LITERATURE QUESTIONS
INTRODUCTION TO LITERARY STUDIES
|
Question
[CLICK ON ANY CHOICE TO KNOW THE RIGHT ANSWER]
|
|
|
New Historicism was a reaction against New Criticism, which was seen as too narrowly focused on text rather than context.
|
|
|
Both fields of literary study are American in origin.
|
|
|
New Historicism is simply an early form of Cultural Materialism.
|
|
|
Both fields of study are strictly focused on how readers interpret and invent meanings for literary texts.
|
Detailed explanation-1: -Current literary criticism is affected by and reveals the beliefs of our times in the same way that literature reflects and is reflected by its own historical contexts. New Historicism acknowledges and embraces the idea that, as times change, so will our understanding of great literature.
Detailed explanation-2: -New Historicism is an approach to literary criticism and literary theory based on the premise that a literary work should be considered a product of the time, place, and historical circumstances of its composition rather than as an isolated work of art or text.
Detailed explanation-3: -Answer and Explanation: Traditional historicism and New Historicism both share a belief that literary texts interact with historical and social contexts. However, the most important difference between the two approaches rests in how each understands and relates to history and the critic or historian.
Detailed explanation-4: -New Historicism envisages and practises a mode of study where the literary text and the non-literary cotext are given “equal weighting”, whereas old historicism considers history as a “background” of facts to the “foreground” of literature.