UNIVERSIDAD TECNOLÓGICA NACIONAL

FACULTAD REGIONAL AVELLANEDA

LICENCIATURA EN LENGUA INGLESA
Estudios Literarios I
Dra. María Rosa Mucci

The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The point, however, is to change it.
Karl Marx

Political Criticism
Marxism derives from the work of Karl Marx, a German philosopher who lived in Paris and London in
the middle of the nineteenth century, a time of severe industrialization that was creating a new class of
industrial workers that he called the “proletariat”. When he wrote his major works The German
Ideology (1846), The Manifesto of the Communist Party (1848) and Capital (1867), the ideals of
socialism (that wealth should be distributed more equitably, that class differences should be abolished,
that society should be devoted to providing for everyone’s basic needs) were emerging in counterpoint
to the principles and realities of industrial capitalism, individual freedom in economic matters, an
intractable inequality in the distribution of wealth, severe class differentiation, and brutal poverty for
those without property. It was also a time of revolution. Across Europe in 1848, monarchies were
overthrown by democratic uprisings, and nations long dominated by others struggled for
independence. It was a time when “bourgeois” society itself, which was organized around the ideal of
the private accumulation of wealth in an economy unhampered by state regulation, was being
challenged for the first time. That Marx was deeply influenced by his historical context is itself a
lesson in Marxist methodology. According to Marx, we are all situated historically and socially and
our social and historical contexts “determine” or shape our lives. Literature is not, according to
Marxist criticism, the expression of universal or eternal ideas as the New Critics claimed, nor is it, as
the Russian Formalists claimed, an autonomous realm of aesthetic or formal devices and techniques
that act independently of their material setting in society and history. Rather, literature is in the first
instance a social phenomenon; it cannot be studied independently of the social relations, the economic
forms, and the political realities of the time in which it was written.

To discuss Marxism in the early twenty-first century may well seem strangely beside the point. After
all, since the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989, one self-proclaimed Marxist regime after the other has
been forced to consign itself to oblivion. However, Marxism as an intellectual perspective still
provides a wholesome counterbalance to our propensity to see ourselves and the writers that we read as
completely divorced from socio-economic circumstances.

Marxist theory argues that the way we think and the way we experience the world around us are either
wholly or largely conditioned by the way the economy is organized. Under a medieval, feudal regime
people well have thought different from the way that we think now in a capitalist economy, in an
economy in which goods are produced (the mode of production) by large concentrations of capital
(old-style factories, new-style multinationals) and then sold on a free, competitive market. The base of
a society determines its superstructure. This implies a view of literature that is completely at odds with
the Anglo-American view of literature. If the economic base indeed determines the cultural
superstructure, then writers will not have all that much freedom in their creative efforts. They will
inevitably work within the framework dictated by the economic base and will have much in common
with other writers living and writing under the same economic dispensation.
Capitalism thrives on exploiting its labourers. Capitalists grow rich and shareholders do well because
the labourers that work for them and produce goods get less. Capitalism alienates labourers from
themselves by seeing them in terms of production. Capitalism turns people into things, it reifies them.
The American Marxist critic Fredric Jameson suggested no too long ago that we now all unknowingly
suffer from a “waning of affect”, the loss of genuine emotion, because of the complete dominance of
the capitalist model in our contemporary world (Jameson 1984:60)

This leads inevitably to the question of how it is possible that we can be so blind to the real state of
affairs around us and how it is possible that apparently some people are not deluded. For Marxism we
are blind to our own condition because of the effects of what it calls ideology. What is the meaning of
ideology? How is ideology able to hide authentic reality from us? At this point we should refer to
Louis Althusser´s ideas.

Although Althusser´s analysis led to valuable insights in the various ways in which literature can
conspire with, and simultaneously deceive, its readers, a good many Marxist critics felt uneasy with
the deterministic character of his view of ideology. He would seem to leave no room at all for
autonomous, non-ideological thought or action.

