A history of criticism and literary taste in Europe, from the earliest texts to the present day. Volume 3 (of 3), Modern criticism

In Short

George Saintsbury’s third and final volume of his monumental survey tracks the transformation of European literary criticism throughout the nineteenth century, alongside crucial groundwork laid in the late eighteenth. Moving through Britain, France, and Germany, the text charts a seismic intellectual shift: the collapse of Neo-Classic dogmatism—with its rigid rules, generic boundaries, and prescriptions—and the rise of modern, impressionistic, and historical ways of reading. Saintsbury evaluates dozens of major and minor figures, from Lessing, Diderot, and Goethe to Coleridge, Hazlitt, Sainte-Beuve, Arnold, and Pater. Rather than treating critical essays as dry manuals, he approaches them as living literature, arguing that true criticism stems not from abstract, universal systems, but from a reviewer's personal, passionate encounter with individual texts. The book has endured because of its remarkable scope, its fierce commitment to reading primary sources directly, and its lively, idiosyncratic voice that treats centuries of intellectual debate as an endlessly entertaining human story.

The Story

The intellectual narrative of this final volume begins in the mid-eighteenth century, a period still dominated by Neo-Classic orthodoxy. Critics across Europe operated under the assumption that literary merit could be measured against pre-established rules of genre, diction, and structure derived from ancient authorities. Yet subtle fractures were already appearing in this fortress. Early Swiss observers like Béat Louis de Muralt began looking across borders, evaluating English drama with an outsider’s detachment. In England, antiquarians and editors began looking backward into Middle English and older verse, while Thomas Warton’s study of Spenser delivered a quiet shock to the system by daring to assert that it is absurd to judge an author by rules he never intended to follow.

In France and Germany, the shift accelerated through dynamic, revolutionary thinkers. Denis Diderot broke away from academic pedantry, bringing an encyclopedic curiosity and an appetite for pure aesthetic pleasure to his analysis of poetry, drama, and art. Diderot's chaotic brilliance directly invigorated Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, who dismantled French Neo-Classic dominance and redirected German attention toward Shakespeare and an independent revaluation of classic principles. Meanwhile, English literature began exerting a profound, transformative force abroad. The works of Milton, Shakespeare, Richardson, and Sterne crossed the Channel, shaking the foundations of Continental taste and demonstrating that emotional power and originality mattered far more than adherence to formal decorum.

As the nineteenth century opened, the Romantic revolution fully overturned the old regime. William Wordsworth launched a direct assault on traditional poetic diction, famously declaring poetry to be the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings recollected in tranquillity. Though Wordsworth's theoretical arguments against metre and poetic language proved vulnerable to logical counterattack, his peer Samuel Taylor Coleridge provided the profound theoretical foundation that Romanticism needed. Coleridge elevated the critic’s task from mere rule-checking to an inquiry into the creative imagination itself, establishing a high watermark for English critical thought.

Alongside Coleridge stood William Hazlitt, who brought an unmatched gusto, vitality, and personal love to literary commentary, treating literature as a vital, breathing phenomenon. Across the English Channel, the romantic impulse reshaped French thought as well. Critics like Désiré Nisard grappled—sometimes reluctantly—with the explosive innovations of Victor Hugo and the Romantic school, while Sainte-Beuve developed a masterly historical and biographical method, culminating in monumental studies like his portrait of Port-Royal. In Germany, Novalis and the Romantics explored the mystical, psychological depths of art, while Goethe's sprawling, monumental reflections on writers like Sterne and Shakespeare offered deep, if occasionally pedantic, insights into the creative spirit.

By the mid-to-late nineteenth century, the story reaches a landscape dominated by historicism, social theories, and new aesthetic dogmas. Critics increasingly attempted to treat literature as a scientific product of national character, climate, and epoch. Yet Saintsbury shows how the finest critics resisted being completely consumed by these non-literary systems. In France, Émile Montégut stood out by insisting that artworks ultimately matter because of their beauty and perfection, not their social utility. In England, Matthew Arnold championed "the Grand Style" and sought to elevate critical taste, though his insistence on rigid definitions mirrored older traps.

The narrative reaches its ultimate climax in the late nineteenth century with the arrival of Walter Pater and the Aesthetic movement. Pater's "Neo-Cyrenaicism" reduced critical judgment to the intense, exquisite pleasure of the individual moment—the solitary soul reacting to the artwork. In his concluding synthesis, Saintsbury surveys the vast field he has crossed, warning against every new "preceptist" system that tries to replace old rules with new dogmas. The story closes on an enduring truth: no universal formula or theoretical system can ever fully capture or explain the mysterious, ever-shifting delight of a great work of art.

