Never Ones For Theory: England and the War of Ideas

Never Ones For Theory: England and the War of Ideas

by George Watson (Author)

Synopsis

The British have often denied the very existence of a tradition of English literary theory. George Watson redeems that denial in his latest book, the first study of 20th Century English theory. The book begins with Yeats, Pound and Eliot, who made England their home. In subsequent chapters, based on personal recollection as well as published sources, it assesses the contribution of I.A. Richards, William Empson, F.R. Leavis, C.S. Lewis, Isaiah Berlin and Wittgenstein, as well as Marxists like E.P. Thompson and Raymond Williams. English literary theory is a tradition that has suffered in reputation, paradoxically, by the sheer fertility of its invention. In this seminal work, the author celebrates that fertility from the first world war down to the death of Iris Murdoch in 1999, showing that England pioneered the academic study of theories of literature years in advance of France or the USA.

$17.55

Quantity

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 144
Publisher: Lutterworth Press
Published: 18 Jan 2001

ISBN 10: 0718830105
ISBN 13: 9780718830106

Media Reviews
Watson's emphasis that 'theory' was happening in England, and particularly in Cambridge, long before it became widely popular elsewhere - is a welcome one, not least in its defiance of those who would describe English criticisms as parochial or gentlemanly-amateurish. Bharat Tandon, The Times Literary Supplement, (May 11, 2001)
Author Bio
George Watson is a Fellow in English at St. John's College, Cambridge. He is the author of The Literary Critics, to which Never Ones for Theory? is a sequel, and general editor of the New Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature.