Example of Formalist Criticism Essay

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Formalist criticism: Age of Innocence.
Formalism deals with the critical approaches that are used in analyzing, interpreting or the evaluation of inherent features of a particular text. The features evaluated include syntax, grammar and literary devices such as tropes and meter. Formalization involves the study of a text without considering any outside influence. Therefore, issues like culture, history, biography and cultural contexts are not considered (Baldick 2014). Hence, the use of formalism to analyze Edith Wharton’s poem “The Age of Innocence” reveals that one can read and understand the poem in a different manner depending on how they interpret it.
The narration of “Age of Innocence” is written in the third person of the or rather describing a member of the society which makes it appear as the story really happened. In addition, most fiction stories use the third person to describe the story. A good example is the use of phrases such as “He did not in the least wish the future Mrs. Newland” (Wharton 2015). Narrating the poem in the third person was a good choice because it makes it easy for the reader to understand the flow of the story. As a result, this makes it for the reader to believe the fact that Edith was describing a person she knew. Hence, this makes the reader eager to read the whole poem in order to understand every detail.
Also, the imagery that Edith presents in the poem gives off some setting of history. Phrases such as “two mildly agitated years” and “custom” (Wharton 2015) shows that the events that happened that time could present som...