How It Unfolds

The cracks in the fortress The journey opens in the eighteenth century as early observers and antiquarians quietly challenge Neo-Classic dogma. Writers like Béat Louis de Muralt observe foreign traditions, while Thomas Warton suggests that poets like Spenser cannot be judged by rules they never intended to follow.

The spark of independence Denis Diderot injects an uninhibited, encyclopedic curiosity into French commentary, valuing immediate emotional pleasure over rigid classroom rules. His chaotic brilliance directly inspires Lessing, who uses Diderot's momentum to dismantle French dramatic dominance and establish independent critical principles in Germany.

The foreign wave English literature sweeps across the European continent, profoundly altering literary taste in France and Germany. The dramatic freedom of Shakespeare, the epic scale of Milton, and the psychological novelty of Richardson and Sterne force Continental theorists to abandon their insular assumptions.

The Romantic assault William Wordsworth issues his famous manifesto against formal poetic diction, defining poetry as emotion recollected in tranquillity. Though his arguments against metre contain flaws, they signal an irreversible shift away from artificial, eighteen-century standards toward raw human feeling.

The height of insight Samuel Taylor Coleridge and William Hazlitt transform English criticism into an art form of its own. Coleridge brings deep philosophical rigor to the study of the imagination, while Hazlitt introduces an infectious gusto, evaluating literature through personal love and fiery enthusiasm.

The historical vista French criticism evolves into a sophisticated exploration of history and human character, led by Sainte-Beuve's extensive historical portraits like Port-Royal. Meanwhile, French contemporaries navigate the tumultuous rise of Victor Hugo and the Romantic school with a blend of fascination and skepticism.

The mid-century struggle Critics attempt to turn literature into a branch of sociology or national history, binding artistic judgment to determinist theories. Independent thinkers like Émile Montégut push back, insisting that literature must be judged primary by its intrinsic beauty rather than its social utility.

The grand debate Matthew Arnold attempts to re-establish high standards by defining "the Grand Style" through serious subjects and severity of tone. However, his provocative definitions spark immediate pushback, proving how difficult it is to impose strict categories on poetic genius.

The individual moment Walter Pater brings the century toward its close by championing an impressionistic, aesthetic approach where critical value is found in the individual moment of personal pleasure. This movement rejects grand moral frameworks in favor of direct, intimate appreciation of the text.

The enduring lesson The book closes with a sweeping survey of the entire history of criticism, warning that every era succumbs to the temptation of inventing new rule-systems. The ultimate lesson remains that art defies universal formulas, requiring every generation to judge literature as they find it.

The People

• George Saintsbury — The author and guiding voice of the history. He wants to evaluate the entire record of European criticism directly from original texts rather than secondary summaries. Unmoved by trendy theoretical systems, he ends up affirming that personal enjoyment and direct contact with literature outweigh all abstract aesthetic theories.
• Gotthold Ephraim Lessing — The rigorous German critic who seeks to liberate his nation's literature from slavish imitation of French Neo-Classicism. Guided by Aristotle and energized by Diderot, he uses his sharp intellect to champion Shakespeare and establish an independent foundation for German dramatic theory.
• Denis Diderot — The buoyant, encyclopedic French thinker who wants to break free from rigid academic rules. Driven by an appetite for artistic pleasure and endless intellectual curiosity, he brings a lightning-fast, flexible intelligence to art, drama, and literature, inspiring key thinkers across Europe.
• Thomas Warton — The English scholar whose study of Spenser marks an early break with eighteenth-century orthodoxy. He wants to appreciate older, Gothic literature on its own terms, ultimately striking a decisive blow against the idea that all poetry must conform to antecedent rules.
• William Wordsworth — The Romantic poet and theorist who wants to strip away artificial "poetic diction" in favor of the real language of ordinary men. His drive to ground poetry in simple life leads him to radical definitions of verse, though his theories occasionally trap him in awkward logical contradictions.
• Samuel Taylor Coleridge — The profound English theorist who seeks a deep philosophical understanding of the human imagination. Standing above almost all his contemporaries in philosophical depth, he transforms English criticism from surface analysis into an exploration of the very essence of poetic creation.
• William Hazlitt — The passionate English essayist who wants to communicate the sheer life, spirit, and excitement of literature. Impulsive and fiercely independent, he relies on intense personal love for books to make poetry feel completely alive to his readers.
• Sainte-Beuve — The monumental French critic who aims to reconstruct the complete intellectual, social, and literary atmosphere of past eras. Through decades of relentless labor, he perfects a historical method that treats literary study as an extraordinary exploration of human character.
• Matthew Arnold — The English poet and critic who wants to save modern literature from provincialism by enforcing high standards through concepts like "the Grand Style." His authoritative tone and strict definitions provoke widespread debate, highlighting the limits of prescriptive criticism.
• Walter Pater — The late-nineteenth-century English aesthetician who seeks to isolate the precise moment of beauty and pleasure in art. By focusing entirely on immediate, personal perception, he moves criticism away from moralizing and historicism toward pure, impressionistic appreciation.

