from Literature: An Introduction to Critical Reading by Lee. A. Jacobus (Prentice-Hall), pp. 10-18.Interpretive Strategies
Most interpretations are primarily text based, reader based, or context based. Text-based interpretations assume that the meaning is "in" the text and that the critic's job is to find it. Reader-based interpretation assumes that the meaning of the text is created by the reader in the act of reading. Context-based interpretations consider the text in relation to biographical, historical, and cultural information. They assume that the meaning of the text is not exclusively in the text or in the reader but is affected by the relationship of text and reader to the cultural issues surrounding the creation of the text, its present circumstances, or the cultural circumstances of the reader.
Text-based Interpretations
The text-based strategy of formalism examines the interrelationship of the formal elements of a text, such as theme, plot, setting, characterization, the expression of ideas, special use of language, metaphor, tone, rhyme, meter, and all other stylistic qualities. The formalist is especially interested in irony, the use of language that says one thing but means another. Sarcasm is one form of irony. In literature we often see tragic irony, in which characters sometimes achieve their dearest wish only to find that it destroys them....
A widely known formalist method is New Criticism, which examines texts for their unity and tries to show how each detail contributes to a unified overall meaning. Psychoanalytic Criticism is also text based when it centers on an examination of symbols, including symbolic relationship between characters, such as those that resemble mother and son or father and daughter. (Psychoanalytic interpretations become context based when they begin to focus on the author's life, which is outside the text, not in it.)
The Formalist Approach: New Criticism Developed in the 1940s, New Criticism continues to be one of the strong intellectual forces in modern thought. The following list describes some of its purer forms.
Issues of New Criticism
Today, most practitioners relax enough to admit that history and ideas outside the work can sometimes influence our reading. However, the ideal of the work as an object separate from the reader's apprehension remains. In New Criticism, it is especially important to separate the reader's response from the work. For example, that you may be saddened or frightened by a poem is irrelevant to an interpretation of its unity or the relationship of its imagery to its theme.A work of literature should be considered as an object independent of the author's intention or biography. The response of the reader is not part of the work of literature and therefore should not figure in its interpretation. Political, sociological, religious, or moral issues outside the work do not affect its meaning. Therefore, they do not enter into the act of interpretation. Because works of literature aim for organic unity, one goal of interpretation is demonstrating how every element and detail helps achieve that unity. Patterns of imagery, such as light and dark, sun and moon, and other repetition of details observed during close reading, often provide the basis of interpretation. The most interesting literary effects usually involve tension produced by irony, ambiguity, paradox and wit.
Psychoanalytic criticism. Literature has always had a psychological dimension, and psychoanalytic criticism pays special attention to it. Hamlet's psychology has fascinated audiences for three hundred years. Relations between parents and children have always been important in both psychology and literature The way characters cope with sexual awareness, an important stage in psychological development, is a major theme in most stories of growing up. Even the most ancient epic literature has revealed insights into personality and psychology for almost every generation of readers. Literature and psychology were connected before psychology became a science.
Acknowledge this significant connection in The Interpretation of Dreams, Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), the founder of psychoanalysis, explained that literature such as the story of Oedipus in Oedipus Rex gives insights into the subconscious, the aspect of the mind that speaks to us in dreams.
The foundation of Freud's theories about human psychology is that the mind has three parts: the ego, or conscious personality; the superego, which monitors and censors desires unacceptable to the ego; and the id, which contains dark sexual desires that would destroy society if they were let loose. Sexuality, according to Freud, is at the heart of most human behavior, whether the individual is conscious or unconscious of this motivation. The ego, the conscious part of the mind, communicates in language. The subconscious mind, the superego and the id, communicates only in symbols. Freudian psychoanalysis puts important emphasis on the symbols of dreams as clues to an individual's psychology.
Many psychoanalytic critics apply Freudian theory to literary works. Looking for a work's repressed sexual content, for example, such critics consider telephone poles, steeples, rifles, pencils, cigars, and zeppelins to be symbols for the penis, and dark, damp caves, forests, interiors of houses, unknown locations on a map, and the unknown in general to be symbols of the vagina.
Issues of Psychoanalytic Criticism
Psychoanalytic criticism has been applied most to works written after 1910, the authors of which were likely to have absorbed some of Freud's ideas even though they may not have read his works. At first glance it may seem inappropriate to apply Freudian theory to works by writers who predated Freud. However, if Freud's ideas accurately describe human psychology, their relevance is not time bound....Part of the critic's job is to reconcile sexual symbols with the theme of the work. A central concern is to find signs of restricted emotional development. A close reading takes special interest in recurrent sexual symbols, dreams, and evidence of repressed feelings directing the action of characters or the author. A close reading examines the narrative for its manifest meaning--what it apparently means--and its latent meaning--what it really means to the subconscious. Casual accidents, such as mistakes in language, therefore take on important significance. An important function is to discover patterns of behavior central to Freudian theory, such as complexes and neuroses. The critic tries to reveal subconscious motivations that characters (and untrained readers) do not notice.
