theoryofliteratu00inwell

Introduction
The most widespread and flourishing methods of studying lit-
erature concern themselves with its setting, its environment, its
external causes. These extrinsic methods are not limited to a
study of the past but are equally applicable to present-day lit-
erature. Hence, the term "historical" should properly be re-
served for that study of literature which concentrates on its
change in time and is thus centrally preoccupied with the problem
of history. Though the "extrinsic" study may merely attempt
to interpret literature in the light of its social context and
its antecedents, in most cases it becomes a "causal" explanation,
professing to account for literature, to explain it, and finally to
reduce it to its origins (the "fallacy of origins"). Nobody can
deny that much light has been thrown on literature by a proper
knowledge of the conditions under which it has been produced}
the exegetical value of such a study seems indubitable. Yet it is
clear that causal study can never dispose of problems of descrip-
tion, analysis, and evaluation of an object such as a work of lit-
erary art. Cause and effect are incommensurate : the concrete result
of these extrinsic causes—the work of art—is always un-
predictable.
All history, all environmental factors, can be argued to shape
a work of art. But the actual problems begin when we evaluate,
compare, and isolate the individual factors which are supposed
to determine the work of art. Most students try to isolate a spe-
cific series of human actions and creations and to ascribe to that
alone a determining influence on the work of literature. Thus
one group considers literature mainly the product of an indi-
vidual creator and concludes hence that literature should be in-
vestigated mainly through biography and the psychology of the
author. A second group looks for the main determining factors
of literary creation in the institutional life of man—in economic,
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