I.A. Richards
Charlotte Broadbent Monica Elvir Taylor Malkus Catalina Moore Rachel White
introducing
I.A. Richards
Brown, Stuart C. “I. A. Richards’ New Rhetoric: Multiplicity, Instrument, and Metaphor.” JSTOR. Taylor and Francis Ltd., Spring 1992. Web. 3 Apr. 2012. <I. A. Richards’ New Rhetoric: Multiplicity, Instrument, and Metaphor>.
“I. A. Richards’ Theory of Literary Criticism.” : I.A. Richards’ Theory of Literary Criticism. Boscoh.com, 2 Nov. 2001. Web. 03 Apr. 2012. <http://boscoh.com/books/ia-richards-theory-ofliterary-criticism>.
Cahill, Allie. “”Proper Meanin’g Superstition”” University of Colorado Boulder. 1998. Web. 03 Apr. 2012. <http://www.colorado.edu/communication/meta-discourses/Papers/App_Papers/ Cahill.htm>.
Murphy, Keith. “I. A. Richards.” Welcome to Keithmurphy. Dragon Publishing. Web. 3 Apr. 2012. <http://www.keithmurphy.info/399/richard.htm>.
Delahoyde, Michael. “New Criticism.” Introduction to Literature. Washington State University. Web. 03 Apr. 2012. <http://public. wsu.edu/~delahoyd/new.crit.html>. Douglas-Fairhurst, Robert. “Essays in Criticism.” Essays in Criticism-2004-Douglas-Fairhurst-373-89.pdf. Oxford University Press, 004. Web. 03 Apr. 2012. <http://eic.oxfordjournals.org/ content/54/4/373.full.pdf html>. Encyclopedia of World Biography. “Ivor Armstrong Richards Ivor Armstrong Richards.” BookRags. Web. 03 Apr. 2012. <http:// www.bookrags.com/biography/ivor-armstrong-richards/>. Hjørland, Birger. “Semiotic Triangle.” 27 July 2006. Web. 3 Apr. 2012. <http://www.iva.dk/bh/core%20concepts%20in%20lis/ articles%20a-z/semiotic_triangle.htm>. “I. A. Richards, 1893--1979.” University of Michigan, Center for the Study of Complex Systems. 14 Aug. 2009. Web. 03 Apr. 2012. <http://cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/notabene/richards-i-a. html>. I. A. Richards. Digital image. True Knowledge. Web. 3 Apr. 2012. <http://www.trueknowledge.com/images/thumbs/180/250/425 f43553aca164b30544dc430c652d3.jpg>.
Roskelly, Hepzibag. “What Do Students Need to KNow About Rhetoric?Hepzibah.” Ap06_englang_roskelly_50098.pdf. College Board. Web. 3 Apr. 2012. <http://sitesearch.collegeboard.org/?q=roskelly&x=0&y=0&sear chType=site>. Russo, John Paul. “I. A. Richards in Retrospect.” Critical Inquiry. Chicago Journals, 1982. Web. 3 Apr. 2012. <http://www.jstor. org/stable/1343195?seq=7>. Slane College F Communications and Fine Arts. “I. A. Richards.” I.A. Richards on Rhetoric. Bradley University. Web. 03 Apr. 2012. <http://bradley.bradley.edu/~ell/iarichar.html>. Russo, John Paul. I.A. Richards. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989. Print. Vendler, Helen. “I.A. Richards at Harvard.” Boston Review. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Mar 2012. <http://bostonreview.net/BR06.2/ vendler.html>. Young, R. V. “The Home of American Intellectual Conservatism â First Principles.” First Principles. ISI Web Journal, 22 Aug. 2011. Web. 03 Apr. 2012. <http://www.firstprinciplesjournal. com/articles.aspx?article=672>.
