Academic literature on the topic '1854-1900 Criticism and interpretation'

Abstract For the past 150 years, American art and art criticism have undergone important cultural and ideological transformations that are explanatory both of their historical evolution and of the possibility of being divided into several stages. In my interpretation, art criticism cuts across the historical evolution of art in the United States, according to the following cultural and ideological paradigms: two predominant cultural ideologies of art between 1865-1900 and 1960-1980, respectively; two other aesthetic and formalist ideological shifts in the periods between 1900- 1940 and 1940-1960, respectively, and one last pluralist approach to the arts after 1980. Even if this conceptualisation of art criticism in America might seem risky and oversimplifying, there are conspicuous and undeniable arguments supporting it. In a previous study published by American, British and Canadian Studies, I provided conceptual justifications both for the criteria dividing the cultural and the ideological within the overall assessment of American art by art critics and for the analysis and interpretation of the first two important temporal periods in the field of art criticism, 1865-1900 and 1908-1940. The present study continues by analyzing the cultural and ideological stances of American art criticism after 1940 and argues for certain paradigmatic shifts from one period to another.

This article aims to explain how the history of the development of health facilities in Tarutung in the 20th century. Tarutung in the past was used as the center of the Christianization movement by zendings from various countries. One of the zending organizations that plays a big role in health services in Tarutung is a German zending organization called Rheinische Missionsgesellscaft (RMG). This article uses a historical research method with four stages in its writing, namely: heuristics (collection of sources), verification (source criticism), interpretation, and historiography (writing). The results showed that zending plays a big role in improving the health and hygiene of the Batak people in Tarutung. The zendings also introduced modern methods of medicine that replaced traditional medicine by the Batak datu. In addition, zending also played a role in establishing various health facilities in Tarutung such as: hospitals, auxiliary hospitals, polyclinics, and nursing and midwifery schools.

The aim of this research is to show the economic activity of the Priangan people during the rule of the Netherlands Indies Government between 1900-1940. The research focusses on the economic policies and discussions from the Netherlands Indies Government in reforming “native” economic life and its response by Priangan society. This study uses the historical method with four research stages, namely heuristic, criticism, interpretation, and historiography. The result of this research shows that state intervention in the local economic life was a failure, evidenced by the number of Priangan people in poverty. In the early twentieth century, sikep (landlord) became major reformers due to a new perspective that valued capital more than land . They succeeded to use their capital to develop micro industries, influencing the economic life of Priangan society. The society was able to creatively adapt to the new policy of economic liberalism. Based on their local wisdoms, the Priangan people created a new form of liberalism supported within their socio-cultural, economic, and political structures. This local liberalism formed the pattern of dynamic economic behaviour and nurtured the entrepreneurial spirit amongst the Priangan society.

This research is about the history of women's fashion style in Jambi in the 1900s - 1970s. Aims to add to the repertoire of writing about the history of gender and historical fashion in Jambi. This study describes how women's fashion style travels in Jambi City, as well as the influence of the entry of modernity and the impact it has on women's clothing styles in Jambi City. This research uses the historical method which has 4 stages, namely heuristics, source criticism, interpretation, and historiography. Kebaya clothing is a clothing that is often used in the daily life of women in the city of Jambi. But along with the times and culture, it began to shift with the presence of clothing from western countries such as dresses, mini skirts and midi skirts that showed the feminine side and also became a trend, especially for urban teenagers. The 1970s was a decade that was quite influential in the fashion sector in Indonesia, because this yearfashion designers began to appear and in Indonesia experienced freedom in dressing. For Jambi, this year is the year Jambi City women started wearing pants as their daily clothing. However, it does not make the existence of the kebaya and clothes brackets disappear.

The opium trade in Kediri Residency was monopolized by Dutch East Indies government. The problem discussed in this study regarding opium trade monopoly at Kediri Residency through bookie intermediary (opiumpachter) in 1833-1900. The methods used in this research is historical methods which includes heuristics, criticism, interpretation and historiography. The result showed that the opium trade monopoly through bookie intermediary (opiumpachter) in Kediri Residency included auction and distribution processions also the sale of raw opium to opium dealers. Generally, the opium trade in Kediri Residency was controlled by Chinese. They become intermediary traders who sell government opium to people in Kediri Residency. The high tax offer at opium auction in Kediri Residency gave high profits to the country. On the contrary, that puts a great deal of pressure on the opium port. The crisis which occurred at the end of the 19th century, caused a setback in the opium trade monopoly through bookie intermediary (opiumpachter) in Kediri Residency.