Reader-Based Interpretation
Reader Response Criticism. Response criticism is based on the reactions of the reader to the work of literature. Because the work causes responses, examining those responses delivers insight into the work. The reader's accumulated experience always affects his or her response....
Issues of Reader Response Criticism
Since specific elements in a work of literature--such as metaphors, word choice, and images--affect readers in specific ways, the reader response critic examines the elements for the response they demand. One obvious value of the reader response strategy is that, since virtually all readers have some response to a work of literature, everyone has a place from which to begin an interpretation. In addition, this interpretive strategy helps explain why the meanings of texts--whose words remain the same--change over the years.The work of literature is not an object separate from the reader; in a sense it does not exist until it is read. The reader's response is the most important part of the interpretive act. We can learn about a work of literature by seeing how readers in different ages responded to it. The history of the work includes a history of readers' responses. The reader supplies what the literary text omits, which can include the physical appearance of characters, the sensory experience of events, and a variety of unspoken background information, such as what it means to be male, female, young, old, sick, or well. The ability of the reader to supply that information affects the interpretation. Because readers are different, there are many responses to the same work of literature, each valuable because each provides insights for interpreting a literary work. Readers tend to fall into what reader response critic Stanley Fish called "interpretive communities," groups of people who respond similarly.... A close reading notes the kinds of reactions the author seems to expect from the reader, and the kinds the reader really gives. A close reading also takes into account what changes in attitude the author has caused in the reader as the reader progresses through the work. To what use does the author put those changes?
Context-based Interpretations
The contexts in which a literary text's author, the text itself, and/or its reader exist can inform context-based interpretations. Feminist criticism examines gender issues within and outside texts; political-economic criticism examines economic and political issues; cultural criticism examines African-American, Asian-American, native American, Hispanic, and other cultural issues. Historicism and New Historicism aim to place the text in a historical context, thereby showing its meaning in a new light.
Close reading by context-based critics is often preceded by special preparation, such as collecting historical or political information or information about ethnic groups, cultural values, or other cultural issues.
Feminist criticism: Interpretive strategies developed by feminist critics are context based since they take into consideration the social circumstances surrounding the creation and the reading of a text. Feminist criticism focuses on aspects of literature that have often been ignored by male authors, male readers, or male critics. The feminist interpretation examines gender distinctions implied in the roles that women play or are expected to play....
Certain feminist critics have argued that the ways in which men and women use language differ. Some of them suggest that men perceive women's language as being less logical, more intuitive, and more difficult to follow. Therefore, men do not credit women's use of language and force women either to adopt the masculine use of language or be ignored. Feminist critics, whatever their special interest, examine literature for language that oppresses women. Because feminists assume that society is patriarchal (male-dominated), they also look for assumptions of male dominance in works of literature.
Issues of Feminist Criticism
Like most current schools of criticism, feminist criticism "borrows" from other interpretive strategies. For example, feminist critics are interested in a reader's responses. They also use techniques of New Criticism to connect patterns that produce meanings that might be otherwise unnoticed. However, unlike New Critics, they do not insist that the work must be read alone, without reference to anything outside itself. Feminist critics value psychoanalytic techniques as well as those of the historical critic, particularly in regard to examining the condition of women when a work was written.One function of close reader is to find language oppositions: sun/moon; powerful/weak; light/dark/ logical/intuitive; calm/hysterical; active/passive; rational/emotional; master/slave; intellectuality/sensitivity; dominating/nurturing; self/other. The first word in each of these pairings is culturally associated with male dominance; the second is associated with female passivity. Exposing subconscious patriarchal assumptions in literature reveals hitherto unexpected themes in a work. Features such as unusual awareness of the female body, maternity, natural cycles, madness, witchery, the demonic, and disease are important to explore. A reevaluation of literature written when male dominance was take for granted is implicit.
Political-Economic Criticism: Although not every piece of literature highlights political and economic issues, every piece of literature does reflect a certain political economy, and this is the focus of political-economic criticism. These critics are especially interested in the relation of individual characters to their society, especially the class system that holds their society together. Marxist criticism focuses on the class struggle between the bourgeoisie, those who control capital and the means of production, and the proletariat, those who do the work. Marxists examine literature for its position on the exploitation of the poor by the rich. Often that means looking for signs of indifference on the part of the author or the characters.
Generally, the interpretive strategy emphasizing political and economic issues looks closely at the level of awareness shown by the literature. For example, in many plays the characters may have no observable occupation--one wonders how they can live in comfort and yet do nothing to earn their position. Comedies often ignore the basic issues of making a living because they seem insignificant in relation to the action of the drama. But the political and economic perspective attempts to establish a balance and produce an interpretation sensitive to the realities that most people have to face.
