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Understanding Critical Theory's Chaos

Richards points out that criticism has a long history dating back to Aristotle. Critics seek to answer questions about what constitutes value in experiences of art like poems, pictures, and music. This chapter focuses on determining the worth of art through critical and creative theories. Richards lists obstacles to legitimate critique, including experimental aesthetics that tries to manipulate preferences, critique overlooking worth to focus on other elements, and ambiguous language leading to misunderstandings.

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Manya Shivendra
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89 views1 page

Understanding Critical Theory's Chaos

Richards points out that criticism has a long history dating back to Aristotle. Critics seek to answer questions about what constitutes value in experiences of art like poems, pictures, and music. This chapter focuses on determining the worth of art through critical and creative theories. Richards lists obstacles to legitimate critique, including experimental aesthetics that tries to manipulate preferences, critique overlooking worth to focus on other elements, and ambiguous language leading to misunderstandings.

Uploaded by

Manya Shivendra
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

1) Summarise the essay The Chaos of Critical Theory.

In the chapter “The Chaos of Critical Theories”, Richards points out that the literature of
criticism is a rather significant field of study, which dates back to the contribution of the great
scholar Aristotle, who is probably the first intellectual to have followed the practice in his
age. The critics seek to answer several questions such as the nature of value that would be
obtained from the experience of reading a poem; the difference between experiences felt; a
picture being given preference over the others; the quality of music to be listened to in order
to obtain the most valuable moments; and the difference in quality about works of art. These
fundamental questions could be compared to certain basic questions such as what would
constitute a picture, a poem, a piece of music; the process of comparison of experiences and
the value of experiences. This chapter focuses on the act of getting worth from the arts,
particularly the craft of writing. This reasoning, which serves as the foundation for all of
Richards' comments on critique, puts into practice the basic critical and creative theories in an
effort to determine the worth of art. He lists a number of obstacles at the outset of this lengthy
study, many of which frequently prevent legitimate critique. The first is "experimental
aesthetics" in the arts, which involves fruitless efforts to manipulate human preferences and
behaviour to accommodate laboratory testing. Second, critique frequently overlooks the topic
of worth in favour of focusing on ancillary elements of the arts. Third, the ambiguous,
frequently misleading lexicon of critique leads to misunderstandings. An appropriate example
would be reviewers who describe works of art as though they have characteristics when, in
fact, they should state that they have an impact on us.

Submitted By- Manya Shivendra

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