Apr 24, · 'An Essay on Criticism' is written in heroic couplets, which consist of two rhyming lines that are written in iambic pentameter. Lines written in iambic pentameter consist of Feb 25, · Alexander Pope ’s “An Essay on Criticism” is largely influenced by ancient poets, classical models of art, and Pope’s Catholic beliefs. The poem revolves Nov 21, · NOTES: An Essay on Criticism by Alexander Pope 1. Literary Criticism 2. 2 1. An Essay on Criticism by Alexander Pope Alexander Pope is a poet and translator from Latin to English. A. Pope was not very original, his thoughts are derived mainly from Dryden. In his essay we don’t find Latin words because he was a translator and he wanted to support English language
An Essay on Criticism
Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays Princeton University Pressis a book by Canadian literary critic and theorist Northrop Frye that attempts to formulate an overall view of the scope, theory, principles, and techniques of literary criticism derived exclusively from literature, an essay on criticism summary.
Frye consciously omits all specific and practical criticism, instead offering classically inspired theories of modes, symbols, myths and genres, in what he termed "an interconnected group of suggestions. Frye's four essays are sandwiched between a "Polemical Introduction" and a "Tentative Conclusion. The purpose of the introduction is to defend the need for literary criticism, to distinguish the nature of genuine literary criticism from other forms of criticism, and to clarify the difference between direct experience of literature and the systematic study of literary criticism.
There are a number of reasons why the introduction an essay on criticism summary labeled as a " polemic ". In defending the need for literary criticism, Frye opposes a notion common to Tolstoy and Romantic thought that "natural taste" is superior to scholarly learning and by extension, criticism. Frye also accuses a number of methods of criticism e. MarxistFreudianJungianNeo-classicaletc. as being embodiments of the deterministic fallacy.
He is not opposed to these ideologies in particular, but sees the application of any external, ready-made ideology to literature as a departure from genuine criticism. This results in subjecting a work of literature to an individual's pet philosophy and an elevation or demotion of authors according to their conformity to the pet philosophy. Another point is to distinguish the difference between personal taste and genuine criticism.
Personal taste is too easily swayed by the prevailing morals, values and tastes of the critic's society at that point in history. If taste succumbs entirely to such social forces, the result is the same an essay on criticism summary that of consciously adopting an external ideology described above.
Yet even if there is a consensus among critics that the works of John Milton are more fruitful than Richard Blackmore to use Frye's examplea critic contributes little by saying so. In other words, value judgments contribute little to meaningful criticism.
In place of meaningless criticism, Frye proposes a genuine literary criticism which draws its method from the body of literature itself. Literary criticism ought to be a systematic study of works of literature, just as physics is of nature and history is of human action. Frye makes the explicit assumption that in order for systematic study to be possible, the body of literature must already possess a systematic nature. Frye claims that we know very little about this system as yet and that the systematic study of literature has progressed little since Aristotle.
Frye concludes his introduction by addressing the weaknesses of his argument. He mentions that the introduction is a polemic, but written in first person to acknowledge the individual nature of his views. He concedes that the following essays can an essay on criticism summary give a preliminary, and likely inexact, glimpse of the system of literature.
He admits to making sweeping generalities that will often prove false in light of particular examples. Finally, he stresses that while many feel an "emotional repugnance" to schematization of poetryan essay on criticism summary, the schematization should be regarded as an aspect of criticism, not the vibrant, personal, direct experience of the work itself—much as the geologist turns away from his or her systematic work to enjoy the beauty of the mountains.
Frye sees works of literature as lying somewhere on a continuum between being plot driven, as in most fictionand idea driven, as in essays and lyrical poetry. The First essay begins by exploring the different aspects of fiction subdivided into tragic and comic in each mode and ends with a similar discussion of thematic literature. Frye divides his study of tragic, comic, and thematic literature into five "modes", each identified with a specific literary epoch: mythic, romantic, high mimeticlow mimetic, and ironic.
This categorization is a representation of ethosor characterization and relates to how the protagonist is portrayed in respect to the rest of humanity and the protagonist's environment. Frye suggests that Classical civilizations progressed historically through the development of these modes, and that something similar happened in Western civilization during medieval and modern times.
