A reformulation of new criticism.

Abstract

Because recent trends in new criticism include tendencies toward misunderstanding of the theory and new discoveries by which explication may more easily be applied to literature, there exists a need for a reformulation of the principles of new criticism. Explication should be made a simple but complete system of critical concepts which are simultaneously applicable to a work of literature and which better aid the reader toward an understanding of a work's total meaning. Such a system of concepts is attempted in the following study and is then illustrated by application to "Burnt Norton," sections one and two, in T. S. Eliot's Four guartets. This author would like to express his appreciation