The Genesis of New Criticism: From Cambridge to the American South

The Genesis of New Criticism

English Foundations: I.A. Richards' Influence

The roots of New Criticism were initially in England, specifically at the University of Cambridge, championed by I.A. Richards. A lecturer, Richards linked New Criticism to the USA by moving to Harvard in 1939. He found in America a very suitable ground to develop his theory of criticism, as Americans sought new methods for literary study without relying on external context. Richards' seminal work, Practical Criticism, explains his method in detail.

René Wellek and Cosmopolitanism

René Wellek contributed significantly to the cosmopolitan component of New Criticism, ensuring it was not an exclusively Anglo-American method of criticism.

American Roots: The Southern Literary Movement

Vanderbilt University and Key Figures

The true roots of New Criticism are found in the United States. Its earliest origins in U.S. criticism were in the South, specifically at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee. There, a group of intellectuals and critics emerged, including prominent members such as John Crowe Ransom, Allen Tate, and Robert Penn Warren.

The Fugitives: Literary Intellectuals

These figures were influenced by two significant movements in the U.S.:

• The Fugitives: A literary intellectual group established at Vanderbilt University in 1915. They published a journal, The Fugitive, and their primary purpose was to disseminate European Modernist literature, primarily T.S. Eliot's poetry.

The Agrarians: Culture, Politics, and Values

• The Agrarians: This group shared literary, cultural, intellectual, and critical characteristics with the Fugitives, but also held an ultra-conservative political agenda. They advocated for a return to what they considered the true, genuine Southern culture, based on:

  • Small farm country
  • Agricultural small towns
  • Plantation life
  • Recovery of traditional values and virtues of what is now known as the Deep South

  They were staunchly against science, the U.S. North, big businesses, and industrialization. Their vision of recovering the past entailed a return to the natural world, a rural past, and what they understood as ancient social harmony. This included the feudal paternalism of plantation life, the well-established myth of the Southern gentleman, and fundamental Christianity. This perspective formed a Romantic view of life, even though they were against sentimental literature. Above all, there was a strong, pessimistic, and disappointed view of life.

  The Agrarians failed from a sociopolitical point of view, but they triumphed from an artistic, cultural, and critical perspective, establishing a new way to contemplate literature. For them, literature was a preserver and communicator of social, intellectual, and human values. However, for literature to be truly influential and effectively preserve and communicate these values, it had to be made popular. If restricted only to a group of intellectuals, it would not be influential.