The English Prophets: A Critical Defence of English Criticism

by Ian Robinson

The writers who make up Ian Robinson’s subject are the great literary and social critics of the nineteenth century and after: Coleridge, Newman, Carlyle, Arnold, Lawrence, Eliot, Leavis and others — what is often, in universities nowadays, patronizingly called “the English tradition”. The suggestion the title makes is, “What if we think of their importance in English life as comparable with that of the prophets in Old Testament Judah?” The book argues for the indispensability of the English critics and also defines a consistent flaw running through them which needs to be mended if, as they must, they are to go on contributing to our own judgement of ourselves.

336 pages, Hardcover

First published April 12, 2001

About the author

Ian Robinson is a British literary critic and English professor. With David Sims, he co-founded Brynmill Press, a company devoted to publishing serious criticism.

His best-known works, such as The Survival of English, The English Prophets, and Holding the Centre, criticize the sloppy use of language and general incoherence in modern culture.