An Experiment in Criticism: Part 1

This site takes its name from CS Lewis’s book An Experiment in Criticism. What is Lewis’s experiment? He focuses on readers rather than books.

Here are the five important points he makes in the book’s first half.

1. Literary readers receive the books they read, while the unliterary only use what they read.
2. Literary readers rest in the books they read. The unliterary distract themselves with books or expect liteature to offer cover philosophy.
3. Literary readers pay attention to words. The unliterary want to move past words to the ideas they represents.
4. Literary readers hear, as well as read, words. The unliterary ignore how words sound.
5. Literary readers accept the variety of emotions occassioned by the books they read. The unliterary only approve of books that meet their desire for projection or wish-fulfillment.