i just discovered that the norton publishing company is putting out an anthology of theory and criticism. it's kind of disturbing to think that the big-shot literary anthology-makers are putting out an anthology of criticism. does this mean that criticism is to be considered literary work? is literature absolutely dead?

ok first my feelings on literary theory and criticism. (i am perfectly qualified to discuss it, having failed theory of literary criticism not once but twice .) i failed mostly because i got sick of writing criticisms of criticisms. there's only so many times you can rehash someone else's rehashing (if you're lucky they're critiqueing someone else's article) before the whole thing becomes one big circle jerk. which, i believe, is one of the fundamental purposes of criticism.

i'm not entirely against the whole system of literary theory, mind you. there's a definite advantage to reading others' opinions about a work you're reading. it can clarify certain points, or show a different facet of a poem. but notice that it shows opinions , nothing more. one thing that really bothers me about many types of criticism is how sure the critic seems that his opinion is the correct one. as if only one right answer exists, and that particular critic has it. the other thing that really bothers me is the assumption that no one else can possibly understand a work of literature (or music, or art), unless it has been predigested and fed back to them. egoism.

and now a word about anthologies. they're useful, especially to the funds-deficient types like me. it's far easier to get a poetry anthology than to buy various (hard to find) books of poetry. however, the problem with anthologies is that someone else is making the decisions of what will be read (not to mention what will be taught, since anthologies are basically teaching tools). i own several anthologies and i have to say the same names are in each, and often the same poems. anthologies more than anything else determine the literary canon of the time, because they are the source of the most exposure. the main problem with anthologies is that their editors have a difficult time refraining from criticism. headnotes and introductions have a tendency to give watered-down summaries of a work's "message" or "idea" and extraneous biographical facts about the authors.

i find the idea of a work's message, and a poem's message in particular to be reductivist and misguided. to say that what counts is what the poet says, and not how she says it is to undermine the whole idea of poetry. a poem can be about the moon, or about the time you got dumped, or about the porchlight next to your front door. it can be about all three. it can mean different things at different times to different people. it may or may not be biographical. it resists most attempts to classify it.

to only summarize and classify is to deny the magic of words. long before there was criticism, there was poetry. storytelling. incantations for ceremony. poems and stories live as long as they are told and read. the experience of literature is a collaboration between the author and the reader, or the storyteller and the audience. each brings something unique to the experience. my advice to the critics: read a poem. don't look for symbols, or the main idea. read it out loud. let the words wash over you like water, with the rhythm of water. expand to fit inside the music. read poems with your body, not just your mind.

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