Aesthetic Distance (Bet most of U don't know what this is)

Aesthetic Distance is a literary term that I had never heard of until now. When I looked it up I found a very complicated definition of it here. I had to reread this definition a few times before I understood what it meant. In a nut shell what its saying is that it’s the desired distance between the reader’s perspective and the reality of the piece of literature or artwork that they are interacting with. You see when we look at artwork, read, or watch a play we know it’s not real, but we can’t help but feel drawn into it the reality of the piece of artwork. The reason we must have this distance is so that we as the audience can have an objective response to something that is subjective. If you still are lost go here to a site I found most helpful. Also click here to see how Aesthetics relates to the theater and why it’s so important. Both sites helped me to understand the term and come up with the definition I summarized here.

From Aesthetic Distance we can move on to a form of literary criticism connected to it called “New Criticism” (yes I know, it’s not a very creative name is it). What’s the connection you ask? Well “New Criticism” (NC) treats a piece of literature as its own unique reality or a self contained, self- referential object. Instead of thinking about what the author intended or how the historical context relates to the meaning, these critics closely read, concentrating on the relationships within the text that give it its own distinctive character or form. New Critics emphasize that the structure of a work should not be divorced from meaning, viewing the two as constituting a quasi-organic unity (two living beings or entities). Special attention is paid to repetition, particularly of images or symbols, but also of sound effects and rhythms in poetry. (I pulled this from here and the site has a much longer definition of this criticism if you want to take a look). So now we begin to see how NC connects to Aesthetic Distance. Literary these critics are taking a literary term and using it as a base for a new form of literary criticism. NC rejects any intentions the author had and looks just at the literature an entity with a purpose or specific design. Check out this link to get all the basics of NC as well as some history about how it came about.

New Critics coined a term I came across as I was reading up on this form of criticism called “Intentional Fallcy”. Basically the term describes the problem of judging a work upon the attentions of the artist who created it. Meaning should be determined from close reading of text, careful viewing of a piece of art, or critically analyzing a play you’re watching; it should not be determined by the intentions of the artist who put together the piece of artwork. In other words we see all art as having “dead artists.” New Critics Wimsatt and Beardsley were the ones who created this term. In short the text means what it says, bottom line. For an extended analysis of this literary term check out this piece of writing here.

So I bet many of you artists out there are feeling kind of low now, huh? To think that you are unimportant in the mind of your audience is kind of an ego crusher. But don’t fret because it is your creations that give audiences something to interpret, without artists people would have nothing to interpret. So don’t feel down about yourself (Because I know I do). Those pompous know nothing critics wouldn’t have anything to argue about if you didn’t express your creative imagination through your art. It’s the artists’ job to create and the audiences’ job to interpret.

There was one other term I found in surfing, but I couldn’t find enough information on it except a weblog. If you want to learn about “Willing Suspension of Disbelief” check out a blog done by cjed. That should give you a good starting point for this term.