INTERFACE BETWEEN PRACTICAL AND NEW CRITICISM

Before a comparative study between new criticism and practical criticism can be made, the origins,
definitions and principles of such theories needs to be examined.

New criticism was a formalist movement in literary theory that dominated American literary criticism in
the middle ages of the 20th century . It emphasized close reading particularly of poetry to discover how
a work of literature functioned as a self contained , self referential aesthetic object.

The movement dereived its name from JOHN CROWE RANSOM's 1941 book titled- The new criticism .

The origins of the New criticism date back to the early 20th century but it didn't see the
widespread popularity until after world war 1. New criticism emphasises the imtrinsic value of a work
of art , no matter its creator or subject matter and demands that criticism remain objective and avoid
delving into personal opinion and interpretation of the piece, New criticism was born in America in
1934 when John Crowe RANSOM wrote an article entitled - The New Criticism , in which he defined his
theory as the interpretation of poetry as poetry and as nothing else.

Some of the notable principles of New criticism are as follows :

-The work should be taken as an independent entity and not judged by it's social, moral or political
implications

- Critics should describe their impressions in details without overtly judging what they read

- Aesthetics sensory aspects matter significantly more than other things like themes or intention
amongst others.

It should however be noted that new criticism tend to treat literature as an illustrative study other
than itself.

Furthermore, practical criticism is a form of literary analysis which focuses exclusively on the text,
ignoring such extraneous factors as authorial intention and historical context.

According to ROBERT EAGLESTONE _ practical criticism sometimes known as " close reading " which
involves the intense scrunity of a piece of paper or poetry concentrating on the words on the page and
disregarding the work's context. It focuses exclusively on the text, ignoring such extraneous factors as
authorial intention and historical context.

The strength of practical criticism was that it set aside the merely impressionistic responses found in
what TERRY EAGLETON describes as the " belle lettristic waffle " of the then hegemonic Bloomsbury
group of authors and brought genuine rigour to the B ussiness of the reading texts. Students Were
taught to better understand the effects of the literary convention and technique ( e.g. role of
metaphors )and given free rein to pronounce judgement on the relative worth of specific texts.

Some of the principles of practical criticism includes;

- It provided the basis for an entire critical method I.e analysing a text without any background
information but paying close attention to words and how those words affect your emotions to get
clarification on the text.

- It is used to test student's responsiveness to what they read , as well as their knowledge of verse
forms

- It treats literature as a sphere of activity which is seoerate from economic or social conditions or from
the life of its author.

In addition to the aforementioned, the relationship between new criticism and practical
criticism would be examined.

New criticism is the development of the practical criticism approach by American critics andpoets .
Such as R.C Muffin. New criticism regards literature as an independent item.rather than basing their
interpretations of a text on the reader's response , the author 's stated intentions or parallel between
the text and historical contexts, New critics perform a close reading concentrating on the relationship
within the text that gives it its own distinctive character or form.

Although we associate New criticism with certain principles and items such as " Affective fallacy "( the
notion that the reader's response is relevant to the meaning of the work and" intention fallacy" ( the
author's intention determines the work's meaning) The new critics were trying to make a cultural
statement rather than to establish a critical dogma.

While practical criticism is a form of close reading and is related to developing the skills of being
able to critically analyse texts ( usually poetry) on early reading . It originated with Richard and it is the
way that one can come up with analytical and interesting points about a piece on first reading Rather
than getting into the academic exercise of theoritical criticism.

The main ideology behind practical criticism is rather than concentrating on the author or the social
context , you focus purely on the text itself and the Lexus itself.

According to Peter barry's beginning theory: The job of criticism is to interprete the text, to mediate
between it and the reader. Practical criticism perceives literature as a vehicle for transmitting universal
truths and eternal values , considering that the meaning of a text remains constant throughput the
time and it's there to be extracted from the text.

Thus, it is therefore safe to state that practical criticism and New criticism go side by side with
new criticism furthering the ideologies behind practical criticisms. In a sense they're both the same
theory with how the texts are perceived, however New criticism goes a step further with its
underlying beliefs. New critics attempt to place emphasis on the fact that meaning if a text is intrinsic.