Basic concepts from Marxist theory

Classism: Classism is the belief that our value as human beings is directly related to the social class to
which we belong: the higher our social class, the higher our natural, or inborn, superiority. It is proper
that those in the higher class should assume leadership roles, for they are, by birth, more intelligent,
honourable, energetic and dependable than those beneath them on the social scale. Marxist theory
rejects the idea that the social class in which we are born determines our superiority or inferiority as
human beings. Marxism considers classism unfair and unwise because it grants privileges to a small
segment of the population and withholds privileges from a large segment of the population without
regard for individual merit.
Capitalism: Capitalism is a system in which everything can be defined in terms of its worth in money.
Because the market (the availability of and demand for a given product) is considered the best
regulator of a product’s monetary worth, capitalist governments tend to avoid regulating business
profits. Industries are therefore left in private hands. Marxist theory suggests that unregulated business
profits tend to promote what might be called an ethics of greed, according to which the only virtue
anyone wants to cultivate is the virtue of making the most money.
Competition: Capitalism believes that competition among individuals is the best way to promote a
strong society because competition ensures that the most capable, most intelligent people will rise to
the top. In contrast, Marxist theory suggests that unrestrained competition is oppressive because it
tends to ensure that the most selfish, unethical people will rise to the top, as they are the ones willing to
do whatever it takes to win.
Commodification: A commodity is anything that has a price tag. Because capitalism defines
everything in terms of its monetary worth, it encourages commodification.
The American Dream: The American Dream is a capitalist ideology associated specifically with
American history and culture. According to this ideology, anyone who has the determination to work
hard enough can rise from “rags to riches” because America is the land of equal opportunity for all.
Marxist theory points out, that our belief in the American Dream blinds us to the reality that a vast
number of people have not had and do not have equal opportunity in education, employment, or
housing due to such factors as their gender, race, religion, sexual orientation and socioeconomic class.
Rugged Individualism: The American Dream has fostered the ideology of rugged individualism which
holds up for our admiration the example of the individual who strikes out alone in pursuit of a goal not
easily achieved.
Religion: Marxist theory observes that religion too often plays a role in oppressing the poor. “Religion
is the opiate of the masses” according to Marxism.

Marxism as a Critical Study in literary analysis

Marxism is a method of socioeconomic political analysis that frames capitalism through a paradigm of
exploitation, analyzes class relations and social conflict using a materialist interpretation of historical
development and takes a dialectical view of social transformation. It uses a methodology known as
historical materialism to analyze and critique the development of capitalism and the role of class
struggles in systemic economic change. According to Marxian theory, class conflict arises in capitalist
societies due to contradictions between the material interests of the oppressed proletariat. Marxism as a
literary research involves an analysis (analytical move of linguistic features).It is a part of an argument
which involves the use of all kinds of data both primary (the text) and secondary as sources of
evidence about the questions or hypotheses about features so as to support the statements in the
argumentation. It is a sociological approach to literature that viewed works of literature or art as the
products of historical forces that can be analyzed by looking at the material conditions in which they
were formed. In Marxist ideology, we often classify a world view as actually the articulations of the
dominant class. It generally focuses on the clash between the dominant and repressed classes in any
given age and also may encourage art to imitate what is often termed an “objective‛ reality.
Contemporary Marxism is much broader in its focus, and views art as reflective age in which it was
produced as stated in (Abraham, p.178, Childers and Hentzi, pp.175-179), Karl Marx, Terry Eagleton,
Raymond Williams. While literary approaches are also called critical approaches or theoretical
approaches including historical, sociological, psychological, post-analytical, New Criticism,
formalism, and structuralism, feminism, deconstruction, reader-response criticism and discourse
approaches to texts, Marxist postulate appears to be far different from them.

