F. R. Leavis was the chief editor of
Scrutiny
, which between 1932 and 1953 had some claim on being the most influential literary journal in the English-speaking world.
The Common Pursuit
is a selection of Leavis's essays from
, including his robust defence of Milton against T. S. Eliot, his deeply-felt engagement with Shakespeare, and his severe strictures on attempts to import sociology and political activism into the study of literature.
The title of the book comes from a passage in Eliot's 'The Function of Criticism', in which the poet argues that the critic must engage in 'the common pursuit of true judgment'. For Leavis, this meant a strenuous insistence on discriminatory criticism - clear statements about what is good and morally mature and admirable, and equally clear condemnation of what is trivial.
, with its controversial judgments of Bunyan and Auden, Swift and Forster, remains as challenging now as it did in 1952, and it is easy to see why Leavis - who was never offered a professorship by Cambridge University - held such sway over the study of English literature in his time.