The Integral Method of Literary Scholarship: Theses for Discussion

S SUBTITLE and length indicate, this is not an elaborate exposition of the theory of a new method, but an attempt to stimulate the discussion of problems the importance of which can hardly be denied by any literary historian or critic.1 The theses are here formulated in a deliberately radical form in order to force the problems to their final consequences and to instigate a lively reaction-which is far sounder than apathy. Like every theory, this one has its strengths and weaknesses, its assertions more or less evident and clear, and formulations that need further exposition, elaboration, or even revision. It is to be hoped that a general discussion will clarify our ends and contribute to the establishing of a really adequate literary discipline.2 The irony and even contempt with which the work of literary historians is treated by scholars in the physical sciences is partly justified by our lack of generally acknowledged methodological principles, by the absence of a strictly defined subject and a consequent lack of defined ends. These deficiencies must be acknowledged serious, for there can be no true discipline without a subject, a method, and an aim. Let us take first the problem of the nature of literature and the subject of literary scholarship. By way of definition, we have and still get the most inexact, vague, and indeed fantastic statements. For Herder, literature means all works in which the spiritual physiognomy of a nation is reflected; for Friedrich Schlegel, it means those arts and sciences of which the subject is man and life. For Carriere, literary history is the history of ideals; for Hettner, it is the history of ideas and their scientific [sic!] and artistic forms; for W. Klemperer, it is the history of the incorporation in words of national ideas.3 Thomas