The Rise Of English (Till Page 23)

Terry Eagleton talks of the concept of literature in eighteenth-century England. He says that in the eighteenth century, the concept of literature was not confined as it is today to just 'creative' or 'imaginative' writing. It included the whole body of valued writing in society: philosophy, history, essays, letters and poems. Literature was not limited to a text that was fictional; a text was literature if it conformed to certain standards of 'polite letters'. It was in the eighteenth century, that the form of the 'novel' was emerging and the eighteenth century was in a dilemma whether to consider this 'novel' as literature or not.
At that time, the criteria for calling a piece of work literature was completely ideological: writing which embodied the balues and 'tastes' of a particular social class qualified as literature.
Literature did not only 'embody' certain social values.
In the previous century, England had suffered from the Civil War - there was a lot of friction between the difference social classes and there was a need to restore the shaken social order and the neo-classical notions of Reason, Nature, and order. Literature gained importance as it served the function of uniting the different classes of people. It tried to incorporate the 'raw middle class' with values so that they could match up to the cultural standards of the ruling aristocracy.
In eighteenth-century England, literature was very easily available in written form. The coffee-house culture was also emerging.

Today, we choose to define literature only considering the 'Romantic Period', With the Romantic Movement, literature was shortened to include writings which were 'creative' and 'imaginative'. By nineteenth century, literature was synonymous with the 'imaginative'. Prose started appearing to be dull and it did not have any effect on the people. People got satisfaction from only the 'creative' writings.

The period we are looking at was one of revolution. Middle-class England did not believe in the utilitarian principles anymore. The French Revolution and the American Revolution was going on. In such a political scenario, the Romantics can be said to have used their 'creative imagination' to create an imaginative realm which did not just question the reason-centric world but also created an alternate escapist world of imagination. The Romantics used the poetic form to criticise all rationalist thoughts. Thus poetry had social, political and philosophical implications and literature could be viewed as a political force. Most of the Romantic poets were political activists themselves.
However, the stress was laid upon the sovereignty and autonomy of imagination. Imagination was of a 'transcendental' nature and it detached the reader and the writer from the actual scenario. Though it claimed to be'representative' of humankind and all sections of society, the Romantic artist existed only in the margins of the society.
However, the Romantic Period saw the rise of modern 'aesthetics', or the philosophy of art.
Literature was not merely seen as a medium of instruction. It also served the purpose of delight. It was in this era , from the works of Coleridge, Hegel and others that we inherit the contemporary ideas of the 'symbol' and 'aesthetic experience', and the unique nature of the artefact.
Aesthetics served the function of suppressing historical differences.
Aesthetics introduced the semi-mystical doctrine of the symbol. Objects in the society which were earlier seen as lifeless and inert now became the medium of an eternal spiritual truth, one perceived by direct intuition and not by any laborious process of critical analysis. The symbol was a unitary thing - either one saw it or one did not. It could not be torn apart to see how it worked. It represented one common idea. Throughout the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries, the symbol is a literary artefact which was offered as an ideal model of human society itself.

Literature is an ideology. The failure of religion was one reason for the growth of English studies in the late nineteenth century. By the mid-Victorian period, religion no longer had a strong hold on the masses owing to the scientific discoveries that were being made and the social changes happening. This was something to worry about for the Victorian ruling class as religion was an extremely effective form of ideological control. As T.S Eliot put it, Religion was capable of operating at every social level. It provided an excellent social 'cement', encompassing pious peasants, enlightened middle-class liberal and theological intellectual in a single organization. Religious symbols are not open to rational demonstrations.
For the Victorian Ruling class, English literature was another remarkably similar discourse to Religious idelogy. Thus English literature, along with serving the functions of instructing, delighting also had a third function: that of saving the souls and healing the State (England).

Introduction: What is Literature?

