The Formalist Approach

Abstract

Formalism may be defined as a critical approach in which the text under discussion is considered primarily as a structure of words. That is, the main focus is on the arrangement of language, rather than on the implications of the words, or on the biographical and historical relevance of the work in question. A strictly formalist critic would, for example, approach The Great Gatsby as a structure of words, ignoring the details of Fitzgerald’s life and the social and historical contexts of the novel. However, formalism, or the concept of strict literary formalism, has often been attacked by individual literary critics or schools of criticism on the grounds that it reduces the text to nothing more than a series of words, thereby limiting its meaning and power. It is true that the Russian Formalists in the early years of the century attempted to examine the text in this way, but Western formalist approaches have tended to be much less theoretical. In practice, such critics have been very responsible to the meaning and themes of the work in question, rather than adopting a linguistic approach. For example, from the 1930s onwards, a movement in Britain and America, loosely called the ‘New Criticism’ began to dominate critical activity and teaching methods.