Marxism and Marxist Lit

erary Criticism
Literature in English
ASL
 Introduction
 Any political practice or theory based on a
n interpretation of the works of Karl Marx
and Friedrich Engels

 Including Communist Parties and Commun

ist states
 Characteristics of Marxism
 Attention to the material conditions of peo
ple's lives, and lived relations among peopl
e
 People’s consciousness of the conditions o
f their lives reflects these material conditio
ns and relations
 “Social class" = differing relations to produ
ction (a particular position within such rela
tions)
 Characteristics of Marxism
 Material conditions and social relations: hi
storically malleable
 View of history: class struggle (evolving co
nflict between classes with opposing intere
sts) structures each historical period
 A sympathy for the working class
 The ultimate interests of workers best mat
ch those of humanity in general
 Characteristics of Marxism
 Workers' revolution: the means of achievin
g human emancipation and enlightenment
 The actual mechanism through which such
a revolution might occur and succeed
 Main Ideas in Marxism
 Means of production:
 A combination of the means of labor and the subject
of labor used by workers to make products
 Means of labor = machines, tools, equipment, infrastr
ucture, and "all those things with the aid of which ma
n acts upon the subject of labor, and transforms it"
 Subject of labor = raw materials and materials directl
y taken from nature
 Means of production produce nothing
 Labor power is needed for production to take place.
 Main Ideas in Marxism
 Base and superstructure:
 Base: people with regard to “the social produc
tion of their existence” forms the economic ba
sis
 Superstructure: political + legal institutions +
religious, philosophical, and other ideas
 The base conditions the superstructure and th
e social consciousness
 Reflexive: changes in one group often influenc
e the other
 Main Ideas in Marxism
 Class consciousness:

 The self-awareness of a social class

 Its capacity to act in its own rational interests

 Main Ideas in Marxism
 Ideology:
 Consciousness and perceptions within a societ
y
 Often controlled by the ruling class
 Determined according to what is in the ruling
class's best interests
 Confuses the alienated groups
 Creates false consciousness
 Example: commodity fetishism (perceiving lab
or as capital ~ a degradation of human life)
 Main Ideas in Marxism
 Exploitation:
 Exploitation of an entire segment or class of society b
y another
 An inherent feature and key element of capitalism an
d free markets
 Profit gained by the capitalist = the value of the prod
uct made by the worker + the actual wage that the w
orker receives
 Paying workers less than the full value of their labour
 To enable the capitalist class to turn a profit
 Class System in Marxism
 Identity of a social class: derived from its r
elationship to the means of production

 As opposed to the notion that class is dete

rmined by wealth alone
 Class System in Marxism
 The proletariat
 Individuals who sell their labour power

 The bourgeoisie
 Owns the means of production"
 Buys labour power from the proletariat (recompen

sed by a salary)
 Exploits the proletariat
 Class System in Marxism
 The lumpenproletariat
 Social scum: criminals, vagabonds, beggars
 People with no stake in the economic system
 Selling themselves to the highest bidder
 The Landlords
 Wealthy people owning pieces of land
 Retaining their wealth and power
 The Peasantry and Farmers
 Disorganized
 Incapable of carrying out change
 Disappearing: most becoming proletariat but some becoming lan
downers
 http://hk.youtube.com/watch?v=eMZRYMlv9tU
 Marxist Literary Criticism
 A loose term describing literary criticism informe
d by the philosophy or the politics of Marxism
 Terry Eagleton (Marxism and Literary Criticism, 1
976)
 Not merely a 'sociology of literature', concerned with
how novels get published and whether they mention t
he working class
 Aim:
 To explain the literary work more fully
 A ensitive attention to its forms, styles and meanings
 Grasping those forms, styles and meanings as the product of
a particular history
 Marxist Literary Criticism
 Goals:

 An assessment of the political "tendency" of a

literary work (determining whether its social c
ontent or its literary form are "progressive“)

 Applying lessons drawn from the realm of aest

hetics to the realm of politics
 Marxist Film Theory
 Expressing ideas of Marxism through film i
n terms of film editing, such as montage

 Employing radical choice of subject matte

r, as well as subversive parody, to heighte
n class consciousness and promote Marxis
t ideas
 Marxist Film Theory
 Sergei Eisenstein:
 Shunning narrative structure by eliminating the indivi
dual protagonist
 Telling stories where the action is moved by the grou
p
 Story told through a clash of one image against the n
ext (whether in composition, motion, or idea)
 The audience is never lulled into believing that they a
re watching something that has not been worked ove
r
 Important works:
 Can dialectics break bricks? (1973)
 http://hk.youtube.com/watch?v=6lEz5rye_U4
Thanks for your struggle
of attention!