Got Any Advice for Someone New to Literary Criticism?

[astrum]

I've read some literary criticism in the past, but very little and usually for school.


However, this year, I've resolved to read more of it (and on my own). Do you have any advice whatsoever for someone who's relatively a novice with reading literary criticism?

For example:
1. What makes a piece of literary criticism worthwhile? What do you like to see most in criticism?
2. How do you sort the wheat from the chaff?
3. There's a lot of deconstructive criticism out there nowadays? How do you feel about it? And do you usually avoid or embrace it?
4. What are some of your favorite types of criticism? And which forms of criticism would be most beneficial to someone who's just starting out?
........and so forth

[JBI]

There are in essence two kinds, historicism and theory. Historicism puts everything into an historical narrative and reduces literature to mere history(including manuscript variants, editions, biography, context, and publishing histories). Theory reduces everything to theoretical concepts, and makes reading more of an application of specific vocabulary, and a discussion of "what is".

Either way, both schools get tiresome and miss the main point of enjoyment. Criticism is rarely to enhance ordinary reader enjoyment, and hence is actually missing theron picture of why people read in the first place.

[Lykren]

There are in essence two kinds, historicism and theory. Historicism puts everything into an historical narrative and reduces literature to mere history(including manuscript variants, editions, biography, context, and publishing histories). Theory reduces everything to theoretical concepts, and makes reading more of an application of specific vocabulary, and a discussion of "what is".

Either way, both schools get tiresome and miss the main point of enjoyment. Criticism is rarely to enhance ordinary reader enjoyment, and hence is actually missing theron picture of why people read in the first place.

I've always suspected that was true, but since I've actually read almost no criticism, I felt I had to steer clear of saying so directly. Now I feel justified.

[Frostball]

What about mere popular criticism? How does that fit in? I'm talking reviews in articles and papers. I have a guilty pleasure of reading what others have to say about works I've read, be it positive or negative, well informed or not. It seems I enjoy the kind of "yeah, I though that too!" or, conversely, the "that's all wrong, did we even read the same book?" that inevitably results from reading them.

[Lykren]

What about mere popular criticism? How does that fit in? I'm talking reviews in articles and papers. I have a guilty pleasure of reading what others have to say about works I've read, be it positive or negative, well informed or not. It seems I enjoy the kind of "yeah, I though that too!" or, conversely, the "that's all wrong, did we even read the same book?" that inevitably results from reading them.

I used to read Christgau's reviews of albums for similar reasons, but eventually I stopped as I came to realize how thoughtless and arbitrary his opinions were. Even when I agreed with him, his explanations for why he enjoyed an album were always just meaningless smoke.

[HSPS]

To expand on what JBI wrote, theorists seem to want to turn literature into a science, as if studying art isn't good enough. They think they're being constructive, but they're only ruining it. There's a lot of physics envy in the 21st century, and it's increasingly virulent thanks to the Large Hadron Collider, The Big Bang Theory, and other popular science-y things. Leave science to the scientists, and leave literature to the people who enjoy literature for its own sake.

My advice: don't bother reading most literary criticism. Discover literature on your own. In my experience, one forms deeper relationships with the works when they're read in intellectual and emotional solitude. I'm not against discussing literature with others, but most formal criticism that I'm familiar with is trash. Harold Bloom is one critic I do read, primarily because he's devoted to maintaining the love of reading in readers, and he's been valiantly fighting the people who have been destroying the study of literature. The books of his literary criticism that I've read weren't very thorough, but perhaps that's not a bad thing.

EDIT: I should clarify that I'm only discussing modern criticism, as I'm not very familiar with pre-20th century criticism outside of Samuel Johnson.

[MorpheusSandman]

I've read some literary criticism in the past, but very little and usually for school.


However, this year, I've resolved to read more of it (and on my own). Do you have any advice whatsoever for someone who's relatively a novice with reading literary criticism?

For example:
1. What makes a piece of literary criticism worthwhile? What do you like to see most in criticism?
2. How do you sort the wheat from the chaff?
3. There's a lot of deconstructive criticism out there nowadays? How do you feel about it? And do you usually avoid or embrace it?
4. What are some of your favorite types of criticism? And which forms of criticism would be most beneficial to someone who's just starting out?
........and so forth1. What makes literary criticism worthwhile is not unlike what makes literature worthwhile, meaning that it provokes people to think about, engage with, and react to it. The best criticism, I think, does one of several things: It captures our subjective reactions to art, it reveals the techniques behind the art that create its affects, or it illuminates the art via context or theoretical constructs.

