RUSSIAN FORMALISM
14 - 21. 03. 2011
R. Selden, Reader's Guide to Contemporary Literary theory
Ch. 1. “Russian Formalism”, pp. 7-16
Russian Formalism and the New Criticism; the historical development of his theory; the status of the artistic processes; the function of literature; the difference between the notion of the plot (as understood by Aristotle) and sjuzet; how did the Formalists understand the idea of “motivation” in literature? (free and bound motifs); what is the meaning of “a dominant” in the context of literary history (examples)?
distinctive for its emphasis on the functional role of literary devices and its original conception of literary history
advocated a "scientific" method for studying poetic language, to the exclusion of traditional psychological and cultural-historical approaches
delimiting literary scholarship from contiguous disciplines such as psychology, sociology, intellectual history, and the list theoreticians focused on the 'distinguishing features' of literature, on the artistic devices peculiar to imaginative writing
literature itself, or rather, those of its features that distinguish it from other human activities, must constitute the object of inquiry of literary theory
"literary facts" have to be prioritized over the metaphysical commitments of literary criticism, whether philosophical, aesthetic or psychological
agreed on the autonomous nature of poetic language and its specificity as an object of study for literary criticism
main endeavor consisted in defining a set of properties specific to poetic language, be it poetry or prose, recognizable by their "artfulness" and consequently analyzing them as such
mechanistic vs. organic formalism
One of the most famous dichotomies introduced by the mechanistic Formalists is a distinction between story and plot, or fabula and "sjuzhet". Story, fabula, is a chronological sequence of events, whereas plot, sjuzhet, can unfold in non-chronological order. The events can be artistically arranged by means of such devices as repetition, parallelism, gradation, and retardation.
motif: smallest unit of plot - single statement or action
bound motif: required by the story; free motif: inessential, but potentially the focus of art - Raphael's story of war in heaven is free motif, but the narration is more important than the story of the war itself because it lets Milton artistically insert it into his overall plot
dominant: focusing component of a work of art: it rules, determines, and transforms the remaining components; it provides the work with its focus of crystallization
dominant may derive from a non-literary system—Renaissance: visual arts, Romantic poetry: music, Realism: verbal
if you use something from a previous dominant, it will be relegated to the background if a different dominant is in effect