In Beginning Theory we are told that the study of literature 'cultivates the taste, educates the sympathies and enlarges the mind." However, whilst this may seem like reason enough to study literature, it is worth noting that these qualities are not quantifiable, and therefore the study of literature can have no fixed 'knowledge component." Why then, should it be studied? 'Literature has historically been seen as dangerous: it promotes the questioning of authority and social arrangements.' It is, after all, 'an institution based on the possibility of saying anything you can imagine." Therefore literature has the possibility of fictionally exceeding what has been thought and written before Edward Freeman, cited in P. Barry, Beginning Theory, (G.B. Manchester University Press, 2002) pg 14 ibid J. Culler, Literary Theory, A Very Short Introduction (G.B, Oxford University Press, 2000) pg 39 I am going to look at Sir Walter Raleigh's poem "A Vision Upon the Fairy Queen.' When read in relation to the New Historicist theory as stated by Stephen Greenblatt in The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism (pg 2251) it can be said that this poem 'should be restored to the past in order to make it count in the present;' that in order to fully grasp the significance of this work of literature, it should be examined in the light of the social and political climate in which it was written. J. W. Lever has argued that we should look at Jacobean literature as 'a product of the intellectual ferment and spirited upheaval which preceded the first great European revolution." Although this is a poem written during the Elizabethan era, the first stirrings of this 'spirited upheaval' are being felt, such as the Essex rising as mentioned in Greenblatt's essay. Therefore by writing of a queen who is 'attended' by the 'Graces' (Love and Virtue) Raleigh is engaging in a dialogue of flattery with the Queen and firmly asserting his loyalty to her. Most 'of Raleigh's poems were intimately linked with his place in the court and in particular, with his fantastic courtship with the Queen' and this one is no exception. By focusing on the 'historicity of the text and the textuality of history' we can see that this poem is both fostered by the prevailing cult of the 'Fairy Queen' that surrounded Elizabeth I and is generating such an image. Indeed, it is an example of how 'life and literature stimulate and play upon each other." New Historicism hopes to find 'through historical research, a stable core of meaning within the text." In this case it is possible to guess at the intention of the poet if we take into account the volatile politics of the Elizabethan era, and the importance that the Queen herself placed on fostering the 'ideal of perfection to which she was wedded at the moment of her consecration." Raleigh himself stated 'Now we have a Present made,' in reference to his poetic dramatization, strengthening the idea that literature shapes history just as it is shaped by history. It is fair to suggest that in doing so, 'drama is holding a mirror up to nature,' not only reflecting the image of 'nature' but reflecting onto it. Through the poetry and propaganda during Elizabeth I's reign, such as that seen in the works of Raleigh and Edmund Spenser who also wrote of a 'fairy Queene,' 'Elizabeth is transformed almost completely beyond human personality, appearing as an image of static timeless perfection." This was an important political tool at a time when few members of the population would ever actually see the Queen, and therefore her hold on her subjects had to be maintained through rumour and public image. Therefore the 'most excellent and glorious person of our soveraine the Queene, and her kingdome in Faery Land' written of by Spencer, Raleigh and their contemporaries played a key role in creating this mystifying and eternal image of the Virgin Queen.  K. Ryan, New Historicism & Cultural Materialism: A Reader, (U.K. Arnold, 1996) pg xi (introduction) J.W. Lever, The Tragedy of State, (U.K. Methuen & Co Ltd, 1971) preface Lines 9 and 5 respectively. See apendix S. Greenblatt, Sir Walter Raleigh: The Renaissance Man and his Roles, (U.S.A, Yale University Press, 1973) pg 57 Cited in P. Barry, Beginning Theory, (G.B. Manchester University Press, 2002) pg 179 Ibid, pg180 S. Greenblatt, Introduction to The Power of Forms in the English Renaissance S. Greenblatt, Sir Walter Raleigh: The Renaissance Man and his Roles, (U.S.A, Yale University Press, 1973) pg 66 Cited in S. Greenblatt, Sir Walter Raleigh: The Renaissance Man and his Roles, (U.S.A, Yale University Press, 1973) pg 98 S. Greenblatt, Introduction to The Power of Forms in the English Renaissance S. Greenblatt, Sir Walter Raleigh: The Renaissance Man and his Roles, (U.S.A, Yale University Press, 