2. Again, it's really a subjective matter of how much you feel that a critical work illuminates a text. I don't think there's any objective measurement besides what affects us.

3. Deconstruction is a form of postmodernism that reduces literature to binary opposites and shows how these opposites conflict throughout a work, disallowing for a holistic, coherent reading. I don't know if there's "a lot of it," at least any more so than, say, feminist, queer, post-structural, or practical/formalist criticism. I think it's like any other mode in that it can be enlightening or sophistic in the right or wrong hands. One of my favorite studies on an individual author is Steven Yenser's Consuming Myth on James Merrill, which is mostly a deconstructionist work.

4. I'm most interested in understanding literature from a technical perspective, how formal devices are used to express thought/feeling and create the experience it does. So I'm most interested in formalist criticism, especially of poetry. My favorite critics are Helen Vendler (whom I think is absolutely brilliant), Christopher Ricks, Williams Empson, Cleanth Brooks, IA Richards, and classic critics like William Hazlitt, Samuel Johnson, and Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

As for recommendations for someone starting out, I think most would consider Samuel Johnson the greatest critic who ever lived, and it's almost always a delight reading his criticism, even when I vehemently disagree (in, eg, his preference for clarity over complexity, and using that to negatively criticize Milton). William Hazlitt is similar, though he was nowhere as prolific or as widely read. The ease with which he provides insights is a marvel, he makes it look effortless, and is completely humble about it. William Empson may be the best critic of the 20th century, and his Milton's God is actually the only work of criticism that Harold Bloom placed in his "Western Canon" collection.

Anyway, it might not be a bad idea to start with critical anthologies like Norton's. (http://www.amazon.com/Norton-Anthology-Theory-Criticism-Second/dp/0393932923/) Read through that, decide what type of criticism interests you the most, and then read more of those authors/that type.

[MorpheusSandman]

There are in essence two kinds, historicism and theory.There are at least 4 kinds: history, theory, practical, and opinion. Opinion is what we get most in reviews and periodical. Practical criticism can mix history, theory, and opinion without being as reductive as the first, as rigorous as the second, or as subjective as the third. Johnson, Hazlitt, Empson, et al. fit into the practical mode.


Either way, both schools get tiresome and miss the main point of enjoyment. Criticism is rarely to enhance ordinary reader enjoyment, and hence is actually missing theron picture of why people read in the first place.Ben Saunders in his Desiring Donne had a good take on criticism as being the exercise of desire that's created or left over from our experience of literature; that the experience creates a new desire to understand the experience. So, while it may be true that criticism rarely enhances the enjoyment of an "ordinary reader," not everyone is an ordinary reader. I love criticism for the same reason I love discussing literature to begin with, and that's to see works/authors I love through the eyes of others quite unlike myself.

[JBI]

Not exactly. Johnson is highly historical, and the others mix the two. To not be so reductionist, I meant all criticism divides on these lines. One seeks history to discuss a text, the other uses theoretical concepts (such as Aesthetics, Rhetoric, etc.)

When you are presented with a four line poem and must talk about it, you will undoubtedly be forced to either historicize on it or theorize. So you either apply a traditional vocabulary to understand it (such as rhetoric), or use history and background to contextualize it. Or like most people, you use both.

As for opinion, opinion always must contain some sort of background in the two in order to have ground and credibility.

As for the popular criticism, it is irrelevant to already established works, and it too will reduce itself to history (contemporary reactions to...)

[kelby_lake]

I like reading older literary criticism; the modern stuff comes off as too smug to me. Now we live in an age where you don't recite poems and passages off by heart and marvel at the beauty of the classics; it's all about analysis and science. As HSPS says, science trumps art- or at least, is considered to- so literature becomes a sort of science. Yes, you can analyse literature technically but that doesn't necessarily make it worthy criticism.

The problem is that I don't think literary criticism has anywhere to go with old texts.

[mal4mac]

Either way, both schools get tiresome and miss the main point of enjoyment. Criticism is rarely to enhance ordinary reader enjoyment, and hence is actually missing theron picture of why people read in the first place.

I agree with this!

It's a shame that so many novels *also* get tiresome and miss the main point of enjoyment. For instance, I found F.R. Leavis' book on D.H. Lawrence more enjoyable than Lawrence's "Women in Love". That said, Leavis was still rather tiresome, and a lot less enjoyable than Dickens or Conrad.

