Principles of literary criticism

by I. A. Richards

if it must, these things are important not because a

high-sounding interpretation can be put upon them, but because they are

useful.—Marianne Moore.

The method then by which any attempt to analyse ‘good’ has been condemned is itself objectionable, and yields no sound reason why a purely psychological account of the differences between good, bad, and indifferent experiences should not be given. The data for the inquiry are in part supplied by anthropology. It has become clear that the disparity among the states of mind recognised as good by persons of different races, habits and civilisations is overwhelming. Any observant child, it is true, might discover in the home circle how widely people disagree, but the effect of education is to suppress these scientific efforts. It has needed the vast accumulations of anthropological evidence now available to establish the fact that as the organisation of life and affairs alters very different experiences are perceived to be good or bad, are favoured or condemned. The Bakairi of Central Brazil and the Tahitians, among others, are reported, for example, to look upon eating with the same feelings which we reserve for quite different physiological performances, and to regard the public consumption of food as a grave breach of decency. In many parts of the world feelings of forgiveness towards enemies, for example, are looked upon as low and ignoble. The experiences which one person values are thought vicious by another. We must allow, it is true, for widespread confusion between intrinsic and instrumental values, and for the difficulty of identifying experiences. Many states of mind in other people which we judge to be bad or indifferent are no doubt unlike what we imagine them to be, or contain elements which we overlook, so that with fuller knowledge we might discover them to be good. In this manner it may be possible to reduce the reported disparity of value intuitions, but few people acquainted with the varying moral judgments of mankind will doubt that circumstances and necessities, present and past, explain our approval and disapproval. We start, then, with a hearty scepticism of all immediate intuitions, and inquire how it is that individuals in different conditions, and at different stages of their development, esteem things so differently.

With the exception of some parents and nursemaids we have lately all been aghast at revelations of the value judgments of infants. Their impulses, their desires, their preferences, the things which they esteem, as displayed by the psycho-analysts, strike even those whose attitude towards humanity is not idealistic with some dismay. Even when the stories are duly discounted, enough which is verifiable remains for infans polypervers to present a truly impressive figure dominating all future psychological inquiry into value.

There is no need here to examine in detail how these early impulses are diverted and disguised by social pressures. The rough outlines are familiar of the ways in which by growth, by the appearance of fresh instinctive tendencies, by increase of knowledge and of command over the world, under the control of custom, magical beliefs, public opinion, inculcation and example, the primitive new-born animal may be gradually transformed into a bishop. At every stage in the astonishing metamorphosis, the impulses, desires, and propensities of the individual take on a new form, or, it may be, a further degree of systematisation. This systematisation is never complete. Always some impulse, or set of impulses, can be found which in one way or another interferes, or conflicts, with others. It may do so in two ways, directly or indirectly. Some impulses are in themselves psychologically incompatible, some are incompatible only indirectly, through producing contrary effects in the world outside. The difficulty some people have in smoking and writing at the same time is a typical instance of the first kind of incompatibility; the two activities get in each other’s way by a psychological accident as it were. Interference of this kind can be overcome by practice to an unexpected degree, as the feats of jugglers show; some, however, are insurmountable; and these incompatibilities are often, as we shall see, of supreme consequence in moral development. Indirect incompatibilities arising through the consequences of our acts are more easy to find. Our whole existence is one long study of them, from the infant’s first choice whether he shall use his mouth for screaming or for sucking, to the last codicil to his Will.

These are simple instances, but the conduct of life is throughout an attempt to organise impulses so that success is obtained for the greater number or mass of them, for the most important and the weightiest set. And here we come face to face again with the problem of value. How shall we decide which among these are more important than: others, and how shall we distinguish different organisations as yielding more or less value one than another? At this point we need to be on our guard not to smuggle in any peculiar ethical, non-psychological, idea under some disguise, under ‘important’ or ‘fundamental’, for example.

Among those who reject any metaphysical view of value it has become usual to define value as capacity for satisfying feeling and desire in various intricate ways.[*] For the purpose of tracing in detail the very subtle and varied modes in which people actually value things, a highly intricate treatment is indispensable, but here a simpler definition will suffice.

We may start from the fact that impulses may be divided into appetencies and aversions, and begin by saying that anything is valuable which satisfies an appetency or ‘seeking after.’ The term ‘desire’ would do as well if we could avoid the implication of accompanying conscious beliefs as to what is sought and a further restriction to felt and recognised longings. The term ‘want’ used so much by economists has the same disadvantages. Appetencies may be, and for the most part are, unconscious, and to leave out those which we cannot discover by introspection would involve extensive errors. For the same reason it is wiser not to start from feeling. Appetencies then, rather than felt appetencies or desires, shall be our starting-point.

The next step is to agree that apart from consequences anyone will actually prefer to satisfy a greater number of equal appetencies rather than a less. Observation of people’s behaviour, including our own, is probably sufficient to establish this agreement. If now we look to see what consequences can intervene to upset this simple principle, we shall find that only interferences, immediate or remote, direct: or indirect, with other appetencies, need to be considered. The only psychological restraints upon appetencies are other appetencies.[*]