A very short introduction to New Criticism

The New Criticism movement surged in the US during the mid 20th century. It's primary focus: the unity and integration of literary works. We can sum the purpose of new criticism up like this: the treatment of literature as an aesthetic object- void of all historical, political, social implications. That said, the focus of the new critics is on the interactions of verbal features, such as ambiguity, paradox, irony, connotation and imagery. Techniques used include "close reading". The "intentional fallacy" demands a reading of the text without any attention given to the personal biography of the author. Some well-known new critics include Cleanth Brooks, John Crowe Ransom, William K Wimsatt and Robert Penn Warren.

The Depth of Don Quixote: Two Portraits

Nabokov agrees with Aristotle's assertions in 'Poetics': "Tragedy wears better than comedy" (Nabokov 13). We see in the protagonists of our novel the embodiment of both: Sancho, whose prescense offers comedic relief, and "The Knight of the Mournful Countenance": blatantly the embodiment of tradgedy itself. With his face sunken and withered, and his under-fed body, he looks like a tradgedy. His armor is worn and moldy, his horse is less than valiant looking.
But his behavior works in complete opposition to pathetic appearance.

He speaks exquisitlely, is courteous
and respectful, and carries himself with utmost confidence. Nabokov spells it out and I agree; Don Quixote is "a hero in the truest sense of the word" (Nabokov 16).

We have the confident, courteous, and chivalric Don Quixote, but he exists in conjuntion with the madman Don Quijote. His elegance is subject at any given moment to fits of utter insanity. In his portrait of Don Quixote, Nabokov provides a complete analysis of "that basic madness of his". Before he went mad, he was a simple and kind country gentleman... a completely different character from his complex transformation into Don Quixote, who replaces Senor Alonso when he vows to commit his life to the pursuits of knight errantry. Later he renounces this commitment,cursing it as the cause of his ruination, and completeing the tradgedy of the novel.

Most readers, myself included, might read Nabokov's lectures and doubt his claim that Don Quijote is a tragic figure and the novel is a tradgedy. I was scanning for sarcasm as I went through them, wondering if Nabokov was seriously insisting that there is nothing funny about the plight of Don Quijote (this, again, coming from a girl who was laughing out loud by herself in her bedroom as she followed each outrageous episode of the knight and his squire). After speaking with Dr. Sexson yesterday, though, and re-reading the lectures as well, I am starting to consider Nabokov's point. From the day he devotes himself to "the colorful calling of knight errantry... with all it's brilliant visions, emotions and acts", he is ridiculed, taken advantage of, and mocked... and that's putting it lightly. All that befalls him henceforth is hurtful. Furthermore, he is viewed by those around him as insane: this is a highly debateable topic. Is our hero really insane? Or is he a man on a mission with a wild imagination who is constantly the victim of wicked trickery? His world, the world of the novel, is an ambigious world of reality and illusion. One can never know.

Nabokov recalls this conversation between Don Quixote and his squire, which, when as I consider it again outside of the adventure of the novel, allows me to understand his tragedy.
"How is it possible for you to have accompanied me all this time without coming to perceive that all the things that have to do with knight-errantry appear to be mad, foolish, and fantastic... Not that they are so in reality: it is simply that there are always a lot of enchanters going about among us, changing things and giving them a deceitful appearance, directing them as suits their fancy, depending upon whether they wish to favor or destroy us". (I wonder if Sancho even understands this nobel speech!) And actually now, re-reading that statement as i write it down, i feel tears brimming in my eyes because that is Don Quixote's world, and really it is our world too. That is the tragic sense of life. That there is always evil and people inspired by evil that are working to bring us down. "Enchanters among us" with deceitful intentions. I thought the tragedy of Don Quixote arose at the end of the novel when he renounces knight errantry, but it actually comes into play from the minute he commits himself to it. Sancho is there for comedic relief. But Don Quixote is alone in his world and troubled by his perceptions of the world around him which he sees as his duty to defend. It is outrageously honorable for him to accept this task in the first place, the task of weighing reality and illusion and defending madness and himself against the immoral attacks of the evil he encounters. And Don Quixote is a literary hero for attempting it, but in the end, even he cannot complete it. That is the great tragedy of this novel.

As for the role of Sancho "Pig Belly" Panza, we can't consider him a complete fool or simpleton- the things that come out of his mouth are far too clever at times to diminish him with those names- but he is certainly outshined by his master and foil, Don Quixote. Where as Sancho Panza is "a product of generalization" (Nabokov 20), Don Quixote is the emblem of individuality. In Nabokov's opinion his most human trait is his unfailing love and devotion to his master. He recalls a speech of Sancho's in the novel where he puts my exact thoughts into words about our hero: "Why, damn me, how your grace does manage to say everything here just the way it should be said, and how well you work that Knight of the Mournful Countenance into the signature!" (Nabokov 20). That is exactly what I think as I marvel over the impressive rhetoric and wisdom of the man of la mancha. In analyzing the two main characters of the great novel, Nabokov sets up his main point (which has been stressed and mulled over in LitCrit this semester) that they represent two ways of looking at the world: "The explication of critical attitudes toward the two heroes lies, I suspect, in the fact that all readers can be separated into Don Quixotes and Sancho Panzas" (Nabokov 24).