Table of Contents Brief Biography................................................1 Historical Context............................................2 Key Ideas, Terms, and Concepts......................3 Major Contributions and Impact on Rhetoric..6 List of Works....................................................9 Influences, Contemporaries, and Followers....11
Taylor Malkus 1
Brief Biography
ďżź Ivor Armstrong Richards was a British literary critic born on February 26, 1893 in Cheshire, England. He went to school at both Clifton College and Magdelen College and later worked at Cambridge and Magdalen as an English lecturer. He married Dorothy Eleanor Pilley in 1926. From 1929 to 1930, he worked as a guest lecturer at the Tsing Hua University in Peking. He started as a lecturer and then became a professor at Harvard University. In 1962, he won the Loines Poetry Award for two volumes of his verse. He retired in 1963.
Taylor Malkus 2
Historical Context When Richards entered the rhetorical field, not much was going on; the rhetorical theory being studied was dominated by that of Aristotle. There were many psychological advancements occurring, though, and these contributed to the movements in rhetoric which would follow. Popular movements of the era included logical positivism and loical empiricism which define valid evidence as that proven empirically.
One of the most prominent rhetoricians in the age of I. A. Richards was Edmund Burke. His theories influenced many by promoting reductive rationalism over moral imagination.
Charlotte Broadbent 3
Key Ideas, Terms, and Concepts I. A. Richard’s ideas of “practical criticism” lead to the concept of close reading and this is thought to be the beginning of modern literary criticism. Richards is considered one of the founders of the contemporary study of literature in English and during his career focused on the meaning within communication.
Oregon and Richard’s (1932) triangle of meaning:
The referent of an expression is relative to different language users. Richards believes that this semantic triangle is the basis for all language. He argues that the metaphor exists as a “borrowing between an intercourse of thoughts, a transaction between contexts,” because we sort perception and compare these perceptions to create references. Richards calls the
symbol of the metaphor a vehicle and the term a tenor. The tenor is the fundamental idea that the symbol refers to. The way that this metaphoric process related to the semantic triangle, is that the vehicle would be in the lower left corner, the referent in the lower right corner and the tenor would be the term that describes the contexts that are used to determine a meaning. The relationship between the tenor and the vehicle is important as this can show how the meaning was formed and then can be applied to many different meanings. As we can see, Richards believes that the whole world is a Metaphor as meaning can only be applied though a submission of our personal contexts.
Charlotte Broadbent 4
Signs and Symbols Richards declared that meaning could be classified into two different categories, signs and symbols. The semantic triangle further demonstrates Richard’s idea, because the sign is the referent and the symbol, is a word. Everything that Richard believed could be traced back to the semantic
Richard’s remedies for communicative misunderstandings: I. Definition: defining words that the author feels the reader may be unfamiliar with. II. Metaphor: communicating metaphorically should happen because humans think like this. III. Feedforward: the author anticipates the audience’s response. IV. Basic English: 850 words Richard’s believed were the only words that needed to be used to communicate efficiently.
Charlotte Broadbent 5
Richards â&#x20AC;&#x153;Chief Difficultiesâ&#x20AC;? of Reading 1. You must understand and understand the meaning of what you are reading. 2. Sensuous apprehension. 3. There may be problems visualizing the imagery used. 4. Mnemonic irrelevancies: misleading effects connecting reading with personal endeavors 5. Stock responses: involves views and emotions the reader has already prepared in their mind. 6. Sentimentality: a question of the due measure of response 7. Inhabitation. 8. Doctrinal adhesions: how a reading may imply views and beliefs, true or false about the world. 9. Technical presuppositions: expectations of similar techniques that have been used before. 10. General critical preconceptions: previous demands that have been made due to theories.
Richards is often referred to as the father of the New Criticism. This is mainly because of the influence his first two books The Principles of Literary Criticism and of Practical Criticism had on critical theory.
Catalina Moore 6
Major Contributions and Impacts on Rhetoric I.A. Richardsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; major contribution to the field of rhetoric was his development of the New Rhetoric in his Philosophy of Rhetoric. This New Rhetoric studied misunderstandings and their meanings and remedies.
