(E-content developed by Dr N A Jarandikar)
Function
of CRITICISM
1.
Judgement:
- In its strict sense, criticism
means judgement. The literary critic, therefore, is primarily an expert
who uses his special faculty and training to examine the merits and
defects of a piece of literary art or the work of a given author and
pronounce a verdict upon it.
- The primary function of a literary critic
is to arrive at and pronounce a meaningful judgement of value.
- I. A. Richards says: “To set up as
a critic is to set up as a judge of values.”
- Literary criticism, says Rene
Wellek, “is judgement of books, reviewing and finally the definition of
taste, of the tradition, of what is a classic.”
2.
Evaluation:
- When a critic attempts to judge
the value of a work of art or literature, he can be said to have evaluated
the work.
- T. G. Williams says: “The function
of a literary critic is the evaluation of what has been written, in terms
of aesthetic principles appropriate to literature.” (English Literature, a
Critical Survey)
3.
Interpretation:
- If judgement be the real end of
criticism, interpretation may be employed as a means to that end.
- Poetry is a ‘criticism
(interpretation) of life’. Criticism is an interpretation of that
interpretation.
- The chief function of criticism is
to enlighten and stimulate by the proper interpretation of the works of
literature.
- If a great poet makes us partakers
of his larger sense of the meaning of life, a great critic may make us
partakers of his larger sense of the meaning of literature.
- Walter Pater aptly says:
“Criticism is the art of interpreting art.”
- Matthew Arnold defines criticism
as “a disinterested endeavour to learn and propagate the best that is
known and thought in the world.”
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