literary history and the study of literature

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Literary History and the Study of LiteratureAuthor(s): Jan Brandt CorstiusSource: New Literary History, Vol. 2, No. 1, A Symposium on Literary History (Autumn,1970), pp. 65-71Published by: The Johns Hopkins University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/468588 .

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Literary History and the Study of Literature

JanBrandtCorstius

T is beyonddoubt that todaythe historical ense s weakening. The

oldambiguous

attitudetowardsthepast-acknowledgement

of his-

tory to be a valuable operativeforce in the present,but also theawareness hat historyis often a drag on progress-is being replacedby the feelingthat oursocietyno longerneedshistory or the solutionofits problems. Consequently,t is thoughtuseless o interpretand evalu-ate the past as a function of the presentand the future. Accordingtothose who hold this opinion,attemptshave to be made to live without

history.This changeof mind withregard o history, o apparent n the young-

er generation, s, of course,due to a number of causes which we can-not trace as clearlyas we shouldlike. It is alwaysdifficult, f not impos-sible, to graspthe true originsof a new sensibility. But this difficultycan never be an excusefor droppingin advance any inquiryinto thecausesof the phenomenonat issue. The presentfeelingthat history sof little or no use to modem man in his attempts o come to gripswiththe problemsof humanity,has, I think,much to do with the rapidandradicalchanges n the social,moral,philosophical, nd religious houghtof our time and theireffectson education,teaching,and scholarship,as

shown by the dazzling successionof problemsposited and dropped,theories thrown out and exploded, methods proposedand rendered

out of date. Thisembarrassingtmosphere f thoughtand actionfavors

reasoningsand decisionswhich are based ratherupon feelingand senti-

mentthan uponreflection.The sameeffectis producedby the intricacyand opaquenessof so many questions,so that it becomesimpossible o

cover the whole rangeof relevantdata. Whatmay be, in this situation,the meaningof the studyof history?Surelyone answerto this questionwill be that the presentturns so quicklyinto a past dead and buried

and is in itselfso despicable hat only a future matterswhich has to be

protected romanycontagionby history.Yet we cannot part with history,since we cannot escape humanity.

To ignore that aspectof our human situation means that our reason-



66 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

ings and decisions are made more deficient than they are alreadydoomedto be. It is a curtailmentof our freedomby ourselves, n con-

sequenceof which the interpretation nd evaluationof the past,whichforman essentialpartof ourthought,are reduced o mattersof momen-

tary feeling. Notions of the past-and we have them willy-nilly-areno longer subjectto our criticalthinking. But becausethey still playtheirpart in our makingof the future we equip ourselvesbadlyfor the

building of a new society, althoughit is, paradoxically, n its behalfthat we seekto do awaywith historyas much as possible. To one whodoes not care for the futureand denies the past any significance or in-dividual and social life, the present might be a series of disconnected

moments of feeling. This view, however,excludes consciousness f thepresent,it reduces man's existenceto mere being without reflection,that is, to the situationof the new-bornchild.

This is, of course, an entirelytheoretical case. However, without

maintainingthat mankindwill destroy tself by abandoningreflection

uponexistence,I do maintain hat suchneglectis a regression.We mayobserve t in those who rejectpresentsocietyand, at the sametime, feelthemselveshelpless o givetheirconceptsof the futurea theoretical oun-dationthat can be realized. This is a ratherfrustrating ituation,symp-toms of which we can perceive n studentsof literature. They nurse astrong scepticismabout the value of literaryhistoryfor the study of

literature,or even denythat historycontributeso the understanding f

literaryphenomena. They do not believeanylongerin theirstudyas itis actuallytaught and try to force a new senseuponit, even if need be,to abandon he notion of literature.