In Its Own Voice

When reflecting on the profound, unpredictable brilliance of Denis Diderot, Saintsbury captures the French thinker's unique ability to find artistic value everywhere without being bound by rigid systems:

"The work of art is for Diderot something which ought to give the human sense and the human soul pleasure, which, if it does so, is to be welcomed and extolled, not without inquiry into the manner and the causes of that pleasure."

Analyzing the sudden, revolutionary shift that occurred when eighteenth-century commentators began reading older English literature without preconceptions, Saintsbury highlights Thomas Warton's sudden, devastating blow against classic rules:

"But before long Warton fastens a sudden petard on the main gate of the Neo-Classic stronghold by saying: 'But it is absurd to think of judging either Ariosto or Spenser by precepts which they did not attend to.'"

In his grand synthesis at the book's close, Saintsbury offers a sweeping verdict on the perpetual rise and fall of theoretical systems throughout literary history:

"If one—even one—lesson has emerged, it must have been that to select the favourite critical fancy of any time as the unum necessarium is fatal—or redeemed only by the completeness with which such a selection demonstrates its own futility."

What It's Really About

Beneath its exhaustive survey of essays, treatises, and reviews, this volume is fundamentally an argument about how human beings ought to read. Saintsbury wages a continuous, subtle war against two major intellectual temptations: the trap of "a priori" rules—where a work of art is judged by how well it obeys predefined recipes—and the trap of heavy theoretical systems that reduce literature to a mere byproduct of sociology, history, or philosophy. The central question driving the book is whether art exists to satisfy an abstract system or to give direct, living pleasure to the human soul.

Through his detailed examination of three centuries of European thought, Saintsbury demonstrates that every age attempts to invent its own dogmatic standards, only for those standards to be shattered by the arrival of true creative genius. Whether it is Neo-Classicists trying to force Shakespeare into Aristotelian boxes or nineteenth-century determinists trying to reduce poetry to national environment, systems inevitably fail when brought face to face with actual masterpieces.

Ultimately, the book argues for an "a posteriori" approach to reading—judging the work "by the event." True criticism, in Saintsbury's view, requires an open, flexible mind, immense reading, and an unquenchable capacity for personal enthusiasm. The highest function of the critic is not to act as a schoolmaster wielding a ruler, but to serve as an enlightened, sensitive guide who helps others experience the distinct, unrepeatable glory of great writing.

Why Read It Today

This volume remains an extraordinary resource for anyone who loves literature, history, or the life of the mind. Reading Saintsbury feels less like studying a textbook and more like sitting in a sprawling private library with an extraordinarily well-read, robustly opinionated companion. He writes with a rare blend of massive erudition, sharp wit, and unflagging energy, breathing vibrant life into forgotten pamphlets, long-dead polemics, and famous essays alike.

Modern readers will find the book surprisingly liberating. In an era where literary discussion is often dominated by hyper-specialized academic jargon or fleeting internet trends, Saintsbury’s broad European perspective offers a refreshing reminder of the bigger picture. He shows that many of our contemporary debates about artistic quality, subjective taste, and the purpose of art are simply new chapters in a conversation that European thinkers have been having for centuries.

It is honest to acknowledge the book's minor difficulties. Saintsbury's style is famously dense and rambling, filled with untranslated Latin and French phrases, abrupt digressions, and relaxed mid-Victorian mannerisms. He assumes a reader who is not frightened by long sentences or subtle historical references. Furthermore, his preference for English, French, and German traditions means that other European literatures receive far less space.

Yet what stays with the reader long after closing the book is Saintsbury's magnificent, infectious passion for print. He possesses an insatiable love for books and a deep respect for the human effort that created them. For writers, students, and dedicated readers deciding whether to undertake this journey, Volume 3 offers something far more valuable than a mere list of dates and names: it provides an irreplaceable masterclass in how to read widely, think independently, and love literature for its own sake.