Methods of studying literature are defined and described. A section on definitions and distinctions investigates literature and literary study; the nature and function of literature; literary theory, criticism, and history; and general, comparative, and national literature. The ordering and establishing of evidence is described. The bulk of the…

Extremists, whether formalists of the New Criticism or of the humanist-moralist tradition, are taken to task in this attempt to combine elements of both in a more pluralistic approach to literary criticism. An analysis of a Frost poem, "Stopping by Woods", is attempted as an illustration of a kind of criticism that seeks to clarify the parts of…

Articles contained in this publication are (1) "Criticism in Teaching Literature" by Wayne Booth; (2) "Criticism and Literature: A Reply" (to Booth's article) by Frederick J. Hoffman; (3) "Criticism in Context" by Helen C. White; (4) "Formalist Criticism and Shakespeare" by Kester Svendsen; (5) "Grammar, History, and Criticism" by Kenneth S.…

Describes an experiment made to illustrate to Ancient History students the value of textual criticism and the problems involved in transmitting a text through the centuries by means of imperfectly copied and preserved manuscripts. (CHK)

The principles which best explain the traditional divisions of rhetoric are those of physics. (JH)

Aristotle's "Rhetoric" offers a model for applying the concept of the enthymeme to the work of film scholars to understand the role of the audience. Used from an analytic perspective, enthymemes emphasize audience reaction to a film, with the focus on how the film is seen, not on how it was made. Applying viewing skills to a sample of…

Traces the genesis of Plato's "conflict" psychology and documents the influence of this genesis on his discussion of rhetoric in the Gorgias and Phaedrus. (Ed.)

Considers the quest for meaning to be the primary function of the rhetorical critic--meaning that goes from the text outward and that is interpreted by the reader. (RB)

Shaw's preoccupation with Hamlet resonates in his creative writing. Article documents this statement not only by examining his novels and plays but by searching through prefaces, postscripts, reviews, letters, speeches, etc. that span Shaw's lifetime. (Author/RB)

Contributes to scholarship on film and feminism by showing how James Whale's film attempts to excise or severely delimit the disturbing critique of the Romantic politics of gender in Mary Shelley's novel "Frankenstein." Discusses parthenogenesis, showing how the novel critiques the Romantic rhetorical reconstructions of masculine…

Argues for two basic kinds of literary analysis: one which attempts to discover the meaning intended by the author, and one which treats the poem as an illustration of a system of ideas independent of the text and its author. (DD)

Presents the reactions of ten advanced students in a Colloquium for Psychoanalytic Criticism to Denise Levertov's "To the Snake." (DD)

Argues the need for explicit rules for the use of critical terms, and provides four such rules. (DD)

Examines Plato's two dailogues, the Gorgias and the Phaedrus, in an attempt to clarify the relations between rhetoric and philosophy with reference to classical antiquity. (MH)