As a conclusion to this class and my casebooks, I wanted to do my re-do casestudy on historical criticism. Although we discussed some essays in class, I feel that we all may agree that this school of criticism can be used in essentially any literary analysis and is especially important to our insight into literature. New historical criticism “aims for readers to understand the work through its historical context and to understand cultural and intellectual history through literature, which documents the new discipline of the history of ideas.”
When it comes down to it, we are affected by the culture of the past and present, just as Greenblatt wrote. When I say that culture effects literature, I thought of the commonly known story of "Little Red Riding Hood." Although it is not an obvious example of a historical reading, readers may see the story as a warning against sexual predators and walking alone. Especially after Dr. Jerz showed us the modern day internet sites, I thought of the cultural message it sent out to readers.
In Belsey's article, we were re-introduced to the idea that reader-response and author's intent come into play in historical criticism as well. Although I realize this is subjective to the times, I feel it is still a relevant aspect of historical criticism. We have the ability to learn about the history through these historical readings, which we can see through further analysis by Delahoyde on New Historical Criticism.
Ever since I began my English literature career at Seton Hill University, I have realized the importance of history in studying literature. The first class that the historical light bulb turned on was Major British Writers. Before every literary time period, we would look into the historical background to help us realize any trends during that writing period and gave us the tools to understand what the author may have intended. Although I think we may need insight into the historical background of literature before reading and completely understanding the author's intent, new historical critics argue that the literature itself has the ability to teach us about the historical time period and culture. To a certain extent this is possible, but where does the historical information end and our outside education begin.
Answering the proposed question, I want to bring up a topic that we spoke about in class. While reading the essay Garson, many students reacted to idea of Keats possibly reacting to the English obtaining Greek urns. While reading "Ode on a Grecian Urn," would students today capture the historical references? I'll be honest, without the history Garson gave us, I would never have understood this historical reading.
I think it is important that we understand the importance of our changing culture, which Greenblatt discussing in the essay and if we combine the history we learn outside of class with the history we learn through the literature itself, we have the ability to learn a great deal about the past cultures.