Because critics are so tiresome, I think they often have no hesitation in recommending tiresome literature, so it's difficult to steer oneself to enjoyable stuff. So how does one know what to read? I suppose you can only take your best guess, and learn to give up early if it's tiresome. There's always something else to read, and many books are not tiresome, so don't persevere with anything tiresome! For instance, I just gave up "Midnight's Children" and am now happily meandering through "Generation X".

You do encounter books that seem, maybe, to be getting to saying something important, but are tiresome to read. I'm finding this, at the moment, with "Intuition Pumps" by Daniel C. Dennett. I'm thinking he might reveal something new about consciousness, if I slug it out for another 300 pages. When will I ever learn?

I suggest adopting a philosophy of "tiresomeness is to be avoided at all costs", and give up within a few dozen pages if the book is tiresome - so it's back to the library for Dan (phew what a relief!)

[MorpheusSandman]

Not exactly. Johnson is highly historical, and the others mix the two. To not be so reductionist, I meant all criticism divides on these lines. When I hear "theory" I tend to think of modern critical theories like Marxism or feminism or psychoanalysis or deconstruction that has at its root a "theory" that it thinks can explain all manner of literary production. This a priori theoretical mode that texts get run through is quite different than what both modern practical critics and those of the past practiced. Christopher Ricks has written two excellent pieces on this, one available online here (http://www.lrb.co.uk/v03/n07/christopher-ricks/in-theory) and another in one of his books (I forget which) called "The Pursuit of Metaphor," both of which aim to present the failures of modern theories to be as universally applicable as they claim to. While you may say that a critic who analyzes linguistic devices to note their affect (like Rick does) is utilizing a kind of aesthetic theory, I think there's a worthwhile distinction to be made in the critic that supposes what they're saying about this form in this piece for this author is only applicable in this case rather than that it's universally applicable. Practical Criticism seems to adjust its methods to the texts while theory applies a single method to every text. Likewise, historians can not bother about either if they choose not to.

[MorpheusSandman]

I like reading older literary criticism; the modern stuff comes off as too smug to me. Now we live in an age where you don't recite poems and passages off by heart and marvel at the beauty of the classics; it's all about analysis and science.A lot of modern criticism IS smug; but so is a lot of older criticism (if anything, I think critics have softened considerably since the times of Pope and Keats; remember that critics were so harsh on Keats, Shelley thought that was what killed him!). Anyway, I know several modern critics that recite poems and passages by heart (Vendler and Bloom are two that do for sure), and I'm not quite sure why you think such memorization would run counter to "analysis" (indeed, wouldn't a person most familiar with something be the best to analyze it?)


The problem is that I don't think literary criticism has anywhere to go with old texts.Depends on what old texts you mean. Probably the two best studies on Milton I've read were from the 20th century: Ricks' Milton's Grand Style and Empson's Milton's God. I know of nothing like either in the earlier Milton criticism.

[HSPS]

As HSPS says, science trumps art- or at least, is considered to- so literature becomes a sort of science. Yes, you can analyse literature technically but that doesn't necessarily make it worthy criticism.

If these theorists do think that science trumps art, then they should study science. I, on the other hand, much prefer art, and not only does art not need to be formally studied, it also certainly doesn't need "theories" that, to me, are detrimental and distracting. (I partially exclude music from this discussion, as music theory is important to know if one is interested in composing. Nevertheless, it's not crucial to the enjoyment of music.) Some might say that I belong to the Aesthetic Movement, but calling aestheticism "a movement" implies that there are other approaches to art, whereas I see it as the only one.

[kelby_lake]

A lot of modern criticism IS smug; but so is a lot of older criticism (if anything, I think critics have softened considerably since the times of Pope and Keats; remember that critics were so harsh on Keats, Shelley thought that was what killed him!). Anyway, I know several modern critics that recite poems and passages by heart (Vendler and Bloom are two that do for sure), and I'm not quite sure why you think such memorization would run counter to "analysis" (indeed, wouldn't a person most familiar with something be the best to analyze it?)


