Roland Barthes (1915-1980) was a major French writer, literary theorist and critic of French culture and society. His classic works include Mythologies and Camera Lucida. Criticism and Truth is a brilliant discussion of the language of literary criticism and a key work in the Barthes canon. It is a cultural, linguistic and intellectual challenge to those who believe in the clarity, flexibility and neutrality of language, couched in Barthes' own inimitable and provocative style.
Written in 1966 in response to an attack on Barthes's Sur Racine , this polemic answers many of the charges brought against French New Criticism by conservative, academic, 19th-century-oriented critics: lack of "objectivity," fondness for "jargon," indifference to the author's intention, etc. More positively, Barthes outlines some key concerns: plurality of meanings; analysis, based on linguistics, of the structures of possible meanings; the idea of a science of literature; and the dynamics of reading. Though some of the issues are specific to the French literary-academic situation, the bulk of this brief essay is a lively and accessible statement of an important modern critical position that is worth reading. Richard Kuczkowski, Dir., Continuing Education, Dominican Coll., Blauvelt, N.Y.
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