Reality and Sincerity - F. R. Leavis

Reality and Sincerity

- F. R. Leavis

Introduction:

     Literary criticism occupies its own position along with literary creations. I. A. Richards, Leavis, Eliot and many such critics have established ‘New criticism’. F. R. Leavis has a lasting effect on English literary criticism. His ideas are welcomed very widely on practical criticism. In the present essay he has proved his excellence as a critic.

Analysis:

    In this essay Leavis has analysed three poems with critical comparison. 

1) Alexander Smith’s – “Barbara”

2) Emily Bronte’s – “Cold in the Earth”

3) Hardy’s – “After a journey” 

    Leavis has given statement that two poems are easy to analyse and understand but ‘Barbara’ is slight difficult. The purpose behind this comparison is to understand “Why some poems are better than other”.

1) Alexander Smith’s ‘Barbara’:

      The first verse sets the scene using adjectives like old, grey, crisped, yellow etc. which sets a tone of something about the end.  The second verse ends with the powerful image of Barbara looking out of heaven which reminds us D. G. Rossetti’s powerful poem “The Blessed Demozel” the third stanza concludes with the erotic memory of a wild morning when the love embraced but one cannot understand the purple stain on mouth because of kiss.  Barbara’s ghost lingers like a bad smell throughout the fourth stanza.

      She sits remembering erotic memory keeping bracelet in her arm. She says that she still loves him. This comparison of earthly and heavenly love is incredible. The poem ends with wind, rain and the mourning of wounded sea. Peace is with Barbara and death.

      Leavis’ criticism of smith’s poem has nothing to do with technical reading through the verse, it looks very personal. Each line is a memory there is almost a picture in each line smith decide the verse as he himself sharing his thought with “Barbara” he is talking to her and he knows what to say so that she will understand him. This poem is not for us but for them...

“When love speaks they have their own language.”

2 Emily Bronte’s “COLD IN THE EARTH”:

     The next poem Leavis discuss in his essay was Emily Bronte’s “Cold in the Earth”. In an earlier book Leavis had called this poem as the finest poem of the 19^th century, but in his later essay he describes Emily Bronte’s poem as a failure for the work by Alexander Smith.

     This poem is read as plangent which suggest that there is something dangerous in it in stanza 7(seven) she describes that......

“Then did I check the tears of useless passion.”

    And we see an obvious hint at the nature of strength in following stanza.

“Then did I learn how existence could be cherish’d,

Strengthen’d and fed without the aid of joy:

‘Cold in the Earth’ and the deep snow piled above thee,

Far, far removed, cold in the dreary grave!”

3 Thomas Hardy’s “AFTER A JOURNEY”:

      Leavis moves on in his essay to discuss After a journey by Thomas Hardy. Thomas Hardy was well-known both as novelist and as a poet. His wife died in “November 1912” after a short and painful illness. The shock of his wife’s death filled Hardy with feeling of remorse and regret and that  he produced a series of poems that are very powerful.

     This poem is a healing poem which seems to refer back to the care of his life. F. R. Leavis describes it as Intimate or self communing.

    It is like we are listening to Hardy’s talking to himself somewhere inside our own mind. He describes his wife in the poem...

“Nut coloured hair, and grey eyes and rose flush”

     It we compare it with other two poems, there is absence of positive tone which Leavis describes as a having a great advantage in reality.

     The first word in the poem Hereto makes an immediate effect of balance. Leavis describe the poem as a journey back through the time but actually we cannot go back through the time. Memory can recall his wife but her presence in the poem makes her absence. There is a detailed analysis of the line.

“But all’s closed now, despite Time’s derision”

     This line makes this point clear; this is the statement that says, everything is closed despite time’s standing. There is a balance all over and the suffering of lose. Thomas Hardy is expressing the reality of remembrance, but he also say that 

“I am just the same”

     The point in this thread is to try to understand how we can recognize the truth of the poem or what makes a good piece of poetry what is it about poetry that makes people want to write it.

     While Emily Bronte’s “Cold in Earth” is a striking poem but when we go back to it from Hardy’s, we may come to judgement  that she is dramatizing herself in a situation such as she has dearly not known in actualise experience.

Conclusion:

 

      Above all F. R. Leavis by comparing to peace of work "Cold in the Earth" and "After A Journey" on the base of reality and sincerity comes to conclusion that Hardy’s “After a Journey” is more effective poem. It highlights the elements of reality and sincerity more than the poem of Emily Bronte.  

 

Reference: Literary Criticism A Reading by  B. Das and J. M. Mohanty