SOURCE: Gerhard, Patricia. “The New Criticism as an Aesthetic Theory.” Western Humanities Review 17, no. 1 (winter 1963): 155-60.

In the following essay, Gerhard defines the function and place of the aesthetic object, namely the poem, in the context of New Criticism and its theories, writing that according to the New Critics, the poem or work of art must be treated as an object complete in itself. Although knowledge about both the artist and the historical circumstances under which the piece was created may aid in the understanding of a poem, these criteria do not belong in the realm of true critical inquiry.

Not only do the individual works of art of the twentieth century reflect our highly specialized and fragmented world, but also the interpretation and criticism of these works mirror our world as well. Each field has tended to develop a technical and esoteric language of criticism to explain...