The war that brought together the hero Nahak Maroe Rai and Dutch troops in South Belu in 1900-1906 was an effort to protect the territory of the Wewiku Kingdom from Dutch rule. The purposes of this study are to describe (1) the background of the Hero Nahak Maroe Rai in the War against the Dutch in Belu God 1900-1906; (2) The Process of the War Between the Heroes of Nahak Maroe Rai against the Dutch in Belu God 1900-1906. This study uses the historical method which includes four stages, namely heuristics, source criticism, interpretation and historiography. The results of the study revealed (1) that the background of the hero Nahak Maroe Rai led all the people of the South Wewikudi Belu Kingdom, Malacca Regency because the Dutch wanted to control the Wewiku Kingdom area; and (2) the war between the people of the Wewiku Kingdom under the leadership of Meo (hero) Nahak Maroe Rai against the Dutch troops occurred three times, namely the first resistance occurred in 1900, then the second battle occurred in 1903. In the first and second battles, The Dutch were successfully repulsed by Nahak Maroe Rai and his troops. For this reason, Nahak Maroe Rai is called by the people of the Wewiku Kingdom as a Meo (hero). In the third battle, in 1906, Nahak Maroe Rai died as a result of being hit by gunfire from Dutch troops; (3) the natural strength of the traditional house owned by Nahak Maroe Rai and the Wewiku people became a factor in the defeat of the Dutch troops.

This essay examines Pablo Avecilla’s Hamlet, an ‘imitation’ of Shakespeare’s tragedy of the prince of Denmark published in 1856, both in its own terms and in the historical context of its publication. This Shakespearean adaptation has been negatively judged as preposterous and unworthy of comment, but it deserves to be approached as what it claimed to be, a free handling of the Shakespearean model, and as responding to its own cultural moment. Avecilla turns the Shakespearean sacrificial prince into a righteous sovereign that has kept the love of a lower-ranked lady and, by pursuing revenge, has successfully overthrown a dishonourable and corrupt ruler. This re-focusing of the Shakespearean plot and politics recalls the French neoclassical adaptation by J-F. Ducis in 1769. In fact, Avecilla seems to combine neoclassical form, which he advocated in his 1834 treatise Poesía trágica, with more Romantic traits at a time when playgoers demanded stronger sensations. As with Ducis’s Hamlet and its earliest translation-adaptations in Spanish at the turn of the century, the alterations from the Shakespearean model may be seen to have political resonances. Seen in the historical context of the so-called Progressive Biennium of 1854-1856, Avecilla’s emphasis on virtue and implicit approval of popular uprising led by an idolized authority is in tune with contemporary concerns for the right of the people and their leaders to rise up against immoral rule, with the Progressives’ support for both monarchy and national sovereignty, with their criticism of the corruption of conservative governments prior to the 1854 revolution, and with the role of ‘revolutionary’ generals such as O’Donnell and Espartero. This political interpretation is strengthened when Avecilla’s own political involvement in the Progressive programme is taken into account.

The Weil-Reinach edition of the De musica attributed to Plutarch is the result of a close collaboration of two among the best philologists and specialists of ancient Greek music active in France between the 19th and the 20th centuries : H. Weil and his pupil Th. Reinach. The latter (who personally provided the collation of the manuscripts, some of the exegetical notes and the index) put together the material, but it was Weil who should be regarded as primarily responsible for the work, whose overall organization and component parts are perfectly consistent with the principles and methods that he had already applied to his previous editions : the subordination of the criticism of the texts, founded on the recension of manuscripts, to their history and interpretation. The interventionism typical of this publication derives from the extremely ambitious target that Weil imposed on all his ecdotic works : the reconstruction not of the corrupt archetype of the extant Byzantine and Humanist manuscripts, but of the original condition of the ancient texts. Viewed in this light, the Weil-Reinach edition of the De musica is a treasure of erudition and intelligence, in which the textual problems of a text, which had been deeply altered since antiquity, are raised for the first time.