Terry Eagleton begins his essay by putting forth the question: what is literature?
One definition which he suggests is "imaginative writing in the sense of fiction - writing which is not literally true". However, this definition can be rejected as seventeenth-century English Literature comprises of the works of Shakespeare, Milton, Marvell as well as the essays of Francis Bacon and the sermons of John Donne. Hobbes's "Leviathan" may also be regarded as literature. French literature contains not only Boileau's poetry but also the letters written by Madame de Sevigne for her daughter. It includes Bosseut's funeral speeches as well as hte philosophy of Pascal and Descartes.
Making distinctions between fact and fiction will not get us anywhere when it comes to defining what is literature. In the late sixteenth and early seventeeth century, the English novel contained both fictional as well as real events. The boundaries of fact and fiction are not very clearly defined. News reports cannot be considered to be completely factual. Literature can also not be simply defined as 'creative' or 'imaginative' writing as this would imply that history, philosophy and natural science are uncreative and unimaginative.

Literature may be defined in terms of its peculiar usage of language. According to Roman Jakobson, literature is a kind of writing which represents an 'ordinary violence committed on ordinary speech'.

• Literature transforms and intensifies ordinary language.
• It deviates systematically from everyday speech.

Terry Eagleton then talks about the Formalist stand for literature. The Formalists believed in the application of linguistics to the study of literature. They gave more importance to the language used than to what was said i.e. they gave more importance to the form than to the content. According to them, it is the form which gives content the meaning.
According to the Formalists, literature was a particular organization of language. It had its own specific laws, structures and devices which were to be studied in themselves and not reduced to something else.
For the Formalists,

• Literary work was not a vehicle for ideas.
• It was not a reflection of social reality.
• It did not speak of any transcendental truth.
• IT WAS A MATERIAL FACT MADE UP OF WORDS and not of objects or feelings.
• It is not an expression of an author's mind.

First, the Formalists saw literary work as only an assemblage of devices. Later, they came to see these devices as inter-related elements or 'functions' within a textual system.

Devices = Sound, Imagery, Rhythm, Syntax, Metre, Narrative Techniques...It includes all forms of formal literary elements which had a 'defamiliarizing' effect.
These literary devices intensified, condensed, twisted, telescoped ordinary language. It was language 'made strange'.
Literary discourse alienates ordinary speech. Literature is a special kind of language.
Therefore, for the Formalists, literary language was a deviation from the normal. It was a kind of linguistic violence.

Terry Eagleton critiques this Formalist understanding of Literature. His arguments are:

1. The idea of a single 'normal' language existing amongst all members of society is an illusion. (One person's norm may be someone else's deviation).
2. The Formalists do not define 'literature'. Rather, they defined 'literariness' i.e. special uses of language which, in reality, can be found not only in 'literary' texts but also many places outside it.
3. If a piece of language is considered 'estranging', it is so only for a certain group of people.
4. There are 'literary' devices used even in daily discourse. However, for the Formalists, 'making strange' was the essence of the literary.
5. Formalists leave the definition of literature up to how somebody decides to read a text, not to the nature of what is written.
   A work is considered to be 'literature' if it is accepted as 'fine writing'. However, if literature is a highly valued kind of writing, one must remember that values change with time, and across cultures.
6. For Formalists, literature should evoke disturbances. The mtter should be condensed in a manner that it appeals to the reader...Formalists think of all literature as poetry but literature also comprises of other genres like novels, realistic or naturalistc writing.

Terry Eagleton admits that many texts taught as 'literature' in academic institutions were constructed to be read as a literary text and many were not. Many writing started off as history or philosophy and were later ranked as literature.
By and large, people term 'literature' writing as writing which is good. Literature is a highly valued kind of writing. Therefore, the categorization of a text as literature is highly subjective. Literature is defined by power-structures, and is relative to time.

We always interpret literary works to some extent in the light of our own concerns - which is one reason why certain works of literature have retained their value across the centuries.
All literary works are re-written by the societies which read them.
Even when something is stated as a fact, that statement is open to questionable judgements. Like it was earlier said, values are culture-specific; in the same way, facts are constructed by societies based on the ideologies and power structures which operate.

Terry Eagleton concludes by saying that we cannot regard literature as an 'objective' descriptive category nor can we say that literature is just what people choose to call 'literature'. Value-judgement has its roots in deeper structures of beliefs and therefore, it is not based on whims and fantasies. Value-judgements have a close relation to social ideologies - they do not refer only to private tastes but also to the assumptions by which certain social groups exercise and maintain power over others.