FORMALISM
WARM-UP: discussing “Against Interpretation”
“In most modern instances, interpretation amounts to the
philistine refusal to leave the work of art alone. Real art had the
capacity to make us nervous. By reducing the work of art to its
content and then interpreting that, one learn to treat the work of
art. Interpretation makes art manageable,
comformable.” (Sontag 1964/2001, 8)
What kind of criticism, of commentary on the arts, is desirable
today? For I am not saying that works of art are ineffable, that
they cannot be described or paraphrased. They can be. The
question is how. What would criticism look like that would serve
the work of art, not usurp its place?
What is needed, first, is more attention to form in art. If
excessive stress on content provokes the arrogance of
interpretation, more extended and more thorough descriptions of
form would silence. What is needed is a vocabulary – a
descriptive, rather than prescriptive, vocabulary – for forms. The
best criticism, and it is uncommon, is of this sort that dissolves
considerations of content into those of form. (Sontag 1964/2001,
12)
Formalism is a school of literary criticism and literary theory having
mainly to do with structural purposes of a particular text. It is the
study of a text without taking into account any outside influence.
•What sort of questions should/might the formalist ask
the text?
