Tennessee Williams’s play, A Streetcar Named Desire, illustrates the struggle of power between economic classes and the changes taking place in America at that time, regarding social status. The constant tension between Blanche and Stanley represents the conflict between social classes, and the clash of...
Introduction To what extent is Marxist criticism helpful in opening up potential meanings in ‘London’ by William Blake? Made-to-order essay as fast as you need it Each essay is customized to cater to your unique preferences + experts online Get my essay By applying a...
Introduction Christopher Paul Curtis certainly makes a point to address class in his telling of the Watsons’ story, but beyond this, The Watsons Go to Birmingham carries more direct allusions to specifically Marxism. The novel chronicles a snapshot in the lives of the Watson family...
Both plays, regardless of their context, are simply about man’s need to control instincts inherently selfish, greedy and lustful. They are not political satires. It is clear that both Pebble and Marlowe are concerned with man’s inherent selfish, greedy and lustful flaws, to portray the...
Basic intro to the storyline that everyone knows, identify the two versions that you will be focusing on. As a child one believes that the folktales read to them are just folktales, but in reality, they signify so much more. One can compare the Perrault...
The Complete Persepolis, an autobiographical novel by Marjane Satrapi, tells the tale of Marjane’s childhood in Iran. In this story, Marjane (Marji) is brought up by communistic parents. Evidence of this Marxist upbringing is displayed several times throughout the book, most especially when Marji exclaims...
While the novel Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen does not openly display Marx’s idea of the oppressed and the oppressor, it does clearly demonstrate Marx’s ideas of society as a history of class struggle. Austen portrays class divisions and struggles through the relationships between...
Examining The Great Gatsby through a Marxist lens illuminates the underlying socioeconomic tensions and critiques prevalent in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s iconic novel. Set during the opulent 1920s, the narrative explores the excesses of the Jazz Age and the stark contrasts between the wealthy elite and...
Introduction This study looks to depict multiple nuances of ideologies through ideological criticism whilst analysing the issues presented when attempting to define it. Then finally subjectively stating the preferred definition of the term with a subsequent justification. Made-to-order essay as fast as you need it...
The period of 1919 to 1929 saw a change in the history of the United States of America. The Great Migration was on with an influx of blacks moving from the south to the north in search of better opportunities. Many settled in Harlem, located...
Social criticism is a mode of approach that expresses the malicious conditions and flaws of social structure. Social criticism interprets the text in the context of various social affairs existing in the current scenario. History, culture and tradition plays predominant role in this criticism. Though...
Bertolt Brecht is regarded as one of the most important figures of twentieth century. He was born in Bavaria in the year 1898.He brought a great transformation in the traditional literary and theatrical form, through his ‘epic theatre’. He attempted to bring a revolutionary change...
In Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie, Luo’s attempt to re-educate the Little Seamstress is indicative of his own participation in the class struggle. This protagonist projects his own desire to be a member of the more sophisticated ‘upper-class’ in his education...
Introduction Emily Bronte’s classic novel, Wuthering Heights, is not simply the tragic love story it may appear to be on the surface, but is an example of class differences and the role of capital in eighteenth century Victorian England. Using Karl Marx’s essay Wage Labor...
Marxist critisism is a form of cultural criticism that applies Marxist theory to the interpretation of cultural texts.
Process
Marxist criticism places a literary work within the context of class and assumptions about class. A premise of Marxist criticism is that literature can be viewed as ideological, and that it can be analyzed in terms of a Base/Superstructure model. Economic means of production within society account for the base. Human institutions and ideologies that produce art and literary texts comprise the superstructure. Marxist criticism thus emphasizes class, socioeconomic status, power relations among various segments of society, and the representation of those segments.
Concepts
Several concepts are indispensable for Marxist criticism: class, ideology, alienation, base and superstructure.
Marxist critics
Terry Eagleton (Marxism and Literary Criticism (1976)), Fredric Jameson (Marxism and Form (1971), The Political Unconscious (1981)), Lukács (History and Class Consciousness (1923)), Pierre Macherey (A Theory of Literary Production (1978)), Raymond Williams.
Karl Marx
Karl Marx was a 19th century German thinker most famous for developing a notion of communism in The Communist Manifesto. His notion of communism was not simply a utopia presented in a vacuum, it was a political program meant to critique the social conditions of capitalism.