Nabokov gives brief attention later to the structural devices of the novel, but he only points them out and goes no further. In his opinion, there is nothing to praise regarding the technique of the novel, which would be nothing if it weren't for the character it takes it's title from. "Don Quixote has been called the greatest novel ever written. This, of course, is nonsense." (GASP!) "...but it's hero, whose personality is a stroke of genius on the part of Cervantes, looms so wonderfully above the skyline of literature... that the book lives and will live through the sheer vitality that Cervantes has injected into the main character of a very patchy haphazard tale, which is saved from falling apart only by its creator's wonderful artisitic intuition that has his Don Quixote go into action at the right moments of the story" (Nabokov 29). Now, Nabokov has a way of turning your mind over. Every point he makes about the novel is brilliant and true, and not at all what anyone would initially consider upon reading it. But this novel is nothing without it's hero, think about it, if Cervantes had wrote any less of a madman into the lead role, would anybody be interested in this jolty ensemble of outrageous episodes. Don Quixote is that dynamic of a character, not only does he pull the novel together, but he has allowed it to endure as "the greatest novel of all time" in many reader's eyes. And Nabokov's goal in these lectures is not to disillusion readers as far as the integrity of this novel, but really to give credit where credit is due, I think. Cervantes isn't the greatest writer of all time, he was a struggling playright who barely knew fame until he created Don Quixote. He didn't write the best novel of all time, but perhaps the best character. Don Quixote of La Mancha: "A hero in the truest sense of the word".

Real Life And Fiction

Like Frye and Dr. Sexson, Nabokov began his lectures on Don Quixote with a warning to "avoid the fatal error of looking for so-called 'real-life' in novels" ("Lectures on Don Quixote" Nabokov 1). We are not to try to discern fact from fiction or vice versa in any novel. A fairy tale is a fairy tale that takes place in it's own world, and therefore cannot really speak to the world of the reader, which he considers to be his reality.

But, if we are honest with ourselves, all realities are tainted by fiction. Which is why as a preface to his lectures Nabokov warns the listener that "there is no use looking in these books for detailed factual representation of so-called 'real-life'" (Nabokov 2). In this way, the when and where of Don Quixote have no real importance. The "where" is Spain, but a ficticious Spain. The time period is the early 17th century, but the events are fictious. Nabokov gives a very breif introduction to the when and where of the book, as well as general criticism, the author introduction, and form... brief enough to answer any general questions, but then he veers away from "generalities", and casts them all aside to deal with the hero of the novel. With all predictable questions about the "real life" of the novel answered, he can freely begin to discuss "fiction": beginning with the portraits of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza.

At The End of Don Quixote: the book and the man

Even with an awareness of what was revealed in our class discussions about the end of Don Quixote, I still couldn't imagine our knight renouncing his life's quest. Even through the chapter where he is defeated by the knight of the white moon, i still didn't expect Don Quixote to submit to his orders and return to his village. Not very Quixotic! But I knew, on page 893, that our hero was lost, at this moment: "You sound very philisophical, Sancho... and you speak very wisely". What?!!? Did he just call Sancho Panza wise? That's when I knew that my hero was lost, and oh what a loss! Starting in chapter 66, just after his encounter with the knight of the white moon, this novel plummeted from hightly comedic to utterly tragic... all in the span of a few chapters, until his death. Even despite our revealing class discussions I did not expect Don Quixote to really renounce kniight errantry or to die, but its true, the end result is both. In chapter 66 there is still hope, because when he speaks of going into seclusion- his year sabatical from knight errantry- he says to Sancho "in that seclusion we shall sgather new strength to return to the practice of arms, which will never be forgotten by me" (894). But by the last chapter he has worsened to the point of cursing the "practice of arms" forever ("now all the profane histories of knight errantry have become hateful to me... I despise them) and, most tragic to me, saying they were a waste of his life. That is a painful statement. Almost 900 pages of thrill, adventure, passion- all a waste? That, to me, was the most tragic part of our hero's demise. When he says (p. 935) "My judgement is restored, free and clear of the dark shadows of ignorance imposed on it by my grievous and constant reading of detestable books of chivalry. I now recognize their absurdities and deceptions, and my sole regret is that this realization has come so late it does not leave me time to compensate by reading other books that can be a light to the soul". Other books? Is this my same Don Quixote? No it's not. He has lost his honor and self-dignity. No longer the "knight errant, daring and brave", he has transformed into an "ordinary gentleman" (NOOOO!) lacking the confidence, lacking those dignified self-introductions I loved so much! He actually asks Sancho to respond for him, doubting his own judgment and competency. The end of Don Quixote had me in tears, for the loss of a hero. I feel as disenchanted as Dulcinea, whom he sought throughout the entire book to no end.

In Memory of WB Yeats

I looked this poem up on google because Sexson cited the beautiful last lines after my presentation, reminding us that poetry is meant to praise, and that a defense of poetry is, effectively, it's praise. Here is the poem in its entireity.

This is the poet WH Auden who wrotet "In Memory of WB Yeats". Not surprisingly, he was greatly influenced by William Blake.
http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15544

For some reason, when i searched for this poem i was bombarded by website from church groups. Its been used in an large amount of sermons.

