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STEPHEN GREENBLATT Introduced term “New Historicism” Renaissance Self- Fashioning (1980) – Self as construction – Identity = desired self- representation + power relations – Power relations as most (?) important context
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STEPHEN GREENBLATT “Towards a Poetics of Culture” (1987) – Relationship between text and context – Aesthetic production in capitalist society – E.g. Ronald Reagan’s movie quotations
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STEPHEN GREENBLATT Marxism (Jameson) Capitalism as… -Agent of “repressive differentiation” -Introduces privacy and the individual -Shatters the unity of politics and poetry Poststructuralism (Lyotard) Capitalism as… -Agent of “false integration, monological totalization” -Destroys privacy, individuals, etc. through creation of single language
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STEPHEN GREENBLATT Oscillation between totalization and difference in U.S. culture Self-consciousness of New Historicism Work of art = creator(s) + societal institutions/practices
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FRANK LENTRICCHIA “Foucault’s Legacy – A New Historicism?” Causality vs. Determinism – [everything a product of its environment vs. absence of free will] Theoretical dilemma of determinism [without it, N.H.=worthless; with it, N.H.=disabled] Old Historicism vs. New Historicism [Hippolyte Tain vs. Stephen Greenblatt]
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FRANK LENTRICCHIA “Foucault’s Legacy – A New Historicism?” Taine's (Incoherent) Old Historicism 1. No human nature 2. History = discontinuous 3. Commitment to continuity and determinism 4. Humanist impulse Greenblatt's New Historicism 1. Objectivity impossible 2. Discontinuity of history mapped as continuous narrative through self 3. Human subject = product of power relations 4. Misapplication of Marx?
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FRANK LENTRICCHIA “Foucault’s Legacy – A New Historicism?” Odd identity of New Historicism (“Marriage” of Foucault and Marx)- Self as effect, not origin Struggles against dominant ideology = futile Need to sustain illusion that self-fashioning is possible
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LOUIS A. MONTROSE “Professing the Renaissance: The Poetics and Politics of Culture” Early proponent of New Historicism Literature: Historically determined and determining Interconnectedness of the LINGUISTIC and the SOCIAL
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LOUIS A. MONTROSE “Professing the Renaissance: The Poetics and Politics of Culture” Historicity of Texts, Textuality of History Need for self-awareness of our own historicity Meaning of text = unstable; historically specific
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CATHERINE GALLAGHER “Marxism and The New Historicism” Politics and New Historicism “…No cultural or critical practice is simply a politics in disguise” (37) Departure from Marxism and continuation of New Left thought
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CATHERINE GALLAGHER “Marxism and The New Historicism” New Left Thought: – 1960s/70s social movement – Departure from traditional Leftism/Marxism – Intellectuals as agents of social revolution – Associated with “Hippie Movement” and political radicalism
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CATHERINE GALLAGHER “Marxism and The New Historicism” New Left Consequences: – Emphasis on “indeterminant negativity” (41) – Collapse of logic of representation Impact of New Left and Women’s Liberation Movement on literary theory
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CATHERINE GALLAGHER “Marxism and The New Historicism” Tension between form and ideology – No simple solution; they do not simply affirm or negate one another – N.H. use this tension to construct subjectivity Politics and New Historicism = All about subjectivity New Historicist “unlike the Marxist, is under no nominal compulsion to achieve consistency” (46)
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IN SUMMARY… Reciprocal, unstable relationship between literature and history Influence of Marxism and Poststructuralism Dilemma of causality vs. determinism Need for self-consciousness of our own historicity Presence and importance of subjectivity
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