[Milton-L] new critics and empson- a few notes
Alice Crawford Berghof
aberghof at uci.edu
Thu Nov 20 17:36:41 EST 2008
Thank you, all, for a stimulating discussion. Another quick note on
this topic: I have presented a conference paper on de Man, Empson,
Brooks and Milton studies, as part of a book chapter that will be
published in 2009 in a collection of essays on New Criticism. Please
contact me off-list if you're interested in reading the final version
of the book chapter. I have consulted Hillis Miller and others, who
agree that there are important and unexplored connections between de
Man and the New Critics. The issue for Milton criticism, it seems to
me, is to distinguish between the usefulness for Early Modern
scholarship of Derrida and de Man. One might align the rhetorically
oriented theories of early Derrida with the culmination of de Man's
study of tropes in the political aesthetics of the latter's late work.
For example, textually oriented as well as new historicist readings of
Milton can be shown to follow a line of reasoning that exceeds in
existential scope the principles of ambiguity, paradox or even
contradiction, and tackles the more problematic issue of
noncontradiction, from IA Richards through Empson, Wimsatt, Derrida on
Husserl, and de Man on rhetoric in Nietzsche as well as de Man on
ideology (both early and late, especially Aesthetic Ideology).
Milton's work on Ramus would be an interesting place to start, in terms
of Milton studies.
I'm reiterating my suggestion that a group of us put together an online
bibliography of Milton criticism. A section on New Criticism and
formalism, for example, would be great, beginning with the fascinating
work in Resistant Structures as well as Renaissance Literature and its
Formal Engagements.
Warm regards to all,
Alice Crawford Berghof
UC Irvine
On Nov 20, 2008, at 12:46 PM, richard strier wrote:
> Actually, Paul de Man was a big Empson fan. The essay on
> American formalism in Blindness and Insight seens Empson as
> offering a way out of the "dead-end." Empson did not see
> himself as part of the same "school" as Brooks and Wimsatt.
> He found their denial of intentionalism particularly
> puzzling. See his review of Well-Wrought, etc, "His Darling
> in an Urn" in Argufying. Also, see his essay called "Verbal
> Analysis" there, which makes it clear that Empson never
> excluded historical and other considerations from his
> analyses. This is equally true of the analyses in 7 Types as
> of those in the pastoral book. The "tyes" in 7 Types are
> purely heuristic. My former colleague Elder Olson's critique
> of Empson in Critics and Criticism is completely misguided;
> Ronal Crane on Brooks is better.
>
> For Empson as a better model for historical criticism than
> Rosemond Tuve (!), see the first chapter of my Resistant
> Structures. For some general thoughts on the non-necessity
> of a conflict between formalism and historicism, see my
> epilogue to Kent Rasmussen, ed., Renaissance Lit and its
> Formal Engagements.
>
> ---- Original message ----
>> Date: Wed, 19 Nov 2008 14:24:05 -0800 (PST)
>> From: Kim Maxwell <kmaxwell at stanford.edu>
>> Subject: [Milton-L] new critics and empson
>> To: John Milton Discussion List <milton-
> l at lists.richmond.edu>
>>
> > Regarding Carrol Cox remark
> >
> > The book from which New Criticism took its name (by
> > John Crowe Ransom in 1941) includes a chapter on
> > Empson. New Criticism, in its denigration following
> > DeMan, Frye, and Abrams in the 1950's, became more
> > monolithic (around poetic autonomy and close
> > reading) than any of those who claim to practice it
> > actually practiced it. It most famous advocates
> > were Ellot, Richards, Empson, Brooks, Warren, and
> > Leavis, not a homogeneous group (Eliot late in his
> > life repudiated his connection with the movement,
> > although he is surely its godfather). I think
> > Empson's book on ambiguity actually makes the
> > mistake that doomed new criticism as a movement (it
> > is still what most of us really do when we read
> > poetry), namely, the presumption that ambiguities
> > can by themselves be classified and then interpreted
> > in some determinate manner, rather than taken as
> > self-conscious moments demanding interpretation,
> > which interpretation must take into account many
> > other things (often), including (as Eliot himself
> > argued all his life) the historical circumstances
> > and reading skills of the moment the poem is
> > read. I think Empson next book, Some Versions of
> > Pastoral, does just that, and drifts away from
> > autonomous reading, but would still be classified as
> > close reading.
> >
> > Kim Maxwell
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