Criticism in the Wilderness

Description

Originally published in 1980, this now classic work of literary theory explores the wilderness of positions that grew out of the collision between Anglo-American practical criticism and Continental philosophic criticism. This second edition includes a new preface by the author as well as a foreword by Hayden White. “A key text for understanding ‘the fate of reading’ in the Anglophone world over the last fifty years.”—Hayden White, from the Foreword “Criticism in the Wilderness may be the best, most brilliant, most broadly useful book yet written by an American about the sudden swerve from the safety of established decorum toward bravely theoretical, mainly European forms of literary criticism.”—Terrence Des Pres, Nation “A polemical survey that reaffirms the value of the Continental tradition of philosophical literary criticism.”—Notable Books of the Year, New York Times Book Review Contents Foreword Preface to the Second Edition Acknowledgments Introduction Part I 1. Understanding Criticism 2 .The Sacred Jungle 1: Carlyle, Eliot, Bloom 3. The Sacred Jungle 2: Walter Benjamin 4 .The Sacred Jungle 3: Frye, Burke, and Some Conclusions 5 .Purification and Danger 1: American Poetry 6 .Purification and Danger 2: Critical Style PART II: 7. The Work of Reading 8. Literary Commentary as Literature 9. Centaur: On the Psychology of the Critic 10 .Past and Present Coda: Polemical Pieces The Recognition Scene of Criticism Criticism, Indeterminacy, Irony A Short History of Practical Criticism Select Bibliography Index