Issues of Political-Economic Criticism
Because most literature assumes the appropriateness of the economic circumstances of its time, political and economic interpretations often come up with surprises...Economic circumstances in a work of literature receive close scrutiny for signs of economic exploitation. The literary work reflects the economic social order that produces it; therefore, writers are expected to reflect their class concerns. The text, the author, and the reader's responses are all susceptible to analysis because all three reveal attitudes toward the bourgeoisie (upper-middle class) and the proletariat (workers). Contradictions and exaggerations of character, description, or language in a piece of literature are sometimes taken as implied critiques of the economic order. Colonialism, whether implicit or overt, becomes a significant subject of analysis. The study of the class struggle reveals itself in literature.
Cultural Criticism: Since the 1960s cultural criticism has called attention to issues involving the special provinces of Asian, Latino, Chicano, and African-American literary experience that are not taken into account by traditional critical methods. For example, the rhythms and styles of American jazz have influenced poets such as Langston Hughes and Nikki Giovanni. Themes of nostalgia for the loss of older ways of life inform Chicano literature. For Chicanos, Aztlan (northern Mexico and southwestern United States) is the homeland. Asian writers have explored family structures, traditions, and other distinguishing features that mark their culture. Louise Erdrich, Carter Revard, and other native American sometimes focus on their knowledge of life both within and apart from the larger American culture.
Like feminist criticism, cultural criticism focuses on a specific segment of society. For example, it often examines works by writers of a particular ethnic group. Larger cultural issues such as apartheid, prejudice, and the effects of colonialism on the colony and the colonizer are also considered important.
Likewise, lesbian and homosexual criticism examine issues relating to lesbians and homosexuals that might otherwise be unnoticed, such as prejudice against their lifestyles. In addition, certain works...contain explicit lesbian themes, which need examination on their own terms rather than on terms dictated by the assumptions of a heterosexual majority.
Issues of Cultural Criticism
Cultural criticism shares many interests with other critical schools, such as the political-economic concern for oppression and the feminist concern for male domination. However, you need not be a member of a specific cultural group to use cultural interpretive strategies any more than you need to be a feminist, Marxist, or psychoanalyst to use those interpretive strategies. Although the methods of cultural criticism are context based, since they examine the cultural context of the literature, the text is very important in itself. Thus the cultural critic often uses formalist interpretive strategies, such as searching for irony, patterns of imagery, and revealing uses of language within the cultural context.Both stated and unstated cultural issues in literature are to be examined. Black English, Chicano bilingualism, and the special uses of language by ethnic groups are examined as special sources of literary power. The role of art and music in literature is of special importance. Folk tales have a special cultural significance in many works. Gender roles and gender expectations relevant to gay and lesbian characters can be the focus of interpretation.
Historicism and New Historicism: Before the 1940s, historical criticism, or historicism, was concerned with factual historical matters surrounding the literary text: When was the work written? What are the author's dates? What sovereigns or political leaders were in place when the work was published? This school of thought was a prime target of the New Critics, who led a revolt in literature in the 1930s and 1940s to encourage study of the work of literature, not its historical period.
New Historicism shows how a greater understanding of a work can develop when its cultural, political, sociological, and ideological context--in effect, its cultural history--is known....The New Historicist links a work to the culture of its time.
Issues of HIstorical Approaches to Criticism
Historical approaches to literature involve and reward research and reading in the period associated with the work of literature. If, for example, you have studied the history of the court of Queen Elizabeth in 1600-1601, when Hamlet was produced, knowing that it was filled with intrigue and uncertainty because Elizabeth was old, frail, quarrelsome, and threatened by rebellion, you would interpret Hamlet much differently than someone who lacks this historical knowledge. Instead of appearing to be only about revenge, the play opens up to reveal a layer of meaning about royal succession, Shakespeare perhaps reflecting England's uncertainty as to who would succeed Queen Elizabeth.Every work of literature profits from being read in a context of its own historical culture. A social era--its assumptions, limitations, aspirations, and values--affects its literature, becoming part of its meaning, and therefore affects our interpretation. Understanding intellectual trends, and scientific, psychological, economic, and political theories of the time is essential to interpretation. Details about the life of the author can be relevant to an interpretation. The study of history is a primary preparation for interpreting any work of literature
Combining Interpretive Strategies
Methods of interpretation are not always absolutely distinct from one another. In practice, feminist critics often use psychoanalytic techniques, and political-economic critics may rely on formalist New Critical techniques for support. Interestingly, these interpretive strategies feed one another. A text-based reading will find elements in the text that need to be accounted for in a formalist strategy and then interpret those elements. A reader-based approach will find details in the text to which the reader must respond and then interpret the responses. A context-based approach will find biographical, cultural, or historical details in and relating to the text and then interpret them. No one of these approaches needs to be kept separate from others that may be useful to you.