The impact of the Russian Formalists on structuralism

Abstract

It was the emergence of the school of Russian Formalists as a reaction to subjectivism and symbolism, which itself confronted the realist and ideological criticism of liberal thinkers in the nineteenth century, one of its most important members was Roman Jacobson.The research of this school in Russia at the beginning of the twentieth century, and the effect of the formalists on structuralism was represented by some principles and concepts such as the concept of form, the study of the literary work in itself, the recognition of the principle of intertextuality, the interest in poetic rhythm, the direction of the literary text, the concept of hegemony, the linguistic analysis of literature, the morphological approach in dealing with the story, and others, As for the most important criticisms directed at formal structuralism, because of the use of scientific language, they eliminated from the analysis the psychological and aesthetic aspects and the detachment of the literary work from its artistic and emotional contents with the poverty of the literary image and its interest in the particulars without the totality of literary work and the use of the concept of structure, which reaches the philosophy of human death, as well as their belief that formalism is a synchronic moment Neglect the circumstances accompanying the structure of the text as well as completely ignoring history, as well as isolating literary works from their authors