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First Written | 1961 |
Genre | Lit Crit |
Origin | UK |
Publisher | Cambridge University Press |
ISBN-10 | 0521422817 |
ISBN-13 | 978-0521422819 |
My Copy | perfect-bound paperback |
First Read | August 17, 2008 |
An Experiment in Criticism
Literary experience heals the wound, without undermining the priviledge, of individuality. There are mass emotions which heal the wound; but they destroy the privilege. In them our separate selves are pooled and we sink back into sub-individuality. But in reading great literature I become a thousand men and yet remain myself. Likethe night sky in the Greek poem, I see with a myriad eyes, but it is still I who see. Here, as in worship, in love, in moral action, and in knowing, I transcend myself; and am never more myself than when I do.
Quoted on September 30, 2011