More term paper support via Don Quijote

I would like to include a few more parts from Don Quixote that take place in one of the episodes I used in my term paper, that is, "regarding what befell Don Quixote with a prudent knight of La Mancha" (Cervantes 550). That prudent knight being the man in the green coat. This episode is chock full of material that defends not only poetry, but specifically, english majors and student poets! Because, to reiterate, the man in the green coat is venting to Don Quixote about his frustrations with his son, who "isn't as good as he would like him to be" due to his choice of studies, which is Latin and Greek Languages. His father sees this as a complete waste of time, and is frustrated that instead of moving onto other areas of knowledge, he continues to read and debate books and poetry. Don Quixote advises him that although it is true that "poetry is less useful than pleasurable" (Cervantes 556). He echoes everything we've heard from subsequent defenders of poetry this semester, saying that "art does not surpass nature but perfects it; therefore, when nature is mixed with art, and art with nature, the result is a perfect poet" (557). And in his conclusion- and this is the big line for all us english majors- Don Quixote defends our field of study, praising the man's son for having "already successfully climbed the first essential step, which is languages, with them he will, on his own, mount to the summit of human letters, which are so admirable in a gentleman" (557)

Term paper posted

In Praise of Poetry: My Inspiration in Literature

"This purifying of wit-this enriching of memory, enabling of judgment, and enlarging of conceit-which commonly called learning, under what name soever it come forth, or to what immediate end soever it be directed, the final end is to lead and draw us to as high a perfection as our degenerate souls, made worse by their clayey lodging, can be capable of."
Sir Philip Sidney

To Inform. To take. To create. By means of my education I have come and will continue to come into my own. Learning has led me to an awareness of my own passion for poetry, and thus, passion for life: of what I need and where I need to go in my life. This quote from Sir Phillip Sidney’s “Defense of Poetry” succeeds in expressing expresses in words what, naturally, I could not, and so stood out from the entire essay to me, and this entire course, as a summary of what I’ve been mulling over in my mind for so long: the beauty of knowledge, education, information: the poetry of wisdom. It is through this journey of learning that I have and will continue to confront the best version of myself.
I would like to model that ideal version of myself on that ingenious hidalgo Don Quixote of La Mancha, a hero by my standards, and in a sense that is completely un-pared in all literature I’ve encountered. Senor Quixote begins his quest when he dedicates himself to the pursuits of knight errantry; he makes it his mission to imitate the language of his books. It takes an understanding and appreciation of literature (which I harbor in my heart as an English major) to consider this mission as one of utmost honor, and not in the least bit farce. In fact I envy our hero for boasting this as his life’s mission: to live himself into his books. Don Quixote speaks of himself and his adventures in the style of the books of chivalry that have ransacked his mind. Oh, that Don Quixote would ransack my mind and invoke me to speak in this high rhetoric so long ago lost! Even if everyone I encounter on my journey thinks me mad, that I would pay it no mind, like our hero. I have wistful notions of adopting Don Quixote’s mission and his rhetoric, but alas, I cannot even read his words out-loud and sound convincing, much less invent my own discourse. I suppose I fear those accusations of madness that the Knight of La Mancha handles so gracefully. That I would be so graceful, this Knight is my hero! The high-rhetoric and wit and wisdom via madness that Don Quixote possesses, his delightfully dignified manner of presenting himself: I envy the hidalgo for all these heroic qualities.
As different as I am from Don Quixote in some respects (those listed in the previous sentence, for instance), I feel smugly similar to him in others. We both have our books, of course (that is we share a dependence on literature). And we have something else, too.
I recall one of many episodes where the knight defends himself and his profession, in Chapter 13 of the First Part, after Don Quixote has met a group of goatherds on the road and is traveling with them to a funeral. One of the travelers they encounter en route to the burial begins to interrogate Don Quixote about his purpose in the land, to which he reiterates his usual elegant explanation of his mission as a knight errant. They immediately consider him mad, both for his exuberant undertaking and equally exuberant way of relating it. They continue to inquire, so as to gauge exactly how mad he is. Don Quixote speaks to them of great knights and soldiers of the past like King Arthur, and then audaciously praises theses knights as more valiant than priests and religious men, because they actively defend the morality that priests only speak about. “In this way we are ministers of God on earth, the arms by which His justice is put into effect on earth” (Cervantes 88). It’s an outrageous claim, I know, but I would defend the poets in the exact same way, including myself: the poets represent the divine in art. Further on in the book, Don Quixote gets another chance to explain lend his knightly wisdom and opinions to a stranger he meets on the road- this time a man in a green coat, with a son studying languages in university. The man in the green coat confesses that he is troubled by his son’s coursework, which he hardly considers to be an “area of knowledge” worth studying. Don Quixote does a better job than I can of defending his son’s choice of curriculum, as well as defining anagogy and praising the poet, explaining that the natural poet, “with that inclination granted to him by heaven, with no further study or artifice composes things that prove the truthfulness of the man who said: Est Dues in nobis” (Cervantes 557). God is in us.
Outrageous. Extravagant. Over-the-top. How could I compare myself to that ingenious knight of La Mancha? I suppose I aim to model myself off of this man just as he does those warriors in his beloved books of chivalry. And since the imaginative Don Quixote makes a far better symbol of poetry than he does a knight errant anyway, maybe it’s not that outrageous.
And so I declare that I am an English major, “the kind, as people say, who go to seek adventures” (Cervantes 553), and like my hero, I am willing to leave my home and comfort and “throw myself into the arms of Fortune so that she may carry me wherever she chooses” that I might “fulfill a good part of my desire” (Cervantes 553). While our desires may differ- his being “to revive a long-dead knight errantry”, and mine to praise and defend the madness of such characters and exuberance in literature- I can only hope that one day I will arrive at a place where I am so “obliged to sing my own praises” as impressively and eloquently as my hero of La Mancha.

