David Bleich: ‘The Subjective Character of Critical Interpretation’

Abstract

Part of the original energy of the New Criticism was a reaction against unsystematic ‘Impressionism’. The aim was to present aesthetic discussions so that they would be more intellectually informative and less easily dismissible. Early New Critics wanted to show that knowledge about literature is really knowledge and not merely a record of fleeting personal observations. From one standpoint one cannot dispute this aim, since anything one knows about literature is knowledge. However it remains true that interpretive knowledge is different from the formulaic knowledge of the physical sciences both in its origins and its consequences.