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Unit 4 · Literary Criticism and Theory English · June 2022 (Shift 2)

A passage urging writers to distinguish nature from custom and not to fear rules set by 'literary dictators' is considered the death-knell of neoclassical criticism. Who wrote it?

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Correct answer: C. Samuel Johnson

Explanation

Johnson, The Rambler No. 156 (1751): distinguish what is established 'because it is right' from what is right only 'because it is established'. The same logic dismisses the unities in the Preface to Shakespeare (1765).

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