I mean reciting at school. I'd guess that Vendler and Bloom are of an age where in school you'd learn by rote. It's not a book of critical theory but The Trial of Lady Chatterley is a very good insight into a past era, where 'literary merit' meant 'beautiful piece of art', as if it sort of radiated a morality, as if it was 'good for you'. Some older criticism I've read (circa sixties/seventies, can't remember the exact critics names) have a certain wide-eyedness and grandioseness; they're not afraid to praise something as being a beautiful work of art, without having to justify or qualify it. Whereas now, I read a recent critical introduction to The Rainbow that spent about 80% of his introduction making facetious well-worn criticisms of Lawrence and the other 20% engaging in dull analysis of Lawrence's syntax when he talks about nature. Reverence has fallen out of fashion; it's all about the critic and their generally unimpressive opinion that either states the obvious or desperately scrabbles for small details they can analyse. Of course, I'm not saying that older critics were any more humble, but making subjective comments was not 'against the rules'.

Literary criticism is inherently subjective; to try and imply that one can objectively prove things about it is nonsense. I don't mean that the critics who are being subjective think anything other than their position is correct but that they don't feel the need to excessively justify it through some fictional objectivity.

For me, literary theories are interesting in the sense that they give a window into a particular era and how they analysed texts but to adopt a school of criticism now is again an attempt to cover critical subjectivity with objectivity. Because we can't really tell how current literary criticism will be judged in thirty years time, all it can offer are individual opinions. Opinions are not the exclusive reserve of professional literary critics.

[MorpheusSandman]

...a past era, where 'literary merit' meant 'beautiful piece of art', as if it sort of radiated a morality, as if it was 'good for you'... Reverence has fallen out of fashion; it's all about the critic and their generally unimpressive opinion that either states the obvious or desperately scrabbles for small details they can analyse.Well, obviously critical trends change (are always changing), but I still think that appreciating aesthetic beauty and morality exist in criticism, even if they aren't the norm (FR Leavis and Bloom come to mind as critics who are concerned with aesthetic quality and reverence; Bloom is practically idolatrous of Shakespeare!); likewise, bad critics have always existed and will always exist. Just like literature itself, the vast majority of it is crap and not worth one's time. The point is to appreciate the best it has to offer.


Literary criticism is inherently subjective; to try and imply that one can objectively prove things about it is nonsense.Certain aspects of criticism are inherently subjective, yes; Qualitative standards come down to nothing more than what qualities we as individuals and groups like and dislike. So someone can point to the same feature in a work and one group will say "this appeals to us" and another will say "this doesn't appeal to us," and obviously such standards change over time. However, there are plenty of objective things in literature, especially in regard to its techniques, historical/social context, intended meanings, significance, etc. These things can all be analyzed in a way that's enlightening or tedious, and which it is probably depends on how much you care about such things. Vendler's in-depth analysis of Shakespeare's rhetorical, structural, and linguistic strategies in his sonnets will only be as enlightening to the extent one cares about such things. Being a wannabe poet who loves stealing such ideas, I was very interested!


Opinions are not the exclusive reserve of professional literary critics.No, but influential opinions are the exclusive reserve of very few, including literary critics.

[kelby_lake]

No, but influential opinions are the exclusive reserve of very few, including literary critics.

Very influential opinions yes, but if a well-read person tells me that 'Nutting' can be read as a sexual allegory, I can get the text in front of me, read it and see whether I agree. If something is there, it will be evident to any well-read person not just critics. A critic could turn out a better academic paper on it than I could but the basic substance of the argument could be made by any well-read person. Admittedly there are dense and complicated texts out there that would require intense study in order to navigate but is that beyond the capabilities of an intelligent well-read person?

[MorpheusSandman]

Admittedly there are dense and complicated texts out there that would require intense study in order to navigate but is that beyond the capabilities of an intelligent well-read person?Yes, I think the majority of late Blake, Stevens, Ashbery, Joyce, and a few others are quite beyond the capabilities of just your average intelligent and well-read person (I consider myself both, and these authors were well beyond my ability to parse them without the help of critics). Plus, I think you underestimate just how much study is involved in order to navigate various aspects of literature. Noting the sexual connotations in Nutting is quite different than connecting those connotations to others in other Wordsworth poems, eg.

[JBI]

The big thing people miss is that it is actually the minority that write on one poem only. Generally of the focus is narrow their analysis will most likely spread to other works by the author or from the time period. Comparison is generally the form, whether historical or theoretical. Likewise book introductions are generally for semi-literate amateurs moreso than for the experts in any given field. Some authors deliberately write low level criticism for beginners or common readers.

The biggest change I would say is this fat number of growing texts of introductions and guides. It's not enough that we have a large body of theory that nobody wants to read or understands, but there is also a large body of guides to read this stuff. Talk about disconnect.

