A Present Tendency in American Criticism

Somebody with the necessary scholarship may be able some day to tell us just when, during the two decades past, American criticism began to seek what looks like a new autonomy. This autonomy is hard to define, but I think that, if space permitted, it would be recognizable enough from examples. Should we say that the critic, proud of his new disciplines and seeking to cut out clearly his own province within literature, has also begun to cut himself off a little from literature? This is an extreme statement and to that degree probably untrue, and certainly it would be hotly denied by a good many people. But since space confines, I consent to be my own victim, and the extremity of my statement may at least serve to define a point of view. The degree of this tendency is questionable, but the fact that it is at work seems to me beyond doubt. And what the existence itself of any tendency like this may imply for the future of literature and literary criticism in this country will be the theme of this brief comment.

At one end of the critical spectrum, certain prefaces of Racine or Dryden may be taken to represent one form of criticism in a more or less pure state. These prefaces attend upon the play they introduce, usher it into the world and explain its intentions, and though many general points may be raised, these are likely to be of a kind held in common by writer and reader, and therefore introduced not to be debated but to clear a path for the particular work. This kind of criticism we may call programmatic in a very direct sense.