My "Touchstone" Moment

Since I became a declared "English Major", I've reached countless epiphanies via "touchstone" passages that we discussed in class pertaining to matthew arnold's essay. But the first work that ever had a memorable and lasting literary impact on me was Rilke's "Letters to a Young Poet", that I talked about in a previous blog. However I'm unable to single out just one touchstone moment from the letters, they're all too important and relevant! here are the ones that I hold the most dear:

"Things are not at all so comprehensible and expressible as one would mostly have us believe; most events are inexpressible, taking place in a realm which no word has ever entered, and more inexpressible than all else are works of art, mysterious existences, the life of which, while ours passes away, endures" (chapter 1)

"Everything is gestation and then birthing. To let each impression and each embryo of a feeling come to completion, entirely in itself, in the dark, in the unsayable, the unconscious, beyond the reach of one's own understanding, and with deep humility and patience to wait for the hour when a new clarity is born: this alone is what it means to live as an artist: in understanding as in creating." (ch. 3)

"You are so young, so before all beginning, and I want to beg you, as much as I can...to be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer." (ch. 4)

"Only be attentive to that which rises up in you and set it above everything that you observe about you. What goes on in your innermost being is worthy of your whole love." (ch. 6)

"Were it possible for us to see further than our knowledge reaches, perhaps we would endure our sadnesses with greater confidence than our joys. For they are moments when something new has entered into us, something unknown." (ch 8)

"The Marriage of Heaven and Hell"

Keeping with the theme of Reason vs. Passion, I'd like to now apply it to the ideology of my critic, William Blake, who wrote an entire epic poem addressing this battle.

"The Marriage of Heaven and Hell" tells of an epic descent into hell in the vein of Dante's "Inferno" and Milton's "Paradise Lost". However, Blake's Heaven and Hell in this book are completely reversed from Dante's or Milton's, where Hell is depicted as a burning torture chamber and Heaven a perfect paradise. Blake's Heaven is, effectively, the terrain of the reality principle, and Hell a land where passion reigns. Blake's obvious defense of Hell is testimony to his philosophies as a poet and critic: that all of life should be drawn from imagination, energy, and passion.

Reason vs. Passion

Our discussions lately in class of Negative Capability brought to mind a poem that meant a lot to me by Kahlil Gibran. It was after reading this poem some years ago that I first acknowledged the existence of that internal struggle between reason and passion that we experience as humans. Before I think I understood it religiously, as a conflict between God's will and Satan's within us, or simpler put, Good vs. Evil. And this poem really opened my eyes to the true struggle, and beautifully depicted I might add. There are almost thirty poems included in this book, "The Prophet", each addressing a different trial of being human, but this was without question my favorite....

Reason and Passion

And the priestess spoke again and said: 'Speak to us of Reason and Passion.'

And he answered saying:

Your soul is oftentimes a battlefield, upon which your reason and your judgment wage war against passion and your appetite.

Would that I could be the peacemaker in your soul, that I might turn the discord and the rivalry of your elements into oneness and melody.

But how shall I, unless you yourselves be also the peacemakers, nay, the lovers of all your elements?

Your reason and your passion are the rudder and the sails of your seafaring soul.

If either your sails or our rudder be broken, you can but toss and drift, or else be held at a standstill in mid-seas.

For reason, ruling alone, is a force confining; and passion, unattended, is a flame that burns to its own destruction.

Therefore let your soul exalt your reason to the height of passion; that it may sing;

And let it direct your passion with reason, that your passion may live through its own daily resurrection, and like the phoenix rise above its own ashes.

I would have you consider your judgment and your appetite even as you would two loved guests in your house.

Surely you would not honour one guest above the other; for he who is more mindful of one loses the love and the faith of both.

Among the hills, when you sit in the cool shade of the white poplars, sharing the peace and serenity of distant fields and meadows - then let your heart say in silence, 'God rests in reason.'

And when the storm comes, and the mighty wind shakes the forest, and thunder and lightning proclaim the majesty of the sky, - then let your heart say in awe, 'God moves in passion.'

And since you are a breath In God's sphere, and a leaf in God's forest, you too should rest in reason and move in passion.

-Kahlil Gibran, "The Prophet"

This is a theme we encounter a lot in literature. As we discussed in class, there is a war between the pleasure principle and the reality principle, what we should do and what we want to do. Depending on what we obide by, we fall into two categories. There are the Don Quijotes, who adhere to the pleasure principle and our desires, who see the world but see something else, too. And then there are the Sancho Panzas, the realists, who adhere to the reality principle.

Nabokov: "Quit Laughing at Don Quixote!"

