in the Victorian era heritage and by need of a comprehensive study of Victorian linguoculture and its implementation in the modern English novel. The Victorian text influences a new genre of the novel that reflects the gravity of modern English prose to the traditional literature of Victorian era, assumed to be particularly important in this context. The analysis of A. S. Byatt’s “Possession” in the Russian literary criticism was made only by O. A. Tolstykh; in the Ukrainian science, this work was investigated by O. Boynitska in the context of searching the past, so this subject is not investigated enough, and in our opinion is new and relevant, especially from the perspective of the “Victorian era” concept embodied in the novel. The aim of the paper is to analyze the “Victorian era” concept peculiarities in the intercultural context, on the basis of A. S. Byatt’s “Possession” as a Victorian novel. The paper takes into account the reproduction of concepts of Marriage, Home, Family, Freedom, Life, as components of “Victorian era.” The Victorian family is often represented through the place of their dwelling; therefore, the great Victorians’ works are overwhelmed by interior descriptions (Dombey’s house, Miss Havisham’s home, Mr. Rochester’s Castle). However, in “Possession,” there is an obvious contrast of Victorian buildings to the same structures in the XX century: the past prime – the modern decline. All the secrets and delusions hidden behind the facades of supposedly respectable buildings result in distorting facts and, to some extent, to violating the rights of ownership to the memories of the past. This gives another meaning to the title of the novel – “possession,” that is ownership, possession of letters, memory, truth.

scholarly journals The Teaching of the Church on Religious Freedom: A Break or Continuity of Tradition?

2021 ◽  
Vol 90 (5) ◽  
pp. 553-584
Author(s):  
Michał Chaberek
Keyword(s):  
French Revolution ◽  
Religious Freedom ◽  
Second Vatican Council ◽  
Pope Benedict Xvi ◽  
Benedict Xvi ◽  
The Past ◽  
Vatican Council ◽  
Final Acceptance ◽  
The Church ◽  
The French Revolution

This paper elaborates upon the Catholic Church’s teaching on religious freedom in the period from The French Revolution to The Second Vatican Council. Based on quotations from the original documents, the author presents the evolution of the Church’s position that switched from the initial rejection to the final acceptance of the religious freedom over past two centuries. The fact of this dramatic change begs the question about the continuity of tradition and credibility of the contemporary position of the Church. Based on the document by the International Theological Commission, “Memory and Reconciliation: The Church and the Faults of the Past,” as well as the teaching of Pope Benedict XVI, the author demonstrates that – in contrast to some contemporary interpretations – the hermeneutics of continuity is possible regarding Church’s teaching on religious freedom.

scholarly journals Reclaiming Histories/Rewriting Destinies: Mrs. Woolf and Orlando in Unearthing the Buried

2019 ◽  
pp. 123-136
Author(s):  
Milica Nenezić
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Stable Structure ◽  
Special Importance ◽  
Literary Expression ◽  
The Past ◽  
Feminist Literary Criticism ◽  
Strange Particles ◽  
The Future ◽  
Structural Theories ◽  
Living Creature

History is usually written by the winners; those who lose retain their own. The extent to which these differ and whether the differences affect the fate of mankind are all issues that require constant rendering and re-examination. The future confidently retains the answers, but do these answers change the circumstances? Can philosophy, feminist literary criticism or post-structural theories obscure the meaning of fiction? We are composed of strange particles that create our being and identity, which does not likely pave the way to our becoming true by solely ‘static’ existence, but by one that unites the past, present and the future. Such particles placed on the platform of literary expression sometimes have the character of a more permanent testimony to history, either written, or tobe-written. One figure, who struggled to raise our awareness and to remind us that the essay can represent a dialogue, that the reader carries special importance and a role in both the creation and reception of artistic skills, yet that language and meaning do not have a stable structure, was Virginia Adeline Stephen Woolf, who was rewriting and reclaiming both individual and common histories. Reflecting on the dilemmas and perplexities of both historical and fictional structural norms in literature, Mrs. Woolf unobtrusively portrayed an androgynous and ever-living creature in her novel Orlando, who seeks, among other feats, to re-evaluate the importance of witnessing and re-examining history

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