The article presents an overview of the existing translations of Aristotle's “Poetics”, characterizes the features of each of them. In the preface to his translation of Aristotle's “Poetics”, V. Zakharov characterized the work of the Greek philosopher as a “dark text.” Each translation of this treatise, which forms the basis of European and world literary theory, is also its interpretation, an attempt to interpret the “dark places.” The first Russian translation of “Poetics” was made by B. Ordynsky and published in 1854, however, the Russian reader was familiar with the contents of the treatise through translations into European languages and its expositions in Russian. For instance, in the “Dictionary of Ancient and New Poetry” Ostolopov sets out the Aristotelian theory of drama and certain other aspects of “Poetics” very close to the original text. Ordynsky translated the first 18 chapters of “Poetics”, focusing on the theory of tragedy. The translator presented his interpretation of Aristotle’s concept in an extensive preface, commentaries and a lengthy “Statement.” This translation set off a critical analysis by Chernyshevsky, and influenced his dissertation “Aesthetic relations of art to reality”, in which the author polemicizes with the aesthetics of German romanticism. In 1885 V. Zakharov published the first complete Russian translation of “Poetics”, in which he offered his own interpretation of Aristotle's teaching on language and epic. The author of this translation returns to the terminology of romantic aesthetics, therefore the translation itself is outside the main line of perception of the teachings of Aristotle by domestic literary theory, which is clearly manifested in the translations of V. G. Appelrot (1893), N. N. Novosadsky (1927) and M. L. Gasparov (1978). The subject of discussion in these translations was the interpretation of the notions of μῦϑος and παθος, the concepts of mimesis and catharsis, the source of suffering and the tragic, the possibility of modernizing terminology. An important milestone in the perception and assimilation of Aristotle's treatise by Russian literary criticism was its translation by A. F. Losev, which was not published, but was used by the author in his theoretical works and in criticizing other interpretations of “Poetics”. M. M. Pozdnev penned one of the last translations of “Poetics” (2008). The translator does not seek to preserve the peculiarities of the original style and interprets “Poetics” within the framework and terms of modern literary theory, focusing on its English translations. The main subject of the translator's reflection is Aristotle's understanding of the essence and phenomenon of poetic art. Translations of the Greek philosopher's treatise reflect the history of the formation and development of the domestic theory of literature, its main topics and terminological apparatus.

Критическое наследие Н. Я. Мясковского рассматривается в аспекте музыкально-исполнительской проблематики и соотносится с важнейшими интенциями отечественной музыкально-критической мысли Серебряного века (1900-1910-е годы). Отмечается, что для Мясковского-критика феномен исполнительской интерпретации не ограничивался художественной составляющей исполнения, но приобретал особую концептуальную масштабность. Интерпретация воспринималась им как сложный многоуровневый процесс, начинающийся с тщательного освоения авторского текста. Следующий этап - формирование исполнительского плана, основанного на глубоком проникновении в композиторский замысел и обогащаемого личностным содержанием интерпретатора. Заключительный этап предполагал последовательное развертывание «исполнительской звуковой формы» и допускал «соавторство» исполнителя и композитора. Существенное внимание Мясковский уделял репертуарной политике. Критериями отбора провозглашались новизна, серьезность, сложность, популяризация мало исполняемых авторов. Таким образом, фундаментальными установками Мясковского-критика являлись безусловный приоритет нового над традиционным, композиторского творчества - над интерпретаторским. Это позволяет причислить его к ведущим представителям «современничества» в русской музыкальной критике предоктябрьского двадцатилетия. The critical heritage of N. Myaskovsky is being examined in aspect of the problems musical performing problems and correlated with the prominent intentions of the Silver Age Russian reflections on music. It is observed for Myaskovsky as critic a phenomenon of performing interpretation wasn’t amounted to nothing more than some artistic component of the specific performance but assumed a special conceptual dimension. Hence the interpretation was perceived by him as a compound poly-level process. Its initial stage implied careful acquisition of the author’s text. The following stage was formation of the performer’s plan by getting profoundly into the composer’s conception, and enriching it by the personal content of the interpreter. The conclusive stage presupposed consecutive development of the “performing sound form”. In the last level of interpretation Myaskovsky allowed certain “co-authorship” of a composer and an interpreter. The most careful attention was paid by Myaskovsky to repertoire policy. The criteria of selection were proclaimed novelty, seriousness, complicacy, popularization of rarely performed authors. Thus, the fundamental attitudes of Myaskovsky as critic were the priority of the new over the traditional, and of composer over interpreter. It permits to reckon Myaskovsky among the leading representatives of “contemporariness” in the Russian music criticism of the pre-revolutionary twenty years.