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9400E3DF153BF930A25751C0A965948260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1

Vladimir nabokov taught a series of lectures on Don Quixote as part of a humanities survey course that he was teaching at Harvard in 1952. The lectures on Don Quixote were meant to serve as an introduction to the rest of the course. This article from the New York Times about Nabokov's obsession with the literary hero explains well his belief that Don Quixote is taken too lightly, that we shouldn't laught so much at his misfortune's (I am VERY guilty of this!) It is not meant to be a heartwarming novel, but rather a heart wrenching one. I will explain this in more depth after i finish the lectures, but this article makes a good introduction!

Mad-man of La Mancha

Last november when i was studying in spain, we made a trip to barcelona which coincided perfectly with an exhibit in the cultural museum there of the spanish artist Salvador Dali's private collection of paintings. There was one room of the exhibit that was completely devoted to Dali's interpretations and art paying homage to the literary hero Don Quijote. The paintings were beautiful, and they mean more to me now after having read don quixote. i wanted to share a few here:

"The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom"

We cited this quote from William Blake in class today. When I went looking for it online I found a quote of his that I thought summed up the anagogic mindset even better:

“The man who never in his mind and thoughts travel'd to heaven is no artist.” (Blake)

That sounds like exactly what we're getting at with this religious, woo-woo, idea of art and poetry in the anagogic phase. But anyways, back to Blake, he's my critic but I hadn't done any research on him yet, only a list of questions about his criticism that I had intentions of researching and getting the answers to eventually. But, today was the last straw. Every single time we mention Blakes name, it is followed by excess or exhuberance and I can't stand it any more! I need to know what the connection is here between Blake and excess, exhuberance, what does this mean! For starters, dicitonary and thesaurus: exhuberance, because truth be told, i'm not sure i exactly know what that word indicates in it's most literal form, so before applying it to Blake's mentality, dictionary definition:

http://www.yourdictionary.com/exuberance

Of all the synonyms, the one i grasped best was "enthusiasm", which we etymologically traced to mean "in theos" , "in god" as in overtook by the spirit of god, which makes since in this context, the exhuberance of art, the religious aspect of art.

exhuberant: joyously unrestrained or enthusiastic

sounds like rhapsody to me. I imagine the behavior of an exhuberant person as sparking a lot of sideways glances and "woo-woo" critiques. Which leads me to some Blake artwork I found (apparently he was as famous a painter and engraver as he was a poet!)

The abundance of William Blake paintings out there really surprised me, first because i've always heard of William Blake in the context of poetry and had no idea he was a painter/engraver as well and second because these painting are OUT THERE, exhuberant, OVER-THE-TOP, wooo wooooooooo............

((More on Blake to come))

Hymn to Intellectual Beauty

http://www.bartleby.com/236/71.html

Someone brought this up to class today, and I made a note to myself to look it up (special thanks to bartelby.com- a warehouse of essays and poetry for the romantics!) Here is yet another testimony to the anagogic mindset and the unseen powers that move us... the "IT" Heather was eluding to in her blog:

"It visits with inconstant glance

Each human heart and countenance"

We said in class today that anagogy is "almost a rememberance" A rememberance of what? This is an idea I hope to explore a little more in the coming discussions in class, but regardless it is echoed in this hymn by Shelley..

"I call the phantoms of a thousand hours

Each from his voiceless grave"

And lo and behold! A reference even to the "woo-woo" moment that accompanies these anagogic revalations....

"Of life, at that sweet time when winds are wooing

All vital things ..."

Haha I think i'm just kidding about that one. That's wooing singular, I think it is distinct from "woo-wooing"

As for my favorite line in this gorgeous hymn:

"O awful LOVELINESS,

Wouldst give whate’er these words cannot express."

Ode on a Grecian Urn

In reading the first few sentences of the first Keat's letter on the web site that Sexson sent out to us- that on the "Authenticity of Imagination"- I immediately recalled this very important poem of his that we looked at in classic literature while studying greek mythology: "Ode on a Grecian Urn"

http://www.bartleby.com/101/625.html

Wow!

Re-reading this for the first time in almost 2 years- since Classical Lit Spring 07- I recall how much this poem moved me the first time I read it, oh! These lines in particular...

For ever warm and still to be enjoy'd,

For ever panting, and for ever young;

All breathing human passion far above,

That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloy'd,

A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.

There's Anagogical for you! As we reviewed in class today, Anagogy is a wording of the highest thoughts, the highest thing imagineable. In works of art, like this grecian urn, beauty is preserved for all time as it cannot be in reality, which is why Keats and the other anagogists defend that poetry and art are above reality, because while nature's beauty changes, conforms, and dies out, beauty and truth are preserved in art and therefore better and ever-lasting.

'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all

Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.'

Rhapsody to Rilke

I liked how we used that word in class on Friday, discussing how both Sidney and Shelley's Defenses are rhapsodic in nature. I was intrigued by that beautiful word so i made a note to myself to look it up when I got home. Rhapsodic (dictionary definition): extravagantly emotional. Is it just me or is the literal, dictionary definition sounding pretty poetic there? Extravagantly Emotional. That's how I like my literature! I don't like literature laid out as math: none of these "how does X function in the text" analytical inquiries. I just want to be moved by something extravagantly emotional. Like Sidney, Like Shelley, where the poet is the "great legislator of morality".

