Perspectives on Criticism

Philosophical speculations about the origin of poetry and the nature and function of criticism have engaged the attention of poets and critics for over 2500 years in the West and still there is no consensus either regarding the mysterious process of creation or the proper function of literary criticism. One reason, of course, is that there is a lack of definiteness both about the nature of the object and about the tools for judging it. Unlike an architecture — a temple or a mosque — a literary work does not conveniently exist in space and time. Paradoxically, though frozen in time it transcends time. The problem is further complicated by the fact that since reading a poem is an aesthetic experience we cannot read the same poem twice, because during the period intervening between the first reading and the second we have changed. However, in recent years, particularly during the second half of the twentieth century literary criticism has burgeoned into too many schools and theories resulting in a complete critical anarchy. In this period of confusion, standing on the darkling plain as we are, we must focus on the real function of literature and save literature from being a casualty in the cross-fire of literary theories. Literary criticism is a discourse on literature, an art of judging literature and deciding how far and for what reasons a literary work is good or bad, great or useless. In fact, the term ‘criticism’ is derived from the Greek krino which means ‘to judge’ and krites which means ‘a judge.’ We should never lose sight of the fact that literary criticism must be literary criticism. And the literary value of a work must be judged by literary criteria alone. The essays included in this volume constitute a significant body of literary criticism in the true sense of the term. Keeping their focus sharply on the literary text the critics, by comparison and analysis, have tried to evaluate different authors and their works. In their wider gropings they have also embraced the other areas such as the relation between linguistics, literary criticism, scholarship and teaching, etc.