By examining the process of production and reception of the works of Walter Pater and Oscar Wilde, this thesis explores the ways in which both conceptions of audience and actual audiences shaped these works. As proponents of "aestheticism," a philosophy which required the development of a highly specialised mode of perception and critical awareness, Pater and Wilde wrote with a fairly select audience in mind. Confronted, however, with actual readers who did not always meet the "aesthetic" criteria (even if they were supporters), they were forced to rethink their conceptions of audience. Pater's and Wilde's developing understandings of audience can be traced in their works, as they experiment with style and genre in an attempt to communicate effectively with their readers. Although at base Pater and Wilde advocated a similar "aesthetic" philosophy, their distinct conceptions of audience played a significant role in determining the nature of their particular versions of aestheticism.

Critics and audiences alike have neglected the idea of Wilde as a precursor to Beckett. But I contend that a closer look at each writer's aesthetic and philosophic tendencies-for instance, their interest in the fluid nature of self, their understanding of identity as a performance, and their belief in language as both a way in and a way out of stagnancy -will connect them in surprising and highly significant ways. This thesis will focus on the ways in which Wilde prefigures Beckett as a dramatist. Indeed, many of the themes that Beckett, free from the constraints of a censor and from the societal restrictions of Victorian England, unabashedly details in his drama are to be found residing obscurely in Wilde. Understanding Beckett's major dramatic themes and motifs therefore yields new strategies for reading Wilde.

This thesis investigates the way that moral and aesthetic concerns about the relationship between fiction and reality are manifested in the work of particular novelists writing at different periods in the nineteenth century, Chapter One examines an early-century subgenre of the novel that features deluded female readers who fail to differentiate between fantasy and reality, and who consequently attempt to live their lives according to foolish precepts learned from novels. The second chapter deals with the realist aesthetic of W. M. Thackeray; focusing on the techniques by which his fiction marks its own relationship both to less realistic fiction and to reality itself. The final chapter discusses Oscar Wilde's critical stance that art is meaningful and intellectually satisfying, while reality and realism are aesthetically worthless: it then goes on the explore how these ideas play out in his novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray.
iv, 120 leaves ; 28 cm.