One of the great Rhap-ers i've encountered in my literature experience and who has impacted me the most has been the German poet Rainer Maria Rilke, whose prose piece "Letters to a Young Poet" I have returned to time and time again in times of loneliness and anxiety. As I am re-reading the letters right now, the mention of his work in our recent Northrop Frye reading assignment- the anagogic phase- was one of those classic instances of synchronization that seem fall on english majors at least 3 times as often as the average human being. Although, the "Letters" are the only literature by Rilke I have read (so far), it has offered me more comfort and been more valuable to me than anything else they've handed me in school. It is extravagance and exhuberance and emotion: it is poetry as religion, which is why Frye employs him as an example in the anagogic phase, where literature is thought to express the highest spiritual meaning. "Anagogic Criticism is usually found in direct connection to religion, and is to be discovered chiefly in the more uninhibited utterances of the poets themselves" (Frye 122). For Rilke art and poetry are the essence of life. I tried to see if I could figure out exactly which passage in the letters Frye refers to on that same page, 123, where he uses Rilke's idea of the poet "revealing a perspective of reality like that of an angel", and if it is taken out of "Letters to a Young Poet", I think it must be here in the sixth letter, where he advises the young poet to "think, dear sir, of the world you carry within you... be attentive to that which risses up in you and set it above everything" and then, the spiritual revelation of the poet:

"As the bees bring in the honey, so do we fetch the sweetest out of everything
and build Him. With the trivial, even with the insignificant (if it but happens
out of love) we make a start...with everything we do alone...we begin him"
(Rilke)

Effectively, the poet builds god, he and god are one. Anagogic may be the only one of the 5 symbolic phases i'm clear on, thanks to the Rilke allusion.

This will probably be the first of several blogs focusing on connections in Frye with Rilke.

If you haven't read it yet, go read it now, because I think no matter what point you're at in your life this book will spark lightbulbs and passions, or at the very least be helpful and comforting. I reccomend it to any and everyone!

Polemics, Apologetics

Frye preludes "Anatomy of Criticism" with a polemic introductions- having come across this term on more than one occasion in the study of lit crit, i had to wiki the definition, just to be clear on what we were referring to. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatomy_of_Criticism (see "polemic introduction"). What makes Anatomy of Criticism polemic? Polemic is defined as "the practice of disputing religious, philosophical, or political matters"- in other words, the "touchy" subject, the ones which, as we said in class, you NEVER bring up. So a polemic text, than, like Anatomy of Criticism, seeks to dispute a theory that is seemingly indisputable. That's Frye for you, going above and beyond mere dispute.

Curiously enough (leave it to the genius of wikipedia- one thing leads to another, link after link of synchronization), the definition for polemic included it's antonym: Apologia. As in Apologetics. Apologists argue for, rather than against, those touchy theories. Apologia is Frye= polemics. Sidney/ Shelley= apologetics. Anyways, i thought it was quite interesting that Frye and Sidney are by definition, opposites, both in style and in school of thought, since that was the initial impression I got in reading and comparing their works.

Myth of the Declining Ages

http://www.mythology.us/ovid_metamorphoses_book_1.htm

I posted this link primarily so that the class would have access to Ovid's "Myth of the Declining Ages" which we have seen referenced in Sidney's Essay, Frye, and frequently in class. However, a rereading of the following, the opening lines of Book 1 of Ovid's Metamorpheses, recalls Sexson's words in our class discussion this afternoon (or, I suppose that technically Sexson was recalling Ovid):

"I want to speak about bodies changed into new forms. You, gods, since you
are the ones who alter these, and all other things, inspire my attempt, and spin
out a continuous thread of words, from the world's first origins to my own
time."

This is, essentially, the idea that all poems are made out of other poems; all stories are a retelling; all literature is displaced myth: this is the assertion at the heart of Frye's theories on literary criticism. And lo and behold, it's Ovid! Amazing....

Check out the Myth of the declining ages, which recalls another part of our class discussion today, that of scripture and the religious interpretation of myth. Frye says that all literature is an extension of myth and you will see outlined in the myth of the declining ages the story of the fall of the man in the Bible (followed by Jupiter attempting to destroy the world with a flood. Biblical?)

And that's just the beginning...

Apology for Criticism

Admittedly, I've been feeling incredibly bitter towards the subject of criticism and critics of all categories in the last week... a condition that was probably brought on by the density of Frye and complemented by the criticism of films in my MTA class and the incessant picking apart of literature in my other survey classes for english lit. Reading Sidney's "Apology for Poetry" has been a complete relief in light of all this criticism, to encounter some literature that holds poetry up for it's beauty regardless of symbols, tones, genres, etc- "art for art's sake"-this is the attitude I want to uphold in regards to literature, the attitude of of Shelley.
However, I came across a passage today in Frye that struck me for it's convincing argument for criticism- so convincing that I had sort one of those lightbulb moments where it all came together: This is why criticism is so important!
It happened on Page 87 in the theory of symbols essay. Citing the example of the Bible as the inevitability of a sacred book and commentary on it's contents, Frye asserts that "when a poetic structure attains a certain degree of concentration or social recognition, the amount of commentary (read: criticism) that it will attain is infinite" (Frye 88). The analogies that follow to explain the inevitability and need for the critic, such as that of the scientist who is able to make theories about phenomenas in the universe that he cannot see or count, gave me the insight i needed to grasp this idea: "there is no occasion for wondering... how one small poet's head can carry the amount of wit, wisdom, instruction, and significance that Shakespeare and Dante have given the world" (Frye 88). And just like that I can't debate the relevance of criticism any more. As the poet's words, however beautiful they may be, are open to infinite interpretations and reactions, there is a case for criticism.

