What new critical
approach do Wimsatt and Beardsley propose in The Intentional Fallacy? / How
does the intentional fallacy evoke romantic illusion?
W.K. Wimsatt and M.C. Beardsley’s
essay The Intentional Fallacy has become a milestone work in English
criticism. It makes certain important clarifications. It seeks to debunk the
old assumption that for understanding a work, knowledge of the author’s design
or intention is necessary. Earlier literary criticism relied rather heavily on
the material offered by the author’s life. The tradition has a long history
with certain variations down the age from Plato and Longinus to Wordsworth to such
modern critics as Benedetto Croce.
However, the emergence of a
school of criticism named “New criticism” sought to point out inherent
weaknesses of such a stand. It brought into focus the work rather than its
author. The critics belonging to this school argued that “the artistic intentions of the creator are not relevant when
judging a work of art.” Wimsatt and Beardsley present the new
critics position strongly in this essay. They do not deny that the author’s
personal feelings, life, incidents etc. are important in forming the work,
rather they underscore their crucial role in the poetic process, they can be
considered the cause of the poem. But the intention of the author cannot be allowed
to become the standard of judging a poem; that is, the poem’s meaning is not to
be sought in the extent to which its writer’s intentions have come to be
understood.
Before us the only evidence is
the poem, something the poet created out of the stuff that is totally
transformed into the poem. So it is the poem that requires all our intention
and should receive it. The critic should not go to any other sources to find
out what the writer wanted to say. Then in a poem we must not confuse between
the narrator’s voice, the dramatic speaker and the author. This also constitutes
a step toward evolving the objective view point. Wimsatt and Beardsley also
warn the critic against indulging in the habit of exploring, his own
consciousness because ‘the poem is not
the critics’ own’, by quoting Prof. Stoll of the internationalist
school. The poem once created, is neither the critic’s nor the author’s but
belongs to the public.