These feelings of literarystudents are not rooted exclusivelyin a

changed attitudetowardshistory. They are nourishedtoo by a kindof literary historywhich, so the criticsclaim, is cultivatedfor its own

sake, bears no referenceto the present,does not care for the literarytext and confines tselfto meticulousdetails. Needlessto say, a criticismof literaryhistorywhich is bent on presenting his pictureof the liter-

ary historian saddles us with a caricature of literary history, al-

though as a caricature, t has its original. That this originalis, for the

greater part, a thing of the past illustratesagain the well-known factthat images, especiallythose of shortcomings,come to lead a life oftheir own, since the situation which they once representeddoes notexist any more. The formerly

justifiablecriticismhas turned into the

amateurishopinionof the generalpublic. The caricaturedmageof the

literaryhistorian igures n the papersand popular writingsof the dayand occasionally erves he purposesof the opponentsof literaryhistoryin manipulating their public. Such a criticism that limps behind the

facts, demonstrates in its own way how the past holds its grip on the



LITERARY HISTORY AND THE STUDY OF LITERATURE 67

present, n this caseobviouslydetrimental o the objects(a better teach-

ing andscholarship)whichit pretends o pursue.

The anti-historicalattitude with respectto the study of literature sindirectlyfurtheredby new criticism and structuralism. know that

many new criticsand structuralists onsider iteraryhistoryessentialto

literary research. In their approach to literature the structuralele-ments of the textsget theirmeaningsand functionswithintheirhistori-cal contexts. But the approachas such is fundamentallyunhistorical.Recentstructuralism, specially hat of influential Frenchscholars,rig-orouslyholds to this basic principle and, consequently,dehistoricizesthestudyof literature.

This kind of structuralism s attackedby marxistas well as by neo-marxistliterarystudents. They both reproach t with an isolationofliterature romits socialcontext. Butthey disagreeon the subjectof thestructuralists' ejectionof literaryhistory. To the marxist scholarhis-toricalforcesare operative n the same context,and by payingdue at-tention to them he maintains, n his way, the rightsof literaryhistory.The neomarxiststudent of literaturedoes not care for historyat all,since to him historical hought tends to derogatefrom the revolution.The sharedopinion that literaryhistory s of no value to the study of

literature s a commonground whereuponan alliance between struc-turalistsand neomarxistshas come about. Literaryhistory s relegatedto sociologyand literarystudy comesto be the study of language, i.e.

poetic language, ideologicallyconsidereda means by which capitalistsocietymanipulates he reader n orderto keep him a true memberofthebourgeoisie.

Scepticismabout the significanceof literaryhistoryand attemptstoconfera new senseon the studyof literaturearein themselvesrespecta-ble and legitimate. By no means do I think them to be reprehensiblephenomena. They question he habitualcredosof the literaryhistoriansand resistroutineanswers o fundamentalquestionsof our study,with-out falling,we hope,into new easyanswersorscrappingall values orworthlessprejudices. They test the meaning and function of literaryhistory.

This can only be done, however,by viewing literaryhistoryin itsrelationto the whole of the study of literature. If that historyhas a

meaningit will be one which mustbe relevant o the endsof literaryre-

search; and if it has a functionit must be one in behalf of the sameresearch.

We study literature n orderto get some insight into the natureofa universally-known ultural phenomenon. By this study we deepenour awareness of a human faculty and its achievements. To studyliterature is to satisfy a primary disposition of man, namely to be deeply




engaged in humanity, in this case to be eager for knowledge of one of

the ways by which the mind creates, in endless variety, its interpretation

of the universe. The poetic process and its creations are subjects of ourcriticism. But what has history to do with it?

On the bookshelf Joyce's Ulysses is next to Homer's Odyssey, and

again, next to that classic of the Irish author figures an international

host of twentieth-century novels that owe so many features to their

common neighbor. This small set of volumes placed on a shelf above

a writing desk symbolizes the unfinished past of literature and at the

same time the literary background of the poet at work. The texture of

Western literature as it has been structured in the course of the ages

ineluctably has its impact on the mind of the poet. He may start themaking of a poem by writing down a line, which is suddenly there as a

gift from heaven, but it is a line, never a form unknown to any poetbefore. Yet what he is writing in that and the following lines has never,if he shows himself to be a true poet, been seen before.