He speculates that contemporary fiction may be undergoing a return to myth, completing a full circle through the five modes. Frye argues that when irony is pushed an essay on criticism summary extremes, it returns to the mode of myth; this concept of the recursion of historical cycles is familiar from Giambattista Vico [2] and Oswald Spengler.
Finally, Frye explores the nature of thematic literature in each mode. Here, the intellectual content is more important than the plot, so these modes are organized by what is considered more authoritative or educational at the time.
Also, these modes tend to organize by societal structure. Now that Frye has established his theory of modes, he proposes five levels, or phasesan essay on criticism summary, of symbolism, each phase independently possessing its own mythosethos, and dianoia as laid out in the first essay.
These phases are based on the four levels of medieval allegory the first two phases constituting the first level. Also, Frye relates the five phases with the ages of man laid out in the first essay, an essay on criticism summary. Frye defines a literary symbol as: "[A]ny unit of any literary structure that can be isolated for critical attention.
The descriptive phase exhibits the centrifugal, or outward, property of a symbol. For example, when a word such as 'cat' evokes a definition, image, experience or any property connected with the word 'cat' external to the literary context of the particular usage, we have the word taken in the descriptive sense. Frye labels any such symbol a sign. An essay on criticism summary does not define the sign beyond this sense of pointing to the external, nor does he refer to any particular semiotic theory.
In opposition to the sign stands the motif which is a symbol taken in the literal phase, an essay on criticism summary. This phase demonstrates the inward, or centripetal, direction of meaning, best described as the contextual meaning of the symbol. To Frye, literal means nearly the opposite of its usage in common speech; to say that something "literally" means something generally involves referring to a definition external to the text.
Instead, literal refers to the symbol's meaning in its specific literary situation while descriptive refers to personal connotation and conventional definition. Finally, Frye draws an analogy between rhythm and harmony with the literal and descriptive phases respectively.
The literal phase tends to be horizontal, dependent on what comes before and after the symbol while the descriptive phase tends to be laid out in space, having external meanings that vary in nearness to the contextual meaning. Frye next introduces the formal phase, embodied by the image, in order to define the layer of meaning that results from the interplay of the harmony and rhythm of the signs and motifs.
The most frequently an essay on criticism summary imagery sets the tone of the work as with the color red in Macbethwith less repeated imagery working in contrast with this tonal background.
This section of the essay gives a faithful representation of literary formalism also known as New Criticism. Frye's representation of formalism here is unique; however, its setting as part of the larger system of literary criticism Frye outlines in the entire work. The notion of form and perhaps Frye's literal phase relies heavily on the assumption of inherent meaning within the text—a point contested by deconstructionist critics. The mythical phase is the treatment of a symbol as an archetype, an essay on criticism summary.
This concept relates most closely with intertextuality and considers the symbol in a work as interconnected with similar symbolism throughout the entire body of literature. While Frye deals with myths and archetypes from a broader perspective in the third essay, in this section he focuses on the critical method of tracing a symbol's heritage through literary works both prior and subsequent to the work in question.
Frye argues that convention is a vital part of literature and that copyright is harmful to the process of literary creation. Frye points to the use of convention in Shakespeare and Milton as examples to strengthen his argument that even verbatim copying of text and plot does not entail a death of creativity.
Further, Frye argues that romantic, anti-conventional writers such as Walt Whitman tend to follow convention anyway. In criticism, the study of the archetypal phase of a symbol is akin to the "nature" perspective in the psychological debate over nature versus nurture. Rather than viewing the symbol as a unique achievement of the author or some inherent quality of the text, the archetypal phase situates the symbol in its society of literary kindred as a product of its conventional forebears.
Finally, Frye proposes an anagogic phase wherein a symbol is treated as a monad. The anagogic level of medieval allegory treated a text as expressing the highest spiritual meaning. For example, Dante's Beatrice in the Divine Comedy would represent the bride of Christ, i. e, the Catholic Church. Frye makes the argument that not only is there a lateral connection of archetypes through intertextuality, but that there is a transcendent almost spiritual unity within the body of literature.
Frye describes the anagogic in literature as "the imitation of infinite social action and infinite human thought, the mind of a man who is all men, the universal creative word which is all words.