Thesis (MA)-- Stellenbosch University, 2004.
Full text to be digitised and attached to bibliographic record.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The following thesis develops a theory of parody as a multifunctional practice in relation to selected works of Oscar Wilde, James Joyce and Tom Stoppard. The study discusses parody as a mode of generic engineering (rather than a genre itself) with ideological ramifications. Based on an understanding of literary and non-literary genres as social institutions, this thesis describes the practice of parody as one of engineering generic or discursive incongruity with a particular cultural purpose in mind. In refiguring generic conventions, the parodist simultaneously reworks their implicit ideological premises. Parody hence comes to serve as a means of negotiating with "the world" through generic modification, and the notions of parodic social agency and cultural work are consequently central to this thesis. Focusing on The Picture of Dorian Gray and The Importance of Being Earnest respectively, Chapters Two and Three discuss Wilde's use of parody, and especially parodic "word-masks", for subverting the aesthetic and social conventions of Victorian England, and covertly propagating a gay subculture through parodic injokes. Word-masks - central to Wildean parody - entail the duplicitous use of an object text / genre as a cover under which a parodist hides other meanings. If Wildean parody might be described as claiming a covert agency, Joycean parody must, in contrast, be acknowledged as expressing deep-seated political ambivalence. Chapters Four and Five of this thesis discuss Joyce's Ulysses with specific reference to his use of parody to conflate, relativize and problematize the dominant aesthetic and Irish nationalist discourses of the early twentieth-century. Joycean parody also demonstrates parodic ambivalence and this is especially evident in what might be called his "parodic patriotism". In contrast to Wilde's and Joyce's use of parody for the expression of subversive or progressive political views, Stoppard's parodies confirm conservative English values not only in their reification of the English canon but also in terms of the ideological premises with which they invest their hypotexts. Chapters Six and Seven examine how parody can serve as one of the ways in which modem artists have managed to come to terms with tradition. Focusing on Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead and Travesties respectively, these chapters explore parody's capacity to function as tribute or homage to the writers of the past being parodied. Ultimately this thesis aims to demonstrate the continuum of parodic cultural work or effects of which parody, as a mode of generic engineering, is capable.
AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: In hierdie tesis word daar - met verwysing na geselekteerde werke van Oscar Wilde, James Joyce en Tom Stoppard - 'n teorie van parodie as multi-funktionele praktyk ontwikkel. Parodie word bespreek as 'n vorm van generiese manipulasie (eerder as 'n genre op sigself) met ideologiese implikasies. Op die basis van 'n vertolking van literêre en nie-literêre genres as sosiale instellings, beskryf hierdie tesis die praktyk van parodie as die bewerkstelling van generiese en diskursiewe ongelyksoortigheid met 'n besondere kulturele oogmerk in gedagte. In die herfigurering van generiese konvensies is die beoefenaar van parodie terselfdertyd besig om hulle geïmpliseerde ideologiese aannames te herbewerk. Parodie word dus 'n metode om met behulp van generiese modifikasie in omgang met "die wêreld" te verkeer; en die idee van die sosiale agentskap en kulturele aksie van parodie staan dus ook sentraal tot hierdie tesis. Hoofstukke Twee en Drie fokus onderskeidelik op The Picture of Dorian Gray en The Importance of Being Earnest. In hierdie twee hoofstukke word Wilde se gebruik van parodie bespreek, met besondere aandag aan sy parodiese "woordmaskers" om die estetiese en sosiale konvensies van Victoriaanse Engeland te ondermyn, asook sy bedekte propagering - deur middel van parodiese binne-grappe -- van 'n gay subkultuur. Sentraal tot Wilde se parodie is woordmaskers wat 'n dubbelsinnige gebruik van teks en genre inspan as 'n dekmantel waaronder die beoefenaar van parodie ander betekenisse verskuil hou. As Wilde se parodie beskryfkan word as bedekte bemiddeling oftussenkoms (covert agency), moet Joyce se parodie - as teenstelling - identifiseer word as 'n uitdrukking van diepliggende politiese ambivalensie. In Hoofstukke Vier en Vyf word Joyce se Ulysses bespreek met spesifieke verwysing na sy gebruik van parodie om dominante estetiese en Ierse nasionalistiese diskoerse van die vroeë twintigste eeu saam te voeg, te relativiseer en te bevraagteken.. Joyce se parodie illustreer ook parodiese ambivalensie - 'n aspek wat duidelik blyk uit wat sy "parodiese patriotisme" genoem kon word. In teenstelling met Wilde en Joyce se gebruik van parodie as uitdrukking van ondermynende of pregressiewe gesigspunte, bevestig Stoppard se parodie konserwatiewe Engelse waardes nie net in hulle vergestalting van Engelse kanoniese tekste nie, maar ook in terme van die ideologiese aannames wat hulle aan hul hipotekste toeskryf. Hoofstukke Ses en Sewe ondersoek hoe parodie kan dien as een van die weë waarlangs moderne kunstenaars daarin geslaag het om hulleself te versoen met tradiese. In Hoofstukke Ses en Sewe - waar daar onderskeidelik op Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead en Travesties gefokus word - word ook aandag geskenk aan die vermoë van parodie om te funksioneer as huldeblyk of eerbetoon aan skrywers wie se werke geparodieer word. Hierdie tesis poog om die kontinuum van parodiese kulturele werk te illustreer waartoe parodie, as 'n vorm van generiese manipulasie, in staat is.

