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An historical definition of the sociol of literature is presented. The situation & development of this field are examined mainly in the US, France, & the Federal Republic of Germany. In the US it is held that sociol'al literary criticism has evolved, perhaps more than anywhere else, in accordance with the soc situation. The approaches of the following critics are noted: V. F. Calverton, R. H. Pearce, L. Lowenthal, I. Watt, K. Burke, & R. Wellek & A. Warren. It is stated that the enormous Amer production of sociol'al works obviously comprises numerous notes on literature, but these notes do not at all compensate for the general dearth which is so obvious in this field. In Germany, there is felt to be a philosophical & sociol'al tradition which is directed to a much greater extent towards the sociol of literature. Certain Marxian writers, such as F. Mehring, are mentioned in this connection. Another approach is the use of the concept of form as applied to society & its cultural productions. G. Lukacs adopts an intermediate approach: his work, Kantian at the start, then Hegelian & Marxian, represents the corpus of the most complete sociol of literature yet produced by a single author. Cited are THE SOUL AND FORMS (Berlin, 1911) & THEORY OF THE NOVEL (Paris, 1963). After WWII it is mainly around the Frankfurt Sch that the sociol of literature developed. Mentioned are T. W. Adorno, W. Benjamin, L. Schuking, E. Auerbach & E. Kohler. In France, a little-known precursor of the French sociol'al tradition is J. M. Guyau, who in 1889 affirmed the structuralist nature of criticism. Other forerunners are J. Bedier, G. Lanson & L. Febvre. It is felt that the sociol of literature has found its most coherent expression in L. Goldmann, who holds that the sociol of literature has in view the understanding of the meaning of a work. This means clarifying the total network of meanings which internal analysis of a work reveals by an explanation & inserting this network in a whole of wider signif: the soc group. In conclusion, the works cited seem to indicate 2 directions for res: (a) a microsociol'al study of groups which comprise a world vision, whose aim must be the study of the actual conditions operating between creative groups & individuals, & (2) a more scrupulous reading of texts which would include the symptomatological structures. E. Weiman.

Russian formalism has been of interest in the west for at least three decades since the publication of Victor Erlich's authoritative study of the school in 1954. Almost every year significant new contributions are made to the analysis of the formalists' scholarship; their multiplex theory, with all of its different, and at times seemingly contradictory, aspects, is elucidated, and many of these aspects are successfully incorporated in modern criticism and literary theory in the west. I will not dwell upon the better known "internalist" aspects of the formalists' work, nor will I try to summarize their theory. Several leading members of the school systematically attempted to create a coherent theoretical framework for thesociologyof literature. In this article I will look at the sociology of the Russian formalists from the point of view of a sociologist, analyze it, and suggest that the formalist sociology of literature makes a valuable contribution not only to our understanding of literature, but also to the understanding of social reality and to the discipline of sociology.

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The structuralist & genetic conception of the sociol of literature, originated by George Lukacs, is analyzed. 5 basic principles of genetic structuralist sociol are enumerated. They are viewed as indicating that, (1) in the case of the sociol of literature, the res worker must seek to discover a structure which accounts for practically the whole of the text, & he must add nothing to it. (2) He must not overestimate the importance of the individual in the explanation, whether individual or collective, for which the mental structure which governs the work has a functional & signif character. (3) What are commonly called 'influences' have no explanatory value & at the very most constitute a factor & a problem which the res worker must explain. 'In short, comprehension is a problem of the internal coherence of the text, which presupposes that the text, the whole of the text & nothing but the text is taken literally & that, within it, one seeks an overall signif structure.' Several examples are provided, among them analyses of portions LES PENSEES (Thoughts) of B. Pascal & the tragedies of J. Racine. Starting from a text which for him represents a mass of empirical data similar to those by which any other sociol'st who undertakes a piece of res is faced, the sociol'at of literature must first tackle the problem of ascertaining how far those data constitute a signif object, a structure on which positive res can be carried out with fruitful results. The diff's are pointed out between the structuralist sociol of literature & the traditional explanation offered by psychoanalysis or literary history. Traditional methods are concerned with the content of literary works & the relationship between that content & the collective consciousness, or the ways in which men think & behave in daily life. The sociol'al explanations of the Lukacsian Sch pose the problem of the work as a unitary structure of the laws which govern its universe & of the link between that structured universe & the form in which it is expressed. Lastly, the possibility of extending res is discussed by taking as a starting point Julia Kristeva's study on Bakhtin (Critique No.239). E. Weiman.