[kelby_lake]

Yes, I think the majority of late Blake, Stevens, Ashbery, Joyce, and a few others are quite beyond the capabilities of just your average intelligent and well-read person (I consider myself both, and these authors were well beyond my ability to parse them without the help of critics). Plus, I think you underestimate just how much study is involved in order to navigate various aspects of literature. Noting the sexual connotations in Nutting is quite different than connecting those connotations to others in other Wordsworth poems, eg.

Poetry is tough, I grant you, and I welcome a helping hand through it. And modernism...well, I avoid the very tough stuff. But linguistic analysis is only a part of criticism.

I suppose what I'm getting at is not the purpose of criticism altogether but of modern criticism. I'm sure there are gaps in literary criticism with some authors overlooked and some needing re-evaluation but is literary criticism capable of any new revelations?

As for connecting sexual connotations in Nutting to other Wordsworth poems, I admit that I don't know Wordsworth (aside from him being a Romantic and writing Daffodils). However someone with an interest in and passion for Wordsworth who knows his other poems could no doubt connect them up. The ability to notice differences and similarities is not exclusive to critics. Of course, there is the task of articulating them but there's a point where articulation turns into overcomplication. Some critics can succinctly articulate intellectually complex arguments but you have to sift through so much sophistry in order to find that- time you could have spent studying the text. Maybe it's just a question of how it's taught but I think that students having to justify their opinions on a text with a critical opinion rather than simply on the text itself means that their own critical faculties are hampered.

[JBI]

Depends what you mean critical opinion. If they are reading Wordsworth's London and use a body of historical literature to flesh out London at the beginning of the 19th century, and then pull on other London poems to create a Poetic "London" of the Romantic period, that is perfect criticism. Then let's say they want to beef it up a little, so they read critical discussions of the cityscape in romantic poetry, and other works, then that is what I call proper research.

Now let's say instead they quote Kristeva and start comparing London the city to some damaged physical body who has been sexually violated - perhaps that doesn't work too well, though you could make a case for Blake.

This is fine criticism, and there is nothing wrong with it except that it is overdone and useless. With millions of English majors out there, and thousands of ph ds, how does one say something new? That's the biggest problem, and it is even worse in China studies since Chinese critics have always been the most thorough and exhaustive. Knowing that someone who you are quoting is smarter than you and knows more is quite distressing.

[MorpheusSandman]

I'm sure there are gaps in literary criticism with some authors overlooked and some needing re-evaluation but is literary criticism capable of any new revelations?Yes, I think so. Shakespeare's sonnets are centuries old; Vendler's study of them was a revelation to me. I haven't encountered anything remotely like it in the historical critical literature about them. It's also worth considering that a great many modern canonical authors didn't even become canonical until this century, such as Donne (and the other metaphysics) via Eliot's criticism, or Blake via Northrop Frye. Similarly, all of the 20th century theoretical schools created new, occasionally revelatory readings of old texts. I often think we take for granted that everything that could be said about an author/work has already been said, but once you actually dig into the critical literature you're surprised by how much hasn't been addressed. Plus, perhaps the biggest 20th century "revelation" was that all criticism came from certain perspectives that said as much about the critics than anything else, so the burgeoning of other voices from very different perspectives was something quite new. One can question the "value" of such things, but there's no denying that what they had to say about art was very different than what those of the past had to say.


However someone with an interest in and passion for Wordsworth who knows his other poems could no doubt connect them up. The ability to notice differences and similarities is not exclusive to critics. Of course, there is the task of articulating them but there's a point where articulation turns into overcomplication. Some critics can succinctly articulate intellectually complex arguments but you have to sift through so much sophistry in order to find that- time you could have spent studying the text. I think anyone with enough an interest in/passion for Wordsworth that starts systematically combing through his oeuvre to note similarities and differences and patterns etc. and then puts those things out there for others to read is, essentially, taking on the role of a critic. Not necessarily a professional critic or academic, but they're performing the same function; perhaps on a lower level, or, less probable, even a higher one. Eliot once said that his "criticism" was born out of his very informal poetry workshop, of just thinking about the art and craft. As for overcomplication, yes, I think that happens, especially as criticism veers more and more towards philosophy and develops its own insular language, often with very vague referents that isn't tied to enough concrete evidence. This is why I appreciate critics like Vendler or Ricks or Empson or others that bring everything back to the text. If they have a point to make, they make sure that they can back that point up with plenty of examples.

