The Literary Criticism Web

Born on March 22, 1928, in Memphis, TN, E. D. Hirsch, Jr., served in the Naval Reserve after graduating from Cornell University in 1950. In 1952, he began his graduate study at Yale University, receiving his Ph.D. in 1957. From 1956 to 1966, Hirsch taught at Yale before moving to the University of Virginia in 1966 as a full professor. From 1968 to 1971 he served as department chair. In 1973 he was named the William R. Kenan Professor of English.

During his career, Hirsch also received many research fellowships and honors. These include the Fulbright Fellowship (1955), the Morse Fellowship (1960), the Guggenheim Fellowship (1964), the Explicator prize (1965), the NEA Fellowship (1970), the NEH Senior Fellowship (1971-71), the Wesleyan University Center for the Humanities Fellowship (1973), the Princeton University Fellowship in the Humanities (1977), and the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences Fellowship at Stanford University (1980-81).

Hirsch's first book, Wordsworth and Schelling: A Typological Study of Romanticism, was published by Yale University Press in 1960. In the same year his influential essay "Objective Interpretation" appeared PMLA. Both of these works attempt to settle the problem of determinacy of textual meaning. Hirsch's third book, Validity in Interpretation (1967), is the work for which he is primarily known, and it includes "Objective Interpretation" in an appendix. This book has often been described as a work that defends an intentionalist theory of meaning. In his work, Hirsch shows concern for the types of expressive and interpretive behavior. He claims that in order for an appropriate understanding to develop, an interpreter must have a "preliminary grasp of a text."

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