Thus the poet's individuality operating in language is enacted in

forms and formulae, techniques and devices that together point to litera-

ture as system, as a coherent set of formal and ideatic traditions which

have come down to him from the past and from which he derives his

notions of the making of poetry. This whole is, of course, not an entitywhich runs invariably for all ages and literatures. It is subject to changes

by national literary conventions and immanent as well as extra-literary

developments, the causes of which are often very difficult to trace. All

making of poetry and prose is regulated by literature as system in its

periodic appearance, i.e. the whole of literary modes and concepts, vi-

sions, perspectives and aspirations, theories and experiments of the

time.

This is, needless to say, only one single aspect of the poetic process.But how can the reader grasp as fully as possible what happens at the

conception of a poem or a novel without knowledge of the literarythought of the time and its subsequent practice? This concerns only the

way by which the poetic langue of the time turns into the parole ofthe poet. There is, however, that other, far more unsolvable, historical

problem concerning the voice of one poet subtly ringing in the ears ofhis fellow-in-poesis when he is at work, and the imagery of a once-read

poem blinking in his mind's eye. Much of the creative process is hiddenfrom our observation. But the role

played

in it

by

the

literary thoughtof the period and the effects it produces are at least more or less trace-able. Why should we deprive ourselves of understanding by renouncingliterary history?

The depreciation of literary history is accompanied by an increase of

literary theory. This shifting of scholarly interest has something to do




with the apparent reaction against an historical approach of literature

that scarcely attended to the structural functions of the data which were

diligently dug up and truly described. In its turn literary theory nowclaims to dispense with literary history. It often proclaims the universali-

ty and timelessness of its principles and classifications without havingtried the latter on material taken from as many periods and literatures

as possible. Consequently it makes those principles and classifications

operative in the analyses of texts irrespective of the period to which that

material belongs. Thus it strips a piece of literature of certain relation-

ships relevant to our understanding of the text and reduces its essentials

to a mere skeleton.

Any application of literary theory that will not commit such a muti-lation of literature involves a scanning of the interrelations between

general theoretical viewpoints and the conventions of periods and

national literatures, which, on their part, may govern the functions of

the theoretically discriminated phenomena. How can this be done

without literary history? It is literary history that makes available to

theory the abundance and diversity of data that it needs in order to be

well-founded and to clarify its problems. Since it is only by comparingand analyzing literary data, carefully chosen from various literatures

and several periods, that generalization comes about.Insofar as literary criticism aims at evaluation, the imponderability of

certain textual elements or even their elusiveness limit, also in this case,the effect of our discrimination, sometimes even so drastically that the

core of the matter altogether withdraws. Consequently evaluative

criticism must be supplied with all possible criteria in order to give it a

fair chance. Fully aware of the probability that the ultimate truth

about the object of our evaluation will stay out of reach, we do not

resign our task, but apply all discriminative methods that we find at

our disposal. Comparison is one of them, based upon formal and

ideatic similarities. And why should we, in comparing, exclusively

juxtapose only contemporary texts? This would mean a wholly arbitraryreduction of the efficacy of our method. Literary evaluation cannot do

without literary history. This is the more evident if the typical literarycontext is concerned in the comparision. And that will often be the

case, for the observation of the various individual realizations, in the

course of time, of literary types-themes, motifs, formulae, symbols,

figuresof

speech,versification, etc.-and their

possiblehistorical inter-

relationships has in itself an evaluative tenor and, at the same time,

places the evaluation on the firm footing of the comparative method.

Many a text has its roots in strong literary traditions, especiallythose of genre and theme, so that only a trained knowledge of these his-

torical phenomena enables us to evaluate its individual qualities. This




holds true of texts of all centuries, our age not excepted. The makingof literature is like a game of chess. The good performance is carried

out according to traditional rules and shines out as quite new andunique.

