 Literary Criticism

Literary Devices
Literary Elements - have an inherent existence in literary piece and are extensively
employed by writers to develop a literary piece e.g. plot, setting, narrative structure,
characters, mood, theme, moral etc. Writers simply cannot create his desired work
without including Literary Elements in a thoroughly professional manner.

Literary Techniques - are structures usually a word s or phrases in literary texts that
writers employ to achieve not merely artistic ends but also readers a greater
understanding and appreciation of their literary works. Examples are: metaphor, simile,
alliteration, hyperbole, allegory etc. In contrast to Literary Elements, Literary Techniques
are not unavoidable aspect of literary works.
 Metaphor - This tree is the god of the forest.
 Simile - This tree is like the god of the forest.
OR: This tree acts as the god of the forest.

 Imagery - Imagery is what it sounds like—the use of figurative language to

describe something.
The best writers use imagery to appeal to all five senses.
1. Sight imagery: The tree spread its gigantic, sun-flecked shoulders.
2. Sound imagery: The forest was hushed, resounding with echoes of the tree’s
stoic silence.
3. Touch imagery: The tree felt smooth as sandstone.
4. Taste imagery: The tree’s leaves tasted bitter, like unroasted coffee beans.
5. Smell imagery: As we approached the tree, the air around it smelled crisp and
precise.
 Symbolism
“Peace” represented by a white dove
“Love” represented by a red rose
“Conformity” represented by sheep
“Idea” represented by a light bulb switching on
Symbolism makes the core ideas of your writing concrete.
 Personification
Personification, giving human attributes to nonhuman objects, is a powerful way to
foster empathy in your readers.
Personification (using sight): The car ran a marathon down the highway.
Personification (using sound): The car coughed, hacked, and spluttered.
Personification (using touch): The car was smooth as a baby’s bottom.
Personification (using taste): The car tasted the bitter asphalt.
Personification (using smell): The car needed a cold shower.
Personification (using mental events): The car remembered its first owner fondly.

 Hyperbole
I’ve been waiting a billion years for this
I’m so hungry I could eat a horse
I feel like a million bucks
You are the king of the kitchen
 Irony
Like most bureaucrats, she felt a boundless love for her job, and was eager to share
that good feeling with others.
Activity:The triple bacon cheeseburger glistened with health and good choices.
“Ben lost his car keys and can’t find them anywhere.”

 Juxtaposition
Poetry - nation & individual, treble & bass, and loudness & silence
Prose - “It was the best of times, it was the worst of time.”
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
 Paradox
A simple paradox example comes to us from Ancient Rome.

Catullus 85 (translated from Latin)

I hate and I love. Why I do this, perhaps you ask.

I know not, but I feel it happening and I am tortured.

From Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest

“To be natural is such a very difficult pose to keep up.”
Note: paradox should not be confused with oxymoron. An oxymoron is also a statement
with contrasting ideas, but a paradox is assumed to be true, whereas an oxymoron is
merely a play on words (like the phrase “same difference”).
  Allusion
Biblical allusions
1. Referring to a kind stranger as a Good Samaritan
2. Describing an ideal place as Edenic, or the Garden of Eden
3. Saying someone “turned the other cheek” when they were passive in the face of
adversity
4. When something is described as lasting “40 days and 40 nights,” in reference to
the flood of Noah’s Ark
 Allegory
Animal Farm is an allegory/allusion to the U.S.S.R.:

Allusion (excerpt from Animal Farm):

“There were times when it seemed to the animals that they worked longer hours and
fed no better than they had done in [Farmer] Jones’s day.”
 Ekphrasis
O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede
Of marble men and maidens overwrought,
With forest branches and the trodden weed;
Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought
As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral!
When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say’st,
“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”

 Onomatopoeia
It’s a jazz affair, drum crashes and cornet razzes.
The trombone pony neighs and the tuba jackass snorts.
The banjo tickles and titters too awful.
The chippies talk about the funnies in the papers.
LITERARY CRITICISM
 Literary criticism is the comparison, analysis, interpretation, and/or evaluation of
works of literature. Literary criticism is essentially an opinion, supported by
evidence, relating to theme, style, setting or historical or political context.
 a research method, a type of textual research, that literary critics employ to
interpret texts and debate interpretations
 a genre of discourse employed by literary critics used to share the results of their
interpretive efforts.
 a genre of argument about a specific text or a set of texts.

Purposes of Literary Criticism

 Historical-biographical criticism
Historical-biographical criticism examines literature through the perspective of the
author’s historical context. This approach assumes that the significance of a particular
piece of literature is inextricably linked to its historical context.
 Moral-philosophical criticism
This literary criticism style approaches literature based on its ethical merits.
 Sociological criticism
Sociological criticism evaluates literature based on its relationship to society.
 Psychoanalytic criticism
This form of literary criticism examines literature based on the psychological
desires and neuroses of the characters within a particular piece of literature.
 Practical criticism
This study of literature encourages readers to examine the text without regard to
any outside context—like the author, the date and place of writing, or any other
contextual information that may enlighten the reader.
 Formalism
Formalism compels readers to judge the artistic merit of literature by examining
its formal elements, like language and technical skill.
 Reader-response criticism
Reader-response criticism is rooted in the belief that a reader's reaction to or
interpretation of a text is as valuable a source of critical study as the text itself.
 New criticism
New critics focused on examining the formal and structural elements of literature,
as opposed to the emotional or moral elements.
  Post-structuralism
Post-structuralism literary criticism abandoned ideas of formal and structural
cohesion, questioning any assumed universal truths as reliant on the social structure
that influenced them.
 Deconstruction
Proposed by Jacques Derrida, deconstructionists pick apart a text’s ideas or
arguments, looking for contradictions that render any singular reading of a text
impossible.
 Feminist criticism
As the feminist movement gained steam in the mid-twentieth century, literary
critics began looking to gender studies for new modes of literary criticism.