Abrams stands unique because of his four oriental critical theories which cover up the entire history of English literary theories and criticism.

6. • Meyer (Mike) Howard Abrams (born July 23,
1912, Long Branch, New Jersey, U.S.—
died April 21, 2015, Ithaca, New York)
• American literary critic known for works
on romanticism
• transformed the study of Romanticism with “The

7. • Under Abrams's editorship, The Norton
Anthology of English Literature became the
standard text for undergraduate survey courses
across the U.S. and a major trendsetter in
literary canon formation.
• The son of a house painter and the first in his

8. • He entered Harvard University as student in 1930 and
graduated in 1934
• He went into English because, he says, "there weren't jobs in
any other profession..., so I thought I might as well enjoy
starving, instead of starving while doing something I didn't
enjoy.“
• Abrams won a Henry fellowship to Magdalene
College, Cambridge, where his tutor was I. A. Richards.

9. • In 1945 he joined the faculty of Cornell University
and taught for nearly 40 years
• In all of his works, Abrams was consistently
concerned with analyzing literary theory
and criticism
• first book :The Milk of Paradise: The Effects of
Opium Visions on the Works of De Quincey,

10. • Second work, The Mirror and the Lamp: Romantic
Theory and the Critical Tradition (1953).
• Natural Supernaturalism (1971) explores a broader
reach of the Romantic sensibility
(religious implications and its influence on
modern literature)
• Critical essays by Abrams on Romantic topics

11. • The Poetry of Pope: A selection (1954)
• Literature and Belief: English Institute essays (1957)
• A Glossary of Literary Terms (1957; 9th ed. 2009)
• English Romantic Poets: modern essays in
criticism (1960)
• Doing Things with Texts: essays in criticism and critical
theory (1989)

13. • "Orientation of Critical
Theories”, chapter of his
book “The Mirror and
the Lamp: Romantic
theory and the Critical
Tradition” (1953)

14. • From Plato until the late 18th century the artist was
thought no more than "a mirror," reflecting nature either as
it exists or as it is perfected or enhanced through the
mirror.
• This conception remained dominant until the advent of the
Romantic era (Abrams sets the date around 1800)
• The artist began to make his transformation from “mirror”

15. • Abrams says that any critical theory consists of four
elements with the help of which they comprehend art:
• The first element is the work of art
• The second element is the artist
• The third element is the source of the work, the objects or
situations that the work describes or reflects or has some
relation to, The ‘universe’.

16. • Abrams arranges these four elements in a
triangular diagram:
• He says that any critical theory while dealing with
all the four elements shows a significant orientation
towards only one of these elements and judges the

17. • Abrams stands unique because of his four
oriental critical theories which cover up entire
history of English literary theories and criticism.
• All critical theories can be divided into four
broad categories depending upon their
orientation towards the elements.

18. • The first (Mimetic) category deals with the importance of
the universe in the work of art.
• The second (Pragmatic) category deals with the influence
of the work on its audience.
• The third (Expressive) orients towards the artist’s role in
the process of creation of the work of art
• The fourth (Objective) category deals with the work as a

20. • The oldest and the “most primitive” of the four categories
• The critical theories that deal with mimesis are oriented towards
the universe and its role in the work of art.
• This theory first appeared in Plato’s Republic.
• Plato’s theory of mimesis operates upon three categories :
• The ideal world
• The physical world
• The world of art

21. • This theory holds that the physical world is an imitation of the
Ideal world and art is an imitation of the physical world. Thus art
is twice removed from reality.
• This idea is famously explained by Socrates in the tenth book of
the Republic where he says that there are three beds :
• one the idea of the bed
• Second a physical bed made by the carpenter who imitates the
ideal bed

22. • According to this theory all works of judged on the basis of
their relation to Ideas. Since ideas are considered true and
beautiful the distance of art from ideas emphasizes its
distance from beauty and truth.
• Aristotle’s Poetics is the next great work of criticism with a
mimetic orientation. Aristotle defines poetry as imitation.
He also distinguishes between different kinds of imitation

23. • According to this theory all works of judged on the basis of
their relation to Ideas. Since ideas are considered true and
beautiful the distance of art from ideas emphasizes its
distance from beauty and truth.
• Aristotle’s Poetics is the next great work of criticism with a
mimetic orientation. Aristotle defines poetry as imitation.
He also distinguishes between different kinds of imitation

24. • His criticism does not pay much attention to the role of the
poet's individual feelings or emotions in the creation of a
work of art.
• A slight orientation towards the work itself.
• Evaluates art (specifically tragedy) based on its effect upon
the audience.
• Aristotle's criticism is very flexible and cannot be easily

25. • Some examples of 18th century discussions of imitation
• Charles Batteux, book name “The Arts Reduced to a Single
Principle”, wanted to reduce the rules of art to one single
principle. He said that imitation is not that of crude everyday
reality, but of ‘la belle nature’, that is a model having all
perfections.
• Lessing, book “Laokoon” (1776), concluded that poetry, like
painting, is imitation. Poetry consists of a number of sounds

27. • Theories that display an orientation towards the
relationship of the work of art to its audience
• Pragmatic theories view the arts as a means of
achieving an end and judges the value of art based
upon its success in achieving that end.
• For pragmatic critics poetry is a means to achieve
certain responses from its readers.

