Robert Penn Warren
Robert Warren was one of the founders of a movement of a way of understanding
literature, or reading literature, called the New Criticism. They started
this stuff in the thirties, but it really took off in the forties. It was
a way of studying literature. Instead of worrying about what role this
had in the author's life, this is in its pure form, instead of worrying
about Shakespeare's relationship with the Dark Lady, instead of worrying
about the entomology of the words, you would read the poem as a poem. You
could validly study Shakespeare without having to delve all into his personal
history. This is fortunate for some works because some were anonymous and
sometimes we don't know much about the author. The point of the movement
was that you could read this stuff without having to know everything about
it. You could just read a poem as a poem. Herald Bloom, I guess, was the
last new critic. He was a cranky old guy who said bad things about anybody
who didn't agree with him. He said that Shakespeare is universal. It's
for all times and all places. Of course, this is very new critically. They
focus on the universality of poetry.
Robert Penn Warren taught for a while at LSU and started the movement
with his buddy Cleanth Brooks from 1935-1942. It really took hold after
WWII. Many soldiers were coming back home & going to school on
the G.I. Bill; the college population exploded; and there were guys getting
their Ph.D.'s who would move off to teach at places like Louisiana Tech
that didn't very good libraries, and how are you going to write about Shakespeare
when you don't have the first folio over there in the library? Well, you
don't worry about it. In New Criticism, you don't have to worry about such
things. You could just get your Shakespeare off the shelf and study it.