This thesis explores the role of Nihilism in Oscar Wilde's thought and writing, beginning with the depiction of Russian Political Nihilism in Wilde's first play; Vera, or the Nihilists and tracing the engagement with philosophical Nihilism in his fiction, drama and essays, up to and including De Profundis. It is argued that Russian Political Nihilism derives from the same sources and expresses the same concerns as the philosophical Nihilism discussed by Nietzsche in The Will to Power, and that Nietzsche and Wilde, working independently, came to a strikingly similar understanding of Nihilism. Philosophical Nihilism is defined in two ways; as the complete absence of values (Absolute Nihilism) and as a sense that, while absolute values may exist, they are unattainable, unknowable or inexpressible (Relative Nihilism). Wilde uses his writing to express Nihilism while simultaneously seeking aesthetic and ethical counterforces to it, eventually coming to see Art and the life of the Artist as the ultimate forms of resistance to Nihilism. Wilde's philosophical views are examined in the context of his time, and in the light of his exceptionally wide reading. He is compared and contrasted with Nietzsche, the philosopher who has done most to shape our view of what Nihilism means, in his ethical and aesthetic response to Nihilism. The conclusion also considers the reception of Wilde's expression of Nihilism and his employment of Art as the only superior counterforce in the first half of the twentieth century, with particular reference to the works of Gide and Proust. Their engagement with Nihilism is explored both in historical context and as a way of addressing a problem which has become uniquely pervasive and pressing in the modern era.

This thesis examines the literary dream in selected works by Kafka, Kubin, Meyrink, Musil and Schnitzler, with a particular focus on the redefinition of subjectivity through dreamlife. The introductory chapter contextualises these case studies in the broader field of oneirocriticism, emphasising the dream's ancient role as fixtional template and its specific significance in the destabilised environment of German Central Europe during the early twentieth century. Alfred Kubin's Die andere Seite (1909), which uses the 'other side' as metaphor for both oneiric and artistic experience, reveals the inherent dualism of the literary dream and its close relationship with creativity. In Robert Musil's Die Verwirrungen des Zdglings Tdrlefi (1906), the protagonist serves as the model for a new type of self-determining subject who draws on the knowledge of dreams and irrationality. Franz Kafka's texts reveal techniques for integrating the dream into fictional worlds that are already dreamlike through the prevalence of (literalised) metaphor and free association. Gustav Meyrink, in Der Golem (1915), shares Kafka's interest in concretised metaphor, but also explores the dream's associations with occult practices, used as a defence against the threatening claims of science. Finally, Arthur Schnitzler's literary dreams offer a direct confrontation with psychoanalysis and a dismantling of nineteenth-century ideals of gender and bourgeois love. Overall, it is argued that the literary dreams by these authors hold varied responses to fragmentation of the Ich in the face of psychological 'vivisection', theories of relativity, and the collapse of old social orders. The dream, as a nightly 'psychosis', crystallised the pervasive fears of self-loss during this period; however, in its perennial role as micro-narrative, it also provided a site for re-construction of the subject. The incorporation of dreams in fictional lives served as a metonymical guide for the integration of un- and subconscious experience overall.

This thesis identifies strategies of queer/irony in the writings of Lord Byron, Heinrich Heine, Theodor Fontane, and Oscar Wilde. Key to the understanding of irony is Friedrich Schlegel's re-evaluation of the concept. The thesis establishes an approach to the multifaceted concept of irony and identify key concepts of queer theory. The focus, however, is close reading. First, Lord Byron's epic satire Don Juan is read with regards to the interplay of narrative strategies and the depiction of gender, homoeroticism and the concept of the child. Furthermore, reviews published at the time of the publication of Don Juan are examined: Why did the reviewers reject the work so violently? Second, in Heine's Buch der Lieder we find ironic strategies that Richard Rorty subsumed into the concept of 'final vocabularies.' By acknowledging the formulaic nature of language in general and Romantic tropes in particular, Heine succeeds in subverting a heteronormative discourse on love and desire. Heine's Reisebilder – 'Die Reise von München nach Genua' and 'Die Bäder von Lucca' – depict the limits of queer/irony: Where meaning is fixed, as in the case of the Platen polemic, irony loses its propensity to contain multitudes. Third, Theodor Fontane's novels of adultery are read against the background of irony as established through a Schlegelian reading of Frau Jenny Treibel and a queer reading of Ellernklipp. The novels Unwiederbringlich and Effi Briest question notions of truth and map the danger of knowledge. At the core of this chapter lies the notion of 'knowledge management,' a strategy closely related to irony. The figure of the courtier Pentz in Unwiederbringlich becomes a harbinger of dangerous, queer knowledge similar to the way Crampas' use of Heine quotations negotiates sexually suggestive knowledge in Effi Briest. In a final step, the aforementioned queer/ironic strategies are employed to read texts by Oscar Wilde. Are the strategies as inferred in the other chapters valid for Wilde's writings as well? We find that, in a time where homoerotic behaviour was heavily sanctioned, ironic writing had become a liability. Wilde's ironies are too opaque for the reader: They have become a movement where nobody is allowed to 'play along'.

