English Research Guide

Psychoanalytic criticism originated with the theories of Sigmund Freud. Freud himself was the first to employ this approach in the analysis of literature; other Freudian critics included Ernest Jones, Otto Rank, and Marie Bonaparte. Developments in psychoanalytic theory were reflected in the different approaches to criticism that evolved. Carl Jung's concept of the collective unconscious, which assumes universally similar responses to archetypal human situations, influenced such works as Archetypal Patterns in Poetry (1934) by Maud Bodkin and A Jungian Approach to Literature (1984) by Bettina L. Knapp . “Ego-psychology,” as developed by Norman N. Holland in The Dynamics of Literary Response (1968) and 5 Readers Reading (1975), is an aspect of psychoanalytic criticism that studies how readers respond to texts. Freud was reinterpreted by Norman O. Brown in Life Against Death (1959) and Love's Body (1966) and by linguist Jacques Lacan, who, in turn, influenced many later critics, including feminist critics Julia Kristeva, Hélène Cixous, and Luce Irigaray.

-Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of Literature®

Feminist literary theory originated largely in the women's movement that followed World War II. Two of the earliest documents of feminist theory are Simone de Beauvoir's book Le Deuxième Sexe (1949; The Second Sex) and Kate Millett's Sexual Politics (1970). Feminist criticism established several aims: to critique the established canon of Western literature and to expose the standards on which it is based as patriarchal; to recover forgotten and neglected texts by women in order to reevaluate them; to establish “gynocriticism,” the study of woman-centered writing, and to establish a women's canon; and to explore the cultural construction of gender and identity.

Feminist critics are extremely varied in their approaches. Among the writers who have had a great impact on feminist critical discourse are Ellen Moers, Carolyn Heilbrun, Sandra Gilbert, Susan Gubar, Annette Kolodny, Adrienne Rich, Elaine Showalter, Nina Baym, Alice Jardine, Catherine Stimpson, Gayatri Spivak, Hélène Cixous, Luce Irigaray, and Julia Kristeva.

-Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of Literature®

The more rigid Marxists have insisted on works that reflected Marxist ideology (see SOCIALIST REALISM). Other, more flexible, critics were able to appreciate the great 19th-century realists, despite the distinctly literary nature of their work. Still other Marxist theorists, such as Bertolt Brecht, embraced modernism and shunned realism as lulling the audience into passive acceptance of capitalist ascendency.

Those who are counted among Marxist critics include György Lukács, Walter Benjamin, and Fredric Jameson.

-Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of Literature®