Frye begins the essay regarding myth as the source of all literature as a visual, auditory and textual art formpaintings as visual art form and music as an auditory art form. The underlying structures and patterns of all these forms are similar, though they have a unique style of their own. as described in Great Chain of Being. The third essay is the culmination of Frye's theory in that it unites the elements of characterization and each of the five symbolic phases presented in the first two essays into an organic whole, an essay on criticism summary.
This whole is organized around a metaphor of human desire and frustration as manifested in the Great Chain of Being divine, an essay on criticism summary, human, animal, vegetable, mineral and water by analogy to the four seasons. At one pole we have apocalyptic imagery which typifies the revelation of heaven and ultimate fulfillment of human desire. In this state, the literary structure points toward unification of all things in a single analogical symbol.
The ultimate of the divine is the deity, of the human is Christ or any other being that embodies the oneness of humanity in its spiritual culminationof the animal is the lambof the vegetable is the Tree of Life or vineand of the mineral is the heavenly Jerusalem or city of God. At the opposite pole lies demonic imagery which typifies the unfulfillment, perversion, or opposition of human desire. In this state, things tend toward anarchy or tyranny. The divine is an angry, inscrutable God demanding sacrifice, the human is the tyrannical anti-Christthe animal is a predator such as a lionthe vegetable is the evil wood as found at the beginning of Dante's Inferno or Hawthorne's " Young Goodman Brown ", and the city is the dystopia embodied by Orwell 's or Kafka 's The Castle.
Great Chain of Being by Aristotle. unicornPhoenix. Finally we have the analogical imagery, or more simply, depictions of states that are similar to paradise or hellbut not identical. There is a great deal of variety in the imagery of these structures, but tame animals and wise rulers are common in structures analogical to the apocalyptic analogy of innocencewhile predatory aristocrats and masses living in squalor characterize analogy to the demonic analogy of experience.
Frye then identifies the mythical mode with the apocalyptic, the ironic with the demonic, and the romantic and low mimetic an essay on criticism summary their respective analogies. The high mimeticthen, occupies the center of all four. This ordering allows Frye to place the modes in a circular structure and point to the cyclical nature of myth and archetypes. In this setting, an essay on criticism summary, literature represents the natural cycle of birth, growth, an essay on criticism summary, decline, death, resurrectionrebirth, and the repetition of the cycle.
The remainder of the chapter deals with the cycle of the four seasons as embodied by four mythoi: comedyromancean essay on criticism summary, tragedyand irony or satire. In the first three essays, Frye deals mainly with the first three elements of Aristotle's elements of poetry i. mythos, ethos, dianoia. In the fourth essay, he explores the last three elements:.
Whereas mythos is the verbal imitation of action and dianoia the verbal imitation of thought ethos being composed of the twoan essay on criticism summary, melos and opsis with lexis composed of the two correspond, though seen from a different rhetorical perspective. Frye identifies the connection as such: "The world of social action and event. has a particularly strong association with the ear. The world of individual thought and idea has a correspondingly close connection with the eye.
Rhetoric means two things: ornamental opsis speech and persuasive melos speech. Rhetorical criticism, then, is the exploration of literature in the light of melos, opsis, and their interplay as manifested in lexis. The radical of presentation —the relation or idealized relation between author and audience—is a further consideration.
Difference in genre relies not on topical considerations science fiction, romance, mysterynor in length e.
An essay on criticism by Alexander Pope -- summary and analysis
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Essay #5 - Summary – Response OR Analysis of an Argument Length: – words Outlines due Wed, Dec 2 Final essay due Fri, Dec 4 Description of assignment: Choose one article from the list provided and prepare EITHER a summary – response OR an Analysis of Argument. A summary – response requires a complete summary of the original article followed by an analysis of areas from An Essay on Criticism, didactic poem in heroic couplets by Alexander Pope, first published anonymously in when the author was 22 years blogger.comgh inspired by Horace’s Ars poetica, this work of literary criticism borrowed from the writers of the Augustan blogger.com it Pope set out poetic rules, a Neoclassical compendium of maxims, with a combination of ambitious argument and great Alexander Pope's Essay on Criticism is an ambitious work of art written in heroic couplet. Published in , this poetic essay was a venture to identify and define his own role as a poet and a critic. He strongly puts his ideas on the ongoing question of if poetry should be natural or written as per the predetermined artificial rules set by the classical poets
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