The Theory of Literary Criticism

The Theory of Literary Criticism: A Logical Analysis by John M. Ellis argues that modern debates about “what criticism should do” have stagnated since the mid-century syntheses, breeding a climate of “wise eclecticism” that shrinks theory’s scope to ad-hoc judgment. Ellis contends this posture is a practical stopgap, not a theory: if critics switch methods “case by case,” theory must still explain which distinctions justify those switches. He traces the impasse to two habits: (1) reform-driven polemics that keep questions at slogan level (“study the text itself” vs. “study its context”) and (2) an unexamined **reference theory of meaning** (language = names for things), which either declares non-referential critical claims meaningless (à la logical positivism) or mystifies them as beyond analysis. Both routes, he argues, block principled criteria for interpretation and evaluation. Ellis proposes recentering literary theory on logical and conceptual analysis, drawing on Wittgenstein rather than importing ready-made dogma. The practical method: begin with What distinction is this claim trying to make?”; surface the implied contrasts and purposes; then test whether the opposed positions genuinely conflict (often they don’t). Examples—“read literature as literature,” “a text is a social document”—only become meaningful once their operative contrasts (e.g., which contextual uses, which exclusions) are specified. The payoff is a theory that (a) analyzes kinds of critical statements without reducing them to reference, (b) provides rules of use rather than rigid verifications, and (c) rebuilds shared criteria where current eclecticism offers only “sound judgment.” This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1974.