F.R.Leavis And The New Criticism

F.R.Leavis(1895-1978),the famous English literary and cultural critic in the 20 th century,has plenty of original opinions and far-reaching influence,with his great contributions upon criticism of poetry,novel and English cultural,which made him become an outstanding commenter of British literary criticism.Leavis is also renowned for his rewriting the "great tradition" of Britain.Although Leavis achieved remarkable achievements,he still drew down much controversial,which was intertwined in ideological debates of literary criticism,Cultural Studies and even university education.Since the 1930 s,Leavis has been introduced by domestic scholars,but has a slight misunderstanding with his thought and theory.Due to Leavis' age and some theoretical perspectives were associated with the New Criticism,the domestic scholars often bring him into the New Criticism.Collecting and organizing the predecessors' research results,this paper firstly intends to interpret Leavis' s theoretical claims according to his view of literary criticism.Secondly,the paper elaborates Leavis' later cultural critic viewpoints.Under the condition of the event that traditional culture was gradually eroded by industrial revolution,Leavis was against C.P.Snow's scientific culture and advocated the idea that "minority culture" guided the cultural orientation.He hoped to inherit and forward the traditional culture through literature.On this basis,he eventually formed his own criticism.Finally,the thesis explains the rational relationship between him and the New Criticism through the comparison of the main theoretical views of Leavis and the New Criticism.In summary,Leavis can not be simply classified into the New Criticism.His theoretical claims and practical paths not only go beyond the New Criticism and have had a great impact on the British cultural criticism tradition,but also provide an important reference for our current thinking of Chinese literary criticism and cultural research.