Between 1933 and 1963, many Quebec critics followed with interest--some sporadically, others regularly--the works and career of Alain Grandbois (1900-1975). This thesis analyzes in systematic fashion the content and the evolution of their discourse.
In addition to engaging in "dialogue" (via their reviews) with certain publishers, the critics reflected upon the problem of regionalism and universalism in Grandbois' "clear and simple" prose works, although in quite different ways with each new book. The collections of poems, on the other hand, because of their "hermetism", induced commentators to study the question of the intelligible and the unintelligible in poetry, a question closely linked to that of the meaning--or the absurdity--of existence. Moreover, these interpreters of Grandbois' works, in order to actualize them, read them into the social discourse of the time. Thus, some denounced them for reasons of dogma or of morality; others, more numerous, sought to make Grandbois' texts more "readable" by referring them to current events or phenomena, such as the Second World War, the immediate post-war period, or the "silent revolution" of the 1960s.
Products of the classical education system, Grandbois' exegetes drew their inspiration from the principal tendencies of European criticism. As well, they tended to compare Grandbois' prose works to those of French prose writers of the interwar years, and to link his poetry to that of European poets (the surrealists and those they influenced, among others), although occasional reference was made to local writers.
Over time, the critics came to construct the myth of Alain Grandbois, that "exceptional" literary and human being who acclimatized the "modern" poem to Quebec, after having roamed the world from 1925 to 1940. The history of Alain Grandbois' critical good fortune, in short, is that of a happy match between an "eminently" distinguished author and his grateful commentators, for whom he created the opportunity to say "new" things about man, art and life.

This chapter evaluates the criticism of statistics. Already in the early nineteenth century, the statistical approach was attacked on the ground that mere statistical tables cannot demonstrate causality, or that mathematical probability presupposes the occurrence of events wholly by chance. The intent of these early critics was not to suggest the inadequacy of causal laws in social science, but to reject the scientific validity of statistics. The new interpretation of statistics that emerged during the 1860s and 1870s was tied to a view of society in which variation was seen as much more vital. Statistical determinism became untenable precisely when social thinkers who used numbers became unwilling to overlook the diversity of the component individuals in society, and hence denied that regularities in the collective society could justify any particular conclusions about its members. These social discussions on natural science and philosophy bore fruit in the growing interest in the analysis of variation evinced by the late-century mathematical statisticians. To be sure, Francis Galton gave little attention to the debates on human freedom, but Francis Edgeworth was closely familiar with them, and Wilhelm Lexis's important work on dispersion can only be understood in the context of this tradition.

During the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, historians across the world often started the history of the modern historical discipline with Leopold Ranke’s teaching at the University of Berlin during the 1830s. Ranke, they argued, here introduced a new style of training exercises, which afterwards defined the discipline. Some connected this history to a story of increasing standardization and institutionalization of education and research, culminating with the methodological textbooks, uniform training exercises, and large research institutes of the period. Many historians also associated Ranke’s exercises with certain epistemic virtues, such as carefulness, accurateness, and love of truth. These epistemic virtues, some argued, were products of the close relationship between teachers and students. The virtues, this chapter argues, also helped nineteenth-century historians assess the scribes, chroniclers, and historians of the past. The chapter illustrates this emphasis upon epistemic virtues through the example of Georg Waitz, who participated in Ranke’s famous exercises during the 1830s and whom nineteenth-century historians often described as his most prominent and loyal student. It especially focuses upon how Waitz conveyed the virtues of the Ranke school to his doctoral students in Göttingen and how this training influenced the students’ practices of interpretation and source criticism. Finally, the chapter discusses the tension between the educational ideas of the Ranke school and the standardization and institutionalization of education and research during the second half of the nineteenth century. The tension, it argues, illustrates that the emergence of the modern historical discipline cannot be explained solely with reference to the process of institutionalization.