28. • Sir Philip Sidney's ‘An Apology for Poetry’ is the first
text that displays pragmatic criticism
• According to Sidney the purpose of poetry is to teach
and delight.
• Sidney judges the value of poetry by analyzing its
effect upon its audience.
• The classical theory of rhetoric can be viewed as the

29. • Horace discusses this theory in his work ”Ars
Poetica”
• Horace advises poets to write poetry with the
aim to blend usefulness with pleasure.
• To teach, to please and to move are the three
aesthetic effects to be achieved upon a reader.

30. • For a number of critics of the Renaissance, the
moral effect was the terminal aim, to which
delight and emotion were added.
• Dryden considered the imitation of nature as
the means for pleasure. He also stressed the
importance of rules.

31. • Pragmatic criticism is mostly concerned with formulating
rules, guidelines and methods for achieving the desired
effects upon the audience
• The rules are often derived from the qualities present in
classical literary works. These rules help the artist in the
process of creation and the critic in the process of
evaluation.

32. • Richard Hurd's ' Dissertation of the idea of
universal poetry ' is another critical text
concerning pragmatic criticism.
• According to Hurd universal poetry is the art
whose purpose is to provide the maximum
amount of pleasure possible.

33. • In order to achieve this effect Hurd proposes
three properties: figurative language, fiction and
versification.
• According to Hurd, since the aim of poetry is to
gratify the mind of the reader, knowledge of the
mind is important while establishing these rules.

34. • Johnson’s preface to Shakespeare is one of the most
important texts dealing with pragmatic criticism
• Johnson combines the mimetic criteria of evaluation
with the aesthetic effects upon the audience in order
to judge works of art.
• Johnson says that Shakespeare holds before his
readers a faithful mirror of manner and life. But

35. • The fact that Shakespeare has survived the test of
time as a poet whose works are read for little reason
other than pleasure is proof that a work of art that truly
imitates nature will continue to please its audience for
a long time.
• Shakespeare's ability to hold up a mirror of life to his
audience is the major criteria upon which Johnson

36. • Pragmatic orientation has been the principal aesthetic
attitude of western criticism beginning from Horace up
to the 18th century
• The development of science and increased knowledge
of psychology , the influence of the works of Hobbes
and Locke in the seventeen century
• the poet and his mental capacities gradually became

38. • Critical theories oriented towards the relation between the
work and the artist
• The expressive orientation is found in the works of Longinus
in his discussions of the sublime which according to
Longinus has its sources in the poet's thoughts and emotions
• However Abrams considers the year 1800 marked by the
publication of Wordsworth's Preface to the Lyrical Ballads as
the date when the expressive orientation begins to surface in

39. • The expressive theories are a product of the Romantic
Movement which emphasized on the power of the poet's
mind
• According to the expressive theory: A work of art is an
external manifestation of internal thoughts and feelings
and the creative process is a result of the impulses of
feeling combined with the poet's thoughts and perceptions

40. • The expressive theories evaluate poetry by trying to figure
out whether the diction and figures of speech are a natural
outcome of the poet's emotions or a deliberate effort.
• The expressive theory tries to answer the questions of
sincerity and authenticity of poetry along with the poem's
correspondence to the actual feeling and state of the poet's
mind.
• The work of art is no longer viewed as a mirror of the

42. • The orientation of objective theories is towards the work of
art alone irrespective of its source, artist or audience
• Objective theories of criticism isolate a work of art and
evaluate it as an independent entity
• One of the early attempts at objective criticism is seen in
Aristotle's Poetics. Aristotle tries to analyze tragedy by
considering it as an individual whole consisting of parts

43. • The objective orientation begins to emerge significantly in
the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
• Some critics tried to understand a poem as a 'heterocosm'
i.e. a whole, independent world complete in itself.
• This is termed by historians as ' art for art's sake'.

44. • A poem, as Poe expressed it, is ‘a poem ‘per se’… written
solely for the poem’s sake’
• T.S.Eliot wrote, “When we are considering poetry we must
consider it primarily as poetry and not another thing”.
• MacLeish’s aphorism “A poem should not mean But be.”
• J.C. Ransom called for recognition of ‘the autonomy of the
work itself as existing for its own sake”.