There are attitudes that scholars who come in contact with literary production can have: either they
read for entertainment or they read for understanding or comprehension. This attitude is borne by the
sense known as common reader of literature who is far different from a critic. A critic, however, is a
person known as a critical reader researcher whose attitude is the conception of the researcher
methodology when it comes to literature. Dixon and Bartolussi (2011, 59) and Gottschalk (2008)
assumed that literary studies are ailing and the remedy for this ailment is the application of scientific
approach to them. Thus, the Marxist critic is expected to frame his analysis based on Marxist approach
looking into a work of art as a product of a society in which it was borne and how class struggle
conflict affect characters. Thus, the critic emphasis in the evaluation of the work of art is based on
features characterizing Marxist theory such as: themes of socio-economic class conflict, labor force,
oppression, domination, corruption. The Marxist critic views works of literature, as well as those
works’ forms and meanings, as products of particular social institutions that reflect a particular
ideology of feudalism to capitalism modal of production.
Robert M. Kashindi (2018)
How to apply a Marxist analysis to literature
It is important to consider the power relations in play within and around the text. In particular we
concentrate on such factors as class, rank, occupation and education, and then we broaden the
analysis to take into account gender, race, nationality and age.

 What role does class play in the text?

 How does the author analyse class relations?
 What class conflicts are expressed? Which ones repressed?
 Does the text support the economic status quo, or does it criticize it?
 Who are “you”, the “I-who-reads”, in terms of class, status quo, occupation and education?
 In what way does the text serve as propaganda?
 In what way have the period, social context and culture in which the text was written
affected your reading?
 What were the literary modes of production and distribution in which the text was
implicated?
 What sections of society are represented in the text?
 Which of the ideologies in play would you characterise as central?
 What relevance to our own times and society does the text seem to have?

 Read the short story “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant (1884) and analyse it from a
Marxist approach. Consider the questions above.
 Read the texts below and paraphrase them in the light of the bibliography seen in class:
Prólogo a la contribución a la crítica de la economía política by Marx

1-
2- Capital and labour relate to each other here like money and commodity; the former is the general
form of wealth, the other only the substance destined for immediate consumption. Capital’s ceaseless
striving towards the general form of wealth drives labour beyond the limits of its natural paltriness,
and thus creates the material elements for the development of the rich individuality which is as all-
sided in its production as in its consumption, and whose labour also therefore appears no longer as
labour, but as the full development of activity itself, in which natural necessity in its direct form has
disappeared; because natural need has been replaced by historically produced need. This is
why capital is productive; i.e. an essential relation for the development of the social productive
forces. It ceases to exist as such only where the development of these productive forces themselves
encounters its barrier in capital itself.
Marx, The Grundrisse (1857)

3- “The bank – the monster has to have profits all the time. It can’t wait. It’ll die. No, taxes go on.
When the monster stops growing, it dies. It can’t stay one size....” “It’s not us, it’s the bank. The bank
isn’t like a man. Or an owner with 50,000 acres, he isn’t like a man either. That’s the monster....”
The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck (1939)

 Read Terry Eagleton´s chapter Literature and History in “Marxism and Literary Criticism”
and write a source base. Remember to define three concepts and include your personal
reflection on the process of reading and on the topic.

Bibliography:
Eagleton, T., (1976), Marxism and Literary Criticism. Routledge: London
Hoare, Q and Nowell Smith, G., (1999), Selections from the Prison Notebooks of Antonio Gramsci.
The Electric Book Company: London
Kashindi, R., (2018), Understanding Marxism as a critical study and research paradigm: a framework
for a critic in literary analysis. European Journal of Political Science Studies, Vol 1:2 UCB
Lodge, D., (2000) (Ed) Modern Criticism and Theory. Pearson Education Limited: United Kingdom.
Pope, R., (1998) The English Studies Book. Routledge: London
Rivkin, J and M. Ryan, (2004) (eds) Literary Theory: An Anthology. Blackwell Publishing: USA
Tyson, L., (2001) Learning for a Diverse World. Routledge: New York