Richards also called for the complete mastery of the laws of language prior to attempting to use it along with a study of how words work explored primarily through the metaphor.
Catalina Moore 7
Richards is well known for having said that he believed literary works should be studied in and of themselves – not with a counter area of study such as psychology or science. He was a pioneer of semantics and really changed how we read and comprehend literature – be it novels or poetry.
Richards inspired the New Criticism movement, which concerned a new method called close reading. This was a new way of analyzing texts, especially poetry, which operates under the premise that the objective determination as to “how a piece works” can be found through close focus and analysis, rather than through extraneous and erudite special knowledge. His methodologies had a large impact on the interpretation of texts by increasing the importance of intention and remedying miscommunication.
Catalina Moore 8
Richards applied his concept of close reading to studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; work because he believed some insight could be gained. For example, he often had his students perform protocols at the beginning of poetry classes which entailed giving first impressions to poems without the benefit of the author or their professorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s guidance. In Practical Criticism Richards describes how he conducted these experiments while teaching at Cambridge University. The results showed the studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; responses were essentially the opposite of the usual evaluations. As it is understood, the students did not seem to grasp the literal sense of the poems nor any deeper meanings to which they alluded.
Sample student answer during a poetry protocol
Richards also tried to advance the idea that reading and writing were a moral obligation and developed a Basic English language, which consisted of only 850 words.
Rachel White 9
The Foundations of Aesthetics • Published: London, 1922 • Co-authored with C. K. Ogden and James Wood.
The Meaning of Meaning: A Study of the Influence of Language upon Thought and of the Science of Symbolism • Published: Cambridge, 1923 • Co-authored with C. K. Ogden
The Principles of Literary Criticism • Published: London, 1924; New York, 1925). • Subsequent editions: • London 1926 (with two new appendices) • New York 1926 (Same as London 1926, but with new preface, dated New York, April 1926) • 1928 – was revised
List of
Rachel White 10
Works
Science and Poetry • Published: London, 1926, • Subsequent editions: • London, 1935. • There is no known US publication of the 2nd Edition • This version was reset, with a ‘Preface’, ‘Commentary’, and an additional essay, ‘How Does a Poem Know When it is Finished’ (1963), as Poetries and Sciences and published by W. W. Norton in New York and London in 1970
Practical Criticism • Published: London, 1929) • Subsequent editions: • 1930 – was revised
Coleridge on Imagination • Published: London, 1934; New York, 1935 • Subsequent editions: • New York and London, 1950 (Revised with new preface) • Bloomington 1960 (Reprints 1950, with new foreword by Richards and introduction by K. Raine).
Monica Elvir 11
Influences, Contemporaries, and Followers In the United States he was the acknowledged “father” of New Criticism. He influenced the works of John Crowe Ransom, Allen Tate, and Robert Penn Warren.
His influence was well timed, coinciding with the expansion of higher education and graduate programs in English after WWII. William Empson: One of Richards’ best students who wrote Seven Types of Ambiguity. In the first chapter of his book, Empson was generous in acknowledging his debts to Richards. Seven Types contains Richards’ influence in its kernel idea, structure, method, terms, and conclusions. The kernel idea combines contextualism with the notion that ambiguities can be plotted in “stages of advancing logical disorder”.
Monica Elvir 12
Whereas Empson developed the linguistic, technical, and methodological lines of Ricahardsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; thought, F.R. Leavis pursued its educational, social, and moral themes. Leavis borrowed and exapanded heavily upon Richardsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; works, chiefly those concerning the perception of immanent cultural collapse; analysis of irony, meter, sentimentality, and stock responses.
Influence on the American Academy His impact in the American academy lay chiefly, although not exclusively, in the program of the New Criticism. Richards shaped the exact theoretical shape of: the poem as object, self-reflexivity, craft and technique, economy, complexity, , anti-personality, and anti-romanticism. His deepest influence on the New Criticism was his microscopic analysis of language.
Rhetoric Project: Introducing Book 4 April 2011