[JBI]

If you like Vendler on Shakespeare's Sonnets try Booth - He's sometimes whacky with it, but more often than not, spot on.

[MorpheusSandman]

I've read Booth's as well, which was indeed excellent as well and certainly an (acknowledged) influence on Vendler. I think they're ample proof that modern critics can find new and insightful things to say about old works. Between them, I give the slight edge to Vendler, though they take different enough approaches to make each worthwhile. I just think, on the whole, Vendler pointed to more things in the structure, language, and rhetorical devices of the sonnets that I'd never noticed before.

[Vota]

Take what I say with a grain of salt.

I view criticism as a way to potentially further the understanding and thus enjoyment of anything that I have previously read, and/or plan to read again. I would not read criticism of work that I have not yet read as it would likely skew or bias my perception and understanding of what I read. To me, criticism is great if you have questions that you cannot come up with answers for by yourself, or for answers that you would like to validate, or just for additional history and side knowledge related to the work itself.

That is my very rookie understanding and thinking of literary criticism. I got most of that thinking from Mortimer j. Adler in his book, "How To Read A book".

I am sure there is much more to be said for criticism, but for a layman such as myself, I find this adequate.

[MorpheusSandman]

I view criticism as a way to potentially further the understanding and thus enjoyment of anything that I have previously read, and/or plan to read again... That is my very rookie understanding and thinking of literary criticism. I think your rookie understanding is as good as an expert's understanding. :)

[kelby_lake]

Yes, I think so. Shakespeare's sonnets are centuries old; Vendler's study of them was a revelation to me. I haven't encountered anything remotely like it in the historical critical literature.

I've just had a look at it; some very detailed linguistic analysis. Those parts of it I find less interesting but as a warm up to other points, they work quite well, like when she describes the final line of Sonnet 18 as being urbane. It's not that I had no idea it could be read like that but of course you get swept up in the more abstract stuff. It's basically just a chat-up line ;)

[JBI]

I guess we need to differentiate between specific studies and non-specific theory which does not analyze, but exists to be applied to a wider range of texts. I get the feeling the latter got too carried away with itself in the 80s and 90s

[MorpheusSandman]

I've just had a look at it; some very detailed linguistic analysis. Those parts of it I find less interesting but as a warm up to other points, they work quite well, like when she describes the final line of Sonnet 18 as being urbane.Well, I go back to what I said earlier about criticism really being about what interests you. Being a wannabe poet, I get inspired by reading such detailed linguistic analysis because it gives me such a wealth of creative ideas to steal.


It's not that I had no idea it could be read like that but of course you get swept up in the more abstract stuff. It's basically just a chat-up line ;)"abstract stuff?" "chat-up line?" :confused:

[kelby_lake]

"abstract stuff?" "chat-up line?" :confused:

That is to say, you're dazzled by the imagery so forget the manipulation. I like the Sonnets; I read them through as a sort of 'narrative'. I know there's mixed feelings about that but I like it, even though it highlights the repetitiveness of the sonnets (I'm pretty sure there's eight in a row about urging the reader to have a son, and it's not like they're on their own).

I find it interesting that the poems to the 'Fair Youth' outweigh those to the 'Dark Lady'. Is that intentional or were there more poems that just weren't discovered?

[MorpheusSandman]

Well, certainly a great many read the sonnets for their imagery and their narrative, but I think Vendler lays out in her introduction why the former creates a very limited appreciation of their accomplishment and the latter seems to only point towards their failings as narrative rather than successes as lyric. In fact, her introduction actually made it into a recent Anthology of Lyric Theory. (http://www.amazon.com/The-Lyric-Theory-Reader-Anthology/dp/1421412004/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1392614979&sr=8-1&keywords=lyric+theory)

It's always possible there were more poems that weren't discovered, but it's also possible that the "Fair Youth" was just a much better patron.

[JBI]

Or a rhetorical construct. I see no reason to think any of the characters in the poems are real, other than the suggestion that they are called "you".

[MorpheusSandman]

Possibly a rhetorical construct; but weren't wealthy patrons relatively common back then? And Shakespeare was a pretty popular author, so it's not inconceivable that he was actually being paid to write these. Certain of the sonnets seem like responses to things the youth actually said, like the one about why Shakespeare continues writing sonnets instead of venturing into newer forms, seem more likely to have been written as an actual response, rather than a rhetorical ploy.

[Whosis]

Some famous authors have written bits of literary criticism about recent or old authors. You may want to look into that.