Literary History Lee Patterson Analysis

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Source Critique Paper
Published in 1995 and written by Lee Patterson, the article Literary History aims to both explain and criticize the way in which the history of literature has been understood since its ideological conception. More precisely, Patterson primarily focuses on literary history through an extrinsic approach, which he defines as “the relation of literature, as a collection of writings, to history, as a series of events.” By approaching the topic in this way, he is able to evade the common mistake of viewing literature through a discriminatory lens, discounting the significance of outside influences when attempting to form a basis for interpretation.
Just as one would want a doctor to be aware of medical practices carried out in the past, it is imperative that any literary scholar be informed about the history of what they’re studying; thus, Lee Patterson’s document serves as an effective platform upon which one’s knowledge of literature can be based. As he points out in the opening line of his article, “’literary history’ harbors an often unrecognized ambiguity,” even “despite its familiarity.” It’s all too easy to underestimate the complexity of literary theory and the changes it has gone through
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After all, when one first considers these two focuses of thought, history entails definitive events that have (most likely) been confirmed as factual occurrences. Whereas with literature, one would be hard pressed to come up with a literary example that utilizes nothing but language itself; it seems that language itself was developed through history. But, literature can be in fact distinguished from other disciplines by its deliberate use of creative constructs and the treatment of language as art. As Patterson says, “literary writing is set apart from other kinds because it uses language in a special, self-reflexive

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