Lionel Trilling
Lionel Mordecai Trilling (July 4, 1905 – November 5, 1975) was an American literary critic, author, and teacher. With wife Diana Trilling, he was a member of the New York Intellectuals and contributor to the Partisan Review. Although he did not establish a school of literary criticism, he is one of the leading U.S. critics of the twentieth century who traced the contemporary cultural, social, and political implications of literature. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he has been a subject of continued interest.
Read more about Lionel Trilling: Academic Life, Partisan Review and The "New York Intellectuals", Critical and Literary Works, Politics, Works By Trilling, Bibliography
Famous quotes by lionel trilling:
“Any historian of the literature of the modern age will take virtually for granted the adversary intention, the actually subversive intention, that characterizes modern writing—he will perceive its clear purpose of detaching the reader from the habits of thought and feeling that the larger culture imposes, of giving him a ground and a vantage point from which to judge and condemn, and perhaps revise, the culture that produces him.”
—Lionel Trilling (1905–1975)
“We who are liberal and progressive know that the poor are our equals in every sense except that of being equal to us.”
—Lionel Trilling (1905–1975)
“In the American metaphysic, reality is always material reality, hard, resistant, unformed, impenetrable, and unpleasant.”
—Lionel Trilling (1905–1975)
“If one defends the bourgeois, philistine virtues, one does not defend them merely from the demonism or bohemianism of the artist but from the present bourgeoisie itself.”
—Lionel Trilling (1905–1975)