1973) pg 65 Cited in S. Greenblatt, Sir Walter Raleigh: The Renaissance Man and his Roles, (U.S.A, Yale University Press, 1973) pg 64 A different style of critical approach is seen in the feminist movement, which I will look at in reference to an extract from Virginia Woolf's 'Mrs. Dalloway.' In contrast to the contextual approach favoured by New Historicists, Helene Cixous states that 'the future must no longer be determined by the past." In the writing style adopted by Woolf for this and many other of her novels, Woolf is making a break from the outmoded 'dominant phallocentric logic' that prevails in literature before the 1920s by writing in the style known as Ecriture Feminine, reflecting the multiplicity of female life. Woolf found that language use is gendered, and that for a woman there is 'no common sentence ready for her use." She therefore presents us with a myriad of impressions of the moment: H. Cixous, The Laugh of the Medusa Toril Moi, Sexual-Textual Politics (U.K. Methuen, 1985) pg 108 V. Woolf, A Room of One's Own 'In people's eyes, in the swing, tramp, and trudge; in the bellow and the uproar; the carriages, motor cars, omnibuses, vans, sandwich men shuffling and swinging; brass bands; barrel organs; in the triumph and the jingle and the strange high singing of some aeroplane overhead was what she loved; life; London; this moment of June.' The fluidity of the sentences and the lack of grammatical and syntactical rules show Woolf's attempt to get away from the 'formal railway line of the sentence.' T. Moi states that 'through her conscious exploitation of the sportive, sensual nature of language, Woolf rejects the metaphysical essentialism underlying patriarchal ideology which hails God, the Father or the Phallus as its transcendental signified." In her essay Cixous bemoans the lack of writing that 'inscribes femininity,' and the female writers 'whose workmanship is in no way different from male writing." Although Woolf's writing stands against this patriarchal style, continually escaping 'the critic's perspective, always refusing to be pinned down to one unifying angle of vision,' Woolf herself sought an androgynous writing style, and is indeed criticised by some feminists for 'wanting to flee her female gender by embracing the idea of androgyny.'  Toril Moi, Sexual-Textual Politics (U.K. Methuen, 1985) Pg 9 Helene Cixous, The Laugh of the Medusa Toril Moi, Sexual-Textual Politics (U.K. Methuen, 1985) pg 3 Ibid, pg 7 The narrative in 'Mrs. Dalloway' is repeatedly pierced with the striking of Big Ben and the 'leaden circles' which sound out the time are 'irrevocable.' This structural motif stands as 'the model of the self-contained powerful phallus' representing the State and the 'political- and thus masculine- economy." This phallic interruption to Mrs. Dalloway's feminine flow of consciousness is in stark contrast to the flow and the flux of the rest of the novel, and can be said to show Woolf's 'inevitable struggle against conventional man' in her writings. As she famously states in 'A Room of One's Own:' 'a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write.'  Ibid, pg 8 Helene Cixous, The Laugh of the Medusa ibid V. Woolf, A Room of One's Own, (England, Penguin, 1922) pg 6 Readers bring 'an implicit knowledge....to their encounters with text." This idea of 'reader-response' criticism states that 'the meaning of the text is the experience of the reader." By reading a work of literature, you are in effect engaging in a discourse of sorts with the author. As the actual feelings or intentions of the author can never be reconstructed or successfully guessed at, the 'real living individual is now entirely superseded by the literary text which has come down to us,' and the reader's interpretation of the text rather than the intention of the author that must be the 'standard for judging the success of a work'. We should study literature in order 'to emancipate us...from the notion and habits which are peculiar to our own age, connecting us instead with what is fixed and enduring.' If it is the case that 'good literature is of timeless significance' somehow transcending the 'limitations and peculiarities' of its age in order to speak 'to what is constant in human nature' it should be studied, in the light of the critical theories I have mentioned and others, in order to draw on the insight and experience of characters, fictional or literal, of the past, to the benefit of those in the present day. J. Culler, Literary Theory, A Very Short Introduction (G.B, Oxford University Press, 2000) pg 62 Ibid pg 63 P. Barry, Beginning Theory, (G.B. Manchester University Press, 2002) pg 175 and W. K. Wimsatt Jr and M. C. Beardsly. The Intentional Fallacy P. Barry, Beginning Theory, (G.B. Manchester University Press, 2002)pgs 13,17 