The Emergence of New Criticism: Its Various Causes

The present study attempts to describe and analyze various causes which led to the emergence of New Criticism. Factors, such as the rapid progress of science, considerable social change, stillness of literature and criticism, the follow up of social and moral values of Victorian period (1832-1901) as an obstacle in the development of literature and literary criticism, concentration on the priority of the writer instead of the text, psychological discoveries of Freud, Jung and Bergson and finally the general dissatisfaction of literary condition in the 19th century led the imagists like T.E.Hulme and Ezra Pound and along with them I. A. Richards to ponder over their literary theories and pay more attention to the texts which paved the way to the blossoming of New Criticism. This article will also consider the major principles of New Criticism and its limitations.