A Visionary Critic

William Blake: November 28, 1757- August 12, 1827

http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5935

Wow. In reading the briefest of brief summaries of the life of William Blake I can already say that I get it. I understand Sexson's insistence on the importance of this man to literary criticism. And that is just from the summary. I've yet to read this man's work (which goes beyond just poetry) and see what everybody's talking about. Additionally, a while back when I first wiki-ed Northrop Frye for information on "Anatomy of Criticism", I was linked to his biography (Frye) in which I discovered, in the first few sentences of the wiki-bio, that William Blake was one of Frye's primary influences. In fact, it was "The insights gained from his study of Blake" that "set Frye on his critical path,and shaped his contributions to literary criticism and theory" (wikipedia, Northrop Frye). Statements such as this suggest that in our thorough studies of the theories of Northrop Frye, we have been, effectively, studying William Blake all along. "Anatomy of Criticism" was inspired by Frye's works on Blake.

Blake's philosophy is in the vein of our favorite romantics: imagination above reason, exhuberance: "His poetic and artistic work is characterized by a unique commitment to imagination as opposed to reason, and the visionary, almost terrifying, and sometimes grotesque nature of his subject matter" (William Blake- poets.org) And I would go further as to say not only by exhuberant ideas, but also an exhuberant manner of presentation of these ideas: in "illuminated manunscripts"- text, engravings, illustrations all intertwined.

"I must create a system or be enslaved by another man's" said Blake. Isn't this the cyclical thought behind the chapters in Frye we are studying now?

I've read a bit about Blake as a poet and painter thus far, but i've yet to look into his role as a critic. Although I suppose that these roles are really one in the same.

Tautologically Speaking...

I started reading Frye's second essay on the theory of symbols after class on Monday, with the subject of Tautology fresh on the brain. After our discussion about how this circular speaking is utilized by everyone from children trying to make reason, to the politicians we talked about in class, to GOD! We mentioned passages in the Bible that are tautological. I wonder if in an effort to express some ideas that are just too big to wrap the human mind around we can't help but resort to what ends up being repetition.
I think that literary criticism would be one such idea. Actually, when I was first getting into the theory of symbols, my initial thought was "Is this how you have to write in order to express a theory without a trace of tautology?" and, if so, what hope is there for the rest of us!
That was initially, as I read further I started to make note of some sentences that, within some very dense and meticulous passages, sound right repetitive... in Frye. For example, in "Literal and descriptive phases: symbol as motif and sign", I was a little stunned after reading this one:
"Poetic images do not state or point to anything, but, by pointing to eachother, they suggest or inform the mood that informs the poem" (Frye 81). Now, that sounds circular to me. But I'm sure a critic like Frye would never implore such a pathetic principle in his work.
Am I not getting the right idea of what Tautology is?
A wiki-search for the definition asks me to be a little more specific.... do I want to define tautology in regards to rhetoric or tautology in logic. I assume for our classes purposes, the rhetorical version. But just out of curiosity, what's the difference?
Tautology (rhetoric) is what we were making fun of Sarah Palin for in class- that is, the unecessary repetition of an idea; using different words to say the same thing twice. People who implore this rhetoric technique end up sounding either a)confusing, b) like children or c) like idiots. Rhetorical tautology can be logical if the sentence illustrates a truth, but it will usually be a completely useless assertions (wiki ex: "If you can't find it, you're not looking in the right place). Basically tautoloy in rhetoric is always going to be useless, senseless, or unecessary.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tautology
As for tautology in logic- tautology that actually points to the truth and gets you somewhere.... that's a concept for the mathmeticians.

Music, Sweet Music

Weeding through the second essay of Northrop Frye's "Anatomy of Criticism" I found myself becoming incredibly frustrated- frustration which began with me simply having to call my attention back to the words in front of me repeatedly as I started to zone out, unable to absorb the complex ideology, and eventually progressed into me having to control urges to just throw the book out of my sight. Call it critical overload. I'm taking 15 credits right now, and all 15 of them are reliant on criticism. I suppose that since there has been art there has been criticism; poetry, novels, films: these are highly influential genres and everybody has their opinion to voice. But Frye, Frye takes it- I've got to be honest- a little overboard sometimes. Truth be told i'm getting pretty annoyed here...But then again I'm probably just trying to compensate for or excuse not being able to understand him half the time...this feeble mind.....


But in the most recent reading of Frye, in between those "overboard" passages, I did happen upon some analogies that gave me some clarity. Fresh off of this newfound "understanding" of Frye (a vague understanding, but thats better than my previous state), I was very grateful for the "lightbulb" moments assignment we recieved in class today. In the last couple of days I've had a few to contribute!


It started for me in the description of the formal phase in the theory of symbols. (The formal phase which coincides with the New Critic's school of thought, which I'm to adopt for the final project), wherein Frye suggests the analogy of music as a way of understanding the roles of form and imagery in text. "The average audience at a symphony knows very little about sonata form, and misses practically all the subtleties detected by an analysis of the score; yet those subtleties are really there, and as the audience can hear everything that is being played, it gets them all as a part of a linear experience; the awareness is less concious, but not less real. The same is true of the response to the imagery of a highly poetic drama."

