EXEMPLIFICATION OF THE APPROACHES

For this part of the paper, I am going to analyze a work as a formalist, feminist and deconstructive would do to make it easier to understand them. Before I only explained the theory, but now I'm going to exemplify the approaches applying them to the poem ‘Adam', by Hugh Cook.

ADAM

“Eden is boring.
Nothing explodes.
There are no trains to fall off the tracks.
And Adam finds himself
With something missing.
Comic books? Broadband? Balsamic vinegar?
Pachinko? Razor blades? Plasma TV?
He's aware of an itch
And scratching
Has yet to be invented.
He eyes the fruit,
The One Forbidden Thing.
"Not yet," says the serpent,
Who's seen the script.
But Adam is engineered for impatience:
Quests, missions, objectives,
Grails unholy or otherwise.
"Out!" says the angel.
And Adam shrugs,
Loses the core,
Strides to the open gate.
Something on two legs
Is running after him.”

Cook, Hugh - Adam. 2003

According to a formalist, we can see in this poem the symbolism of “Comic books,” “Broadband”, “Balsamic vinegar”, “Pachinko”, “Razor blades” and “Plasma TV” that symbolize the material world. Another aspect to comment is the opposition between good and evil symbolized by “the angel” and “the serpent”. The main problem that a formalist would have in analyzing this text is that it refers to “Eden”, “Adam” and “the serpent”, which have a clearly religious reference, but as in the text there are no physical descriptions of the Eden, and it's not said who Adam is, we can't analyze them, because formalists only focus on the text, so they wouldn't notice all the religious meanings and symbolism of the serpent (which symbolizes the Devil), Eden (the paradise, which represents nature in its undamaged state), and Adam (the first man, described here as someone who finds life boring and wants something more, something that would get if he eats the fruit, although to discover this we need some intertextual information to find out what does the fruit represent, because “the one forbidden thing” is very general and doesn't give as much information as we would probably need to analyze all the symbolism that it has in a religious view). So, as we have seen, we might need some extra information that we can't find in the text to analyze it in a proper way, so the formalistic approach wouldn't be complete to analyze this text.

A most appropriate approach to analyze this text would be the deconstructive one. It would analyze the oposition between development and nature, seeing the Eden as a boring place without any stimulus or activity to avoid boredom, contrasted to the nowadays material world, where's plenty of things such as “plasma TV”, as it says in the poem.

Finally, the feminist approach would comment for example in the last verse, “ Something on two legs/ Is running after him”. In this fragment, a feminist would think that the "two legs" maybe refer to Eva, the Adam's wife, who doesn't appear in the poem although she was part of Adam's life, and when it says that A dam goes out of the "Eden" and two legs are following him, these two legs seem to make reference to Eva, his wife, who went out of the "Eden" with him, according to the biblical story, since both are expulsed after eating the banned fruit. A feminist person would say that the author, referring to Eva with two legs is doing a scornful reference to her, it means to the woman, since he doesn't treat her as a human, but as just two legs that are following Adam wherever he went, it means like if the man, in this case Adam, were the one who takes decisions, and the woman, Eva, only follows him, what can be seen clearly as a male chauvinist reference to end the poem. Also, we can comment that the author only describes Adam's thoughts, as if only were important his worries, without talking about Eva's feelings. Adam finds Eden boring, so he decides to get out of there, but he doesn't ask his wife how does she feel about it. Another interesting issue to analyze is that in the biblical text, is Eva who eats the apple, so is she who causes the exit from the Eden, not Adam, as this text wants to show.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Websites

· Ady, Paul. Approaches to Reading and Interpretation. 22/01/05. http://www.assumption.edu/users/ady/HHGateway/Gateway/Approaches.html

· Blackmon, Samantha. Critical Approaches to Literature. 22/01/05. http://www.sla.purdue.edu/blackmon/engl360k/critical.html

· Burris, Skylar Hamilton. Literary Criticism Study Guide.22/01/05. http://www.literatureclassics.com/ancientpaths/litcrit.html#formalism

· Cook, Hugh. Adam poem - Adam leaves Edem.22/01/05. http://zenvirus.com/poems/adam.html

· Davis, Jeffry. A Few Critical Approaches to Literature. 22/01/05. http://www.wheaton.edu/english/faculty/davis/guidance_for_students/approaches.html

· Leitch, Vincent B. Taboo and Critique: Literary Criticism and Ethics. 22/01/05. http://www.mla.org/ade/bulletin/n090/090046.htm

· Murfin, Ross & Ray, Supriya M. The Bedford Glossary of Critical and Literary Terms (Adapted). 22/01/05. http://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/virtualit/poetry/critical_define/crit_femin.html

· Oppermann, Serpil Tunç. Feminist Literary Criticism: Expanding the Canon as Regards the Novel. 22/01/05. http://members.tripod.com/~warlight/OPPERMANN.html

· Padgett, John B. Critical Approaches to Literature. 22/01/05. http://home.olemiss.edu/~egjbp/spring97/litcrit.html

· Ramey, Bill. Derrida and Deconstruction: An Introduction. 22/01/05. http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/billramey/derrida.htm

· Ruyle, Susan. Approaches to Criticism (Based on Wilbur S. Scott; Five Approaches to Literary Criticism New York: Collier Books, 1962). 22/01/05.
http://iserver.saddleback.cc.ca.us/div/la/neh/scott.htm

· Ryan, Simon. New Criticism. 22/01/05. http://www.mcauley.acu.edu.au/staff/simonr/new_criticism.htm

· Stacy Tartar Esch. Critical Approaches to Literature. 22/01/05. http://brainstorm-services.com/wcu/critical-approaches.html

Books

· Guerin, Wilfred L. [ et al.] A Handbook of critical approaches to literature. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992.

· Norris, Christopher. Deconstruction: theory and practice. London: Routledge, 1993.

Volver a página inicial