Ian Robinson (17 April 1937 – 30 October 2020) was a British literary critic and English lecturer. He was educated at King Edward VI Grammar School,

Retford Retford (), also known as East Retford, is a market town in the Bassetlaw District in Nottinghamshire, England, and one of the oldest English market towns having been granted its first charter in 1105. It lies on the River Idle and the Chesterfie ...

, and

Downing College Downing College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge and currently has around 650 students. Founded in 1800, it was the only college to be added to Cambridge University between 1596 and 1869, and is often described as the olde ...

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

(he earned firsts in both parts of the English Tripos) where he was a pupil of

F. R. Leavis Frank Raymond "F. R." Leavis (14 July 1895 – 14 April 1978) was an English literary critic of the early-to-mid-twentieth century. He taught for much of his career at Downing College, Cambridge, and later at the University of York. Leavis ra ...

.John Ferns
"Ian Robinson and the English Tradition,"
''First Principles'', 8 December 2008 Robinson served as lecturer and senior lecturer in the English Department at

University College of Swansea , former_names=University College of Swansea, University of Wales Swansea , motto= cy, Gweddw crefft heb ei dawn , mottoeng="Technical skill is bereft without culture" , established=1920 – University College of Swansea 1996 – University of Wa ...

from 1961 to 1997 Best known for his 1973 book ''The Survival of English'', Robinson has been a champion of traditional English literature and a critic of what he alleges to be the degeneration of the English language in modern life. With David Sims, he co-founded The Brynmill Press Ltd, in 1970, a company devoted to serious criticism which began with the quarterly review ''The Human World'' (1970–4) and went on to publish works of literary criticism, philosophy (including

Ludwig Wittgenstein Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein ( ; ; 26 April 1889 – 29 April 1951) was an Austrian-British philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. He is considere ...

’s ''Remarks on Frazer’s “Golden Bough”''), fiction, and poetry. Robinson's book The New Grammarians' Funeral was a critique of

Noam Chomsky Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American public intellectual: a linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is ...

generative grammar Generative grammar, or generativism , is a linguistic theory that regards linguistics as the study of a hypothesised innate grammatical structure. It is a biological or biologistic modification of earlier structuralist theories of linguistic ...

. It was well received by few linguists. Robinson was a critic of the

Matthew Arnold Matthew Arnold (24 December 1822 – 15 April 1888) was an English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools. He was the son of Thomas Arnold, the celebrated headmaster of Rugby School, and brother to both Tom Arnold, lite ...

, T. S. Eliot, and

tradition, as discussed in his book ''The English Prophets''. Along with works of pure literary criticism on Chaucer, he has published much in a category he calls “criticism of language”, beginning with ''The Survival of English'', which includes comments on the language of the media, of religion, of politics. He thinks that judgement is always a refinement of a sense held in common, and in 2008 published ''Holding the Centre'', trying to demonstrate that a number of the Arts subjects have become incoherent by losing their place in the common language. He differed from his mentor Leavis by holding the view that judgement in literature cannot do without Christianity, and he has been a trustee of the Prayer Book Society. He died on 30 October 2020, at the age of 83.Powys Society Newsletter, Vol. 102, pg. 6
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Books

* ''Chaucer’s Prosody'' (1971) * ''Chaucer and the English Tradition'' (1972) * ''The Survival of English: Essays in criticism of language'' (1973) * With David Sims, ''The Decline and Fall of Mr Heath'' (1974) * ''The New Grammarians’ Funeral'' (1975) * ''Prayers for the New Babel'' (1983) * ''Richard II and

Woodstock Woodstock Music and Art Fair, commonly referred to as Woodstock, was a music festival held during August 15–18, 1969, on Max Yasgur's dairy farm in Bethel, New York, United States, southwest of the town of Woodstock, New York, Woodstock. ...

'' (1988
Brynmill Press
* ''The Establishment of Modern English Prose in the Reformation and the Enlightenment'' (1998) * ''The English Prophets: A critical defence of English criticism'' (2001) * With

Duke Maskell Duke is a male title either of a monarch ruling over a duchy, or of a member of royalty, or nobility. As rulers, dukes are ranked below emperors, kings, grand princes, grand dukes, and sovereign princes. As royalty or nobility, they are ran ...

, ''The New Idea of a University'' (2001) * ''Chaucer and the English Tradition'' (second, completely rewritten edition, 2004) * ''Who Killed the Bible?'' (2006) * ''Holding the Centre'' (2008) * ''Untied Kingdom'' (2008) *''How to Read Shakespeare's Verse'' (2019)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Robinson, Ian 1937 births 2020 deaths People from Retford Academics of Swansea University Alumni of Downing College, Cambridge Alumni of Churchill College, Cambridge British literary critics People educated at King Edward VI Grammar School, Retford