As with Walter Pater ("All the arts aspire to music") and Rilke ("Language where all language ends"), nothing proves more infallible an analogy than that of Music.

Comparing Criticisms

I'm fulfilling the last of my core credits this semester- the "A" credit, the "arts" credit- in an Media and Theatre Arts program 100 level class called "Movies in America", in which we've been dealing largely with movie criticism since the debut of cinema in the US until the present day. Many of the theories behind critiquing movies allign with those I've encountered before in literature classes. Movies to me, aren't a big deal. I'm not obsessed or passionate about them like, say, my brother, who is an MTA major and can relate every little daily scenario to some cinematic moment. He's got a lot to say about all the details of a film: the lighting, the sound, the cinematography, directing, editing, etc... but I've been paying a lot of attention to his rants and raves lately as well as those of my professor in MTA101 and kind of inwardly comparing and contrasting Movie criticism and Literary criticism. Well, I know it could be argued that film criticism IS literary criticism, since movies can be considered literature. Many are based on books and all rely on a script, a written play-by-play of the film. Tuesday, we were discussing the "Auteur" theory in regards to the movie Citizen Kane, which we then watched in class. I know from American Lit that this movie is regarded as an American masterpiece and a milestone in cinematic history. http://www.filmreference.com/encyclopedia/Academy-Awards-Crime-Films/Auteur-Theory-and-Authorship.html

Essentially, this "Auteur" or "author" theory proposes that the director of a film is like the author of a novel; permeating his artistic vision through the scenes of a movie like a novelist does through the words in a book. That we appreciate art because of the artist, that the voice of the artist comes through in the finished product. But this is a tricky theory to apply to the film genre,because how can you call the director the artist when a whole team of people go into the movie-making process? I tried to consider these ideas in light of some of Frye's ideas about literary criticism. So much more goes into an artistic body of work- be it film, novel, poem, painting- than just the words on the page, which are essentially just symbols. Although I do think that the author of a novel has a lot more responsibility for the finished product than the director of a film, who collaborates with a whole team of other artists to produce the final film. In some movies, it is the cinematography that really stands out, in others the score, and still others the acting. These elements don't come into play in a novel or poetry, or do they? One way I considered it was that the words on the pages of a novel are like a script, and the reader's interpretation is like a performance, in which sense, we're more responsible for our understanding or interpretation of the book than the author. Compare, contrast. Compare, contrast. These are other ways I'm finding to consider this complicated concept of criticism.

That is like, SOO American!

A couple of weeks ago in class, we were having a discussion in class that brought us to a discussion on the decline of rhetoric, which really peaked my interest. Sexson talked about the "Language of Chaos"and the ideas of the italian philosopher Giambattista Vico (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giambattista_Vico for the briefing) Vico's major works proposed important theories around philosophy, philology, law and history, and, considering that those theories influenced some of the most highly exalted authors in history (his Scienza Nuovo - The New Science was used by James Joyce to write Finnegan's Wake, and his ideas were largely implored by Samuel Taylor Coleridge), I'm asking myself how it is that I haven't heard the name before in my 3 years of university. Well, a further inquiry into some of the ideas behind Scienza Nuovo revealed Vico to be as relevant to a class on literary criticism as Frye! It was his role as rhetorician, however, that i really wanted to delve into as it is was the most pertinent to our discussion that day- on the decline of literary expression and our modern day, pathetic, rhetorical fads. If you'll remember Sexson's reference to Vico in class, this was the guy who said "you cannot seperate poetry and history". He says that "the entire universe is in a constant state of decline since the beginning". The beginning, that is, when the gods were in charge and the world was in a pure state, which then fell- but not too drastically- to the heroes, and finally to men. Divine->Heroic-> Human. Vico marks each of these ages by the Trope or figurative language utilized in each. From the divine, biblical rhetoric of the gods to the "high filutant" (filutant, i'm assuming, to mean fanatical, excessive?) language of the epic heroes, to the language of men, the language of commerce, and now... Us. We are in a state of declination beyond lowly,mercantile language. We've digressed to the current age of jibberish...the language of "like, ___" "like, ___" "uhhhh" "i dunno".... "DUDE!" "Awesome" "sweeeeetnesss". This discussion in class sparked my attention because i've had a heightened awareness of these faddy discursive additives since i've come back to America 2 months ago (I'd like to add "Sooooo" to that list, it seems to be the way to begin any anecdote "Soooo, I was like, looking up Giambattista Vico on Wikipedia...."). After a year of speaking mostly spanish, and hardly any american interaction, I felt bombarded by this jargon when i got back, and I still am very aware of how awful it sounds now, though guilty of utilizing it myself. Every language has its coloquial, sort of dumbed-down phraseology. And this day in age it has become a language of chaos. It's jibberish! Vico said that language was like a "power-house of customs", a phenomena that reflects the beliefs, knowledge, abilities of it's people. Language and rhetoric reflect the transition from one stage to the next: from the divine, to the heroic, to the human. This is only one aspect of the theory being proposed by Vico in Scienza Nuovo. But since his time (late 17th early 18th century) we've definitely reached a more primitive state, in my opinion, rhetorically speaking.