This brings me to the next part of my subject, which is the relation

between the criticism of modern literary movements and literary history.Some twenty years ago the argument concerning the application of the

historical method to the study of literature centered on two closely re-

lated points. Could we, it was asked, identify ourselves with the poetand critic of the past, as far as their literary opinions and visions were

concerned, to such an extent that we could reach as near as possible the

truth of that which had once happened in literature? Or is all criticisman action of the present literary thought towards the past? That debate

was provoked by those who were inclined to answer the last question in

the affirmative. And one of the issues of the discussion on the use of

the historical method in the study of literature was a conception of

literary history that pretended to give full scope to the preferences of

the historian; he could pronounce his priorities far more openly and ex-

plicitly than he had allowed himself to do so before.

As a matter of fact this conception was more discussed than put into

practice. It was, in my opinion, one of the symptoms of the changedattitude towards history already mentioned. However, from that con-

ception it was but a step to affirm the desirability of abandoning all

literary history by restricting oneself to the study of contemporary litera-

ture which, by the way, is itself, in many of its forms, the outcome of

experiments made by poets for the purpose of freeing themselves from

the burden of history. To start from zero was, and is still, a very attrac-tive idea to poets as well as to students of literature.

Yet it is a fallacy to fancy that the study of contemporary literature

can be done without literary history. The only zero in literature is thewhite page, but as soon as the last word has disappeared, literature seemsto turn into the plastic arts. I do not think that we can trace exactly theborderline between these arts and literature. Even when we have todeal with modernistic literary phenomena such as assemblage and col-

lage in poetry and prose, the making of concrete poetry, the use ofaleatoric and randomizing devices, the orchestration of sound poemsand the construction of object poems, literary history plays its part inthe study of these kinds of literature. For instance, how can we under-

stand the own nature of concrete poetry without knowing about theMallarmean notion of constellation or the idea of the moving readerintroduced by Apollinaire, the mobiles of the Flemish poet Paul van

Ostayen, or the letter-images of Theo van Doesburg, the founder andconductor of the international review De Styl, not to mention their




literary ancestors? The theoreticians and critics of concrete poetry con-

stantly refer to literary history, for its help enables them to trace similari-

ties and differences, to discern influences, imitations, pastiches, pla-giarisms, and, subsequently, to find what is actually new in that poetry.

In the foregoing I mentioned only a few reasons why the scholarshipand teaching of literature cannot do without literary history. I referred

to the function of literary history in studying the poetic process, analyz-

ing the literary text, evaluating a work of literature, and criticizing con-

temporary literary movements. One feels slightly embarrassed to be

justifying such a vital, integral part of our scholarship and teaching, un-

til one realizes that the anti-historical attitude of our time is not the

outcome of a scrutiny into the functions of history with regard to both.

Literary history as an approach to literature is not put aside because it

has proved to be an outworn manner in dealing with literature or be-

cause it can be replaced by a more effective one. It is rejected because

of the general feeling of uneasiness about scholarship and teaching con-

cerning the humanities, a feeling that expresses the world-wide ques-

tioning of established values which we experience today.

Literary history is denied validity not for its presumed defectiveness as

ascholarly

method but for the function,imputed

to all history, to be a

weapon of the conservatives in the social and political war of the time.

This feeling about history is constantly motivated by the lack of a legiti-mate outlook on human society, since any consistent view on man and

society will assimilate history. Therefore, we scholars and teachers of

literary history have to suit our didactics to that motivation in order

to overcome the negative feeling about history.

Students urge the necessity of discussing our subject by appealing to

the motivation-crisis wherein they feel themselves involved with regard

to their study. But that crisis is essentially one of their view of life, es-pecially concerning human society. It is of no use working off the latter

by throwing all responsibility for their critical situation upon the prin-

ciples and methods of the study. Of course, the way of the present

study is related to the way of the present life. But it is also true that

scholarship and teaching only change in a society which is being

changed by men who are able to shape their world thanks to their moral

and intellectual fortitude.

The legitimate motivation of our study is founded in our legitimatemotivation of humanity. This holds true for all, scholars, teachers, and

students.

UTREGCHT UNIVERSITY

literary history and the study of literature

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