English Literature: Marxist Questions.

How did Marx and Engels view literature?

Art and literature were something that Karl Marx was very much in to, as he was a cultured German that enjoyed the classic tradition of his society. This meant that Marxists criticised the founders of Marxism as it they enjoyed literature.


What is the sociology of literature?

The ‘sociology of literature’ is the means of literature production, distribution and exchange in a particular society. Also, the social composition of the author and audiences, finally the levels of literacy that was in the text.


What did Matisse believe about all art?

Henri Matisse remarked art as that all art bears the imprint of its historical epoch, but that great art is that in which this imprint is most deeply marked.


What is 'original' about Marxist literary criticism?

It does not focus on the historical approach to literature but its own revolutionary understanding of history itself.


Why is art part of the superstructure?

Art is classed as the superstructure as it is a part of society’s ideology, which is a complex structure of social perception which ensures that the situation in which social class has power over others which is seen as ‘natural’ or not at all.  


What, according to interpretations of Conrad's work was the crisis facing the Western bourgeois class?

‘’A sense of  history as futile and cyclical, of individuals as impenetrable and solitary, of human values as relativistic and irrational, which marks a drastic crisis in the ideology of the Western bourgeois class to which Conrad allied himself. But Conrad’s personal standing as an ‘aristocratic’ polish exile deeply committed to English conservatism, intensified for him the crisis of English bourgeois ideology’’


Which four elements make up the levels of 'unity' which Marxist criticism focuses on?
‘ideology’, ‘social relations’ to ‘produce forces’ and ‘levels’ of society

In his letter to Joseph Bloc, what did Engels want to deny about the base and superstructure?

‘’Engels wants to deny that there is any mechanical, one-to-one correspondence between base and superstructure; elements of the superstructure constantly react back upon and influence the economic base.’’ But Engels himself was a bourgeoisie.


Why does Marx believe we enjoy classical Greek literature?

The Greeks, who produced major art in an economically undeveloped society, clearly evidences. Certain major artistic forms like the epic are only possible in an undeveloped society.