Criticism and Creativity

Literary Theory and Criticism

Dilip Barad
Dept. of English
M.K. Bhavnagar University
dilipbarad@gmail.com
 In this unit . . .
• … we shall try to understand
– the relationship between Criticism and Creativity.
– We shall see how criticism is valued like creative
writings.
– We shall try to understand the role and place
given to ‘the critic’ in the field of literary criticism.
 Who is better among the best?
• The Creative writer or the Critic?
• Wwyp, write down the arguments in favour
and/or against:
• 1.
• 2.
• 3.
 List down the following literary stalwarts in the
category of Creative writer, critic or both:
• Plato, Aristotle.
• Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Sir Philip Sidney.
• Alexander Pope, Dryden.
• Dr. Samuel Johnson
• Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats & the Romantics
• Mathew Arnold, Oscar Wilde, Walter Pater – the Victorians
• T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, I.A.Richards, Northrop Frye, Stanley
Fish, F.R. Leavis, Gerald Genette, Derrida, Roland
Barthes, Widdowson, Greenblatt, Edward Said, Gayatri
Chakravarty Spivak, Terry Eagleton. (New
Criticism, Formalist, Structuralist, Post-
Structuralist, Deconstruction, New Historicism, Post-
Colonialism, end of theory… rise of new reading in 21st
century)
 Difference between criticism and
creativity?
• Creative writer has artistic sensibility. He observes the world
like any common men. But his vision observes the world
quite differently.
• He can perceive from life-experience what common man
cannot see at all. This experience and observation get
imaginative colours with the help of artistic sensibility.
• He creates a world of imaginative reality. His world is more
beautiful and artistic than the real world. He is naturally
gifted to create the work which has power to move or
transport the reader. He gets his raw material from the life.
He is critic of life.
• Nature never set forth the earth in so rich tapestry as
divers poets have done. . . Her world is brazen,
the poets only deliver a golden" (Sir Philip Sidney)
 Difference between criticism and
creativity?
• Criticism is a task of those who write on the creative
writings. The word criticism has been derived from the
Greek word Kritikos, which means ‘able to discern and
judge’ and whoever does the act of judging is called
Critic. Criticism is the art of judging the merits and
demerits of creative composition.
• In the words of Thomas De Quincey criticism may be
termed as the literature of knowledge and creative
writing as the literature of power. Literature of power
deals with life, where as literature of knowledge
share information on creative composition.
 Difference between criticism and
creativity?
• In Gerard Genette’s words, ‘if the writer questions
the universe, the critic questions literature, that is
to say, the universe of signs. But what was a sign
for the writer (the work) becomes meaning for the
critic (since it is the object of the critical
discourse), and in another way what was meaning
for the writer (his view of the world) becomes a
sign for the critic, as the theme and symbol of a
certain literary nature’.
 The egg and chicken problem!
• The relationship between Criticism and Creativity
is a very close and it is very difficult to decide
which of these two processes came first.
• This relationship is as illusive as that of the seed
and the tree, and the egg and the hen. The seed
grows out of a tree and tree grows out of a seed.
• In the same way a hen grows out of an egg and
an egg grows out of a hen. Similarly, it is
absolutely impossible to find out whether an
artist came first or a critic.
 A Critic of literature –
independent & unique identity
• R.A. Scott James has rightly observed “To the
critics, of the arts and especially literature,
custom has given an independent place. In this
respect it differs from all other kind of criticism.”
• The critic of architecture is architecture, of that of
gardening is gardener, but that of poet may or
may not be a poet.
• Thus, since time immemorial, it has been
customary to accept the criticism of art from a
man who may or may not have been artist
himself.
 The debate: Who should be a critic?
• Dramatists like Ben Jonson is of the view that to
‘judge of poets is only the faculty of poets; and
not of all poets, but the best’.
• Only the best of poets have the right to pass
judgments on the merit or defects of poetry, for
they alone have experienced the creative process
form beginning to end, and they alone can rightly
understand it.
• Dryden: ‘…corruption of poet is the generation of
critic…’
Dr. Samuel Johnson – The Rambler
‘… nature and learning has qualified
them to judge…’

* Some believe that artist should

create its art and leave it for critic to
pass judgment over it.
 Two extreme view points…
• Both the above given views are extreme. While it is
true that the critic has understanding of poetry as
well as analytical mind, which proves dependable –
the poets are not quite without the gift of analytical
thinking.
• Moreover, it cannot be said that the poet who
creates does not understand his own creation, and
that in order to understand he must approach the
critic.
• Thus, even Ben Jonson is also not quite fair. Most
often, the poet who bursts out into spontaneous
utterance has no critical awareness of it.
 Two extreme view points…
• Poet has a powerful experience, a vision of life
which he wishes to communicate to others
through his work, but whether it is adequately
communicated or not, whether it has moving,
transporting qualities or not, whether the writer
has succeeded in expressing what he intended to
express…etc… are the questions which a student
of literature(critic) which balanced mind, poetic
sensibility – though not poetic ability and
capacity – has to reply.
• Thus, critics are distinguished persons.
• They have qualified themselves for the task.
• Alexander Pope has rightly said it is heavenly gift.
• “Both from Heaven derive their light These born
to judge, as well as those to write.”
• Dr. Johnson – nature and learning has qualified
them to judge.
• They give equal value to both the critic and the
creative writer. To him both are gifted writers,
one to write creatively and the other to judge the
creativity.
 Exceptions in Generalization
• But this does not mean that all the critics are fair
and qualified critics.
• Sometimes we find purely professional who lack
both sympathy and impartiality of an ideal critic.
• They do not render good service to literature, but
they hinder the young and rising talent. (Keats’
premature death, Hardy gave up writing novels).
Oliver Goldsmith calls them eunuchs –
themselves unable to create, and therefore they
hinder creativity in others.
 A Dog appreciates dog
• R.A.Scott James observed “Less gifted man
would be certain to miss the significance of his
drawing. If you show a dog a photograph of
his master he will not recognize it. It will show
more excitement at the photographs of dog
next door”.
• Any student of literature who wishes to take
some profitable use of the critical literature
available to him will do well to keep the
following words of Scott James in his mind
before he goes on with the task that he has
undertaken to accomplish:
• “It may be a gain to attend to the writer of
this critical literature precisely in so far as
they are not standing aloof, like magistrate
who were never guilty of crime
pronouncing dispassionately upon the
blamelessness or the misdemeanor of
artist”.
 To conclude…
• No critic can ever form accurate judgment
unless he possesses the artist’s vision.
• Criticism and creativity are inextricably
mingled with each other. Thus the artist is
the critic of life and Critic, that of art.
• The artist must have the imagination and
vision to critically imitate the life/nature; the
Critic from beginning to end, relive the same
experience.
Thank you . . .