"Achieved Unity of Meanings" vs. "A Galaxy of Signifiers"

by

 Cornelia Kaltenbacher

Table of Contents

1. Introduction  3

2. New Criticism 5
2.1. Definition and features 5
2.2. T. S. Eliot 7
2.3. R. P. Blackmur  9
2.4. Cleanth Brooks  10

3. Deconstruction  11
3.1. General views  11
3.2. Jacques Derrida and Ferdinand de Saussure 12
3.3. Hillis Miller  16
3.4. Paul de Man 18

4. “An Achieved Unity of Meanings” vs. “A Galaxy of Signifiers”- Comparing New Criticism to Deconstruction 19

5. Conclusion – Personal Notes  21

6. Consulted works 23

1. Introduction

The term “modernism” is widely used to identify new and distinctive features in the subjects, forms, concepts, and styles of literature and the other arts in the early decades of the present centur y, but especially after World War I (1914-1918). The specific features signified by “modernism” vary with the user, but many critics agree that it involves a deliberate and radical break with some of the traditional bases not only of Western art, but of Western culture in general. This radical break is also to be seen in the literary theories and methods of critical analysis since World War I. The cronological order in which the major new forms of criticism appeared is approximately as follows: Russian formalism(1920s and 1930s)/ archetypal criticism(1930s and 1940s)/ New Criticism; phenomenology( as applied to literary criticism); stylistics(1940s and 1950s)/ structuralist criticism and modern forms of feminist criticism( 1960s)/ theory of the anxiety of influence; deconstruction ; discourse analyses; forms of reader-response criticism; reception theory; semiotics; speech-act theory( 1970s)/ dialogic criticism; new historicism; cultural studies(1980s). The new forms of criticism I’m going to introduce and to discuss in this paper are New Criticism and Deconstruction, but before introducing New Criticism, I would like to first define “criticism”. What is the meaning and the function of “criticism”? Why do we need literary criticism? The answers to these questions are important to me in order to understand the modern theories of literature.

“Criticism, is the overall term for studies concerned with defining, clasifying, analysing, interpreting, and evaluating works of literature.”¹ What I’m going to analyze in this work is not criticism, but “theoretical criticism”. Theoretical criticism proposes a theory of literature, in the sense of general principles, together with a set of terms, distinctions and categories , to be applied to identifying and analyzing works of literature, as well as the “criteria”² by which these works and their writers are to be evaluated. Since the 1970s there has been a flood of writings, Continental, American and English, proposing diverse nove l and radical forms of critical theory. Why do we need criticism? In order to understand texts or to give them the “right interpretation”³. But can one speak about a right interpretation? In order to find a plausible answer to this question, I will focus on two of the most important modern literary theories, namely New Criticism, defined as “an achieved unity of meanings”⁴ and Deconstruction as “a galaxy of signifiers”⁵, comparing the two ones by means of the consulted essays on New Criticism and Deconstruction.

But before comparing the two theories, I will first introduce you into the meaning and features of both theories, presenting you some of the most important critics and their essays and critical theories referring to New Criticism and Deconstruction. I will dedicate the last two units of my paper to an ample comparison between New Criticism and Deconstruction, showing you, that there are both similarities and differences to find in the two theories, and that in spite of all the differences, the former survives in the last one. Moreover, I will point some personal conclusions concerning my own point of view to the topics mentioned above.

2. New Criticism

2.1. Definition and features

[...]

1 Abrams, M. H., A Glossary of Literary Terms, Sixth Edition, Cornell University, 1993, “Criticism”, Page 39

2 The term „criteria“ is defined by standards or norms. Abrams, M. H., A glossary of literary terms, Sixth Edition, Page 39

3 In this paper I will try to find an answer to the question, if we really can speak about a “right interpretation”

4 The expression „achieved unity of meanings“ is based on Abrams’ explanation of New Criticism in “A glossary of literary terms”, pg. 247, as an “organic unity”. The new critics have seen the form of a work to be primarily “a structure of meanings”, which evolve into an integral and freestanding unity. I’ll focus on this point again later on.

5 „A galaxy of signifiers” is the expression Roland Barthes uses for Deconstruction in his essay “Interpretation”, S/Z, 1970, when speaking about the “ideal text”: “In this ideal text, the networks are many and interact, without any one of them being able to surpass the rest; this text is a galaxy of signifiers, not a structure of signifieds.” (Source of quotation: Prof. Dr. Dietmar Claas, The Importance of Reading, -A Reader- , Heinrich- Heine- Universität Düsseldorf, Roland Barthes, S/Z,1970, Interpretation, Page 67)