Before reading the poem, "My Last Duchess," my ranked categories were:
1. Understanding of traditional literary elements
2. Clear understanding of vocabulary
3. Scholarly context
4. Authorial intent
5. Contemporary cultural context
6. Modern cultural context
7. Author's beliefs
8. Personal beliefs
After reading the poem, my first two categories stayed the same but I moved the contemporary cultural context to the third ranking. I realized when reading poems from the past, you must have some knowledge of the trends and values that were around at the time the poem was written. I also moved the modern cultural context to eighth place because you don't really need to know about the present when reading a classic poem. I kept an understanding of traditional literary elements first because having some decent amount of understanding of characterization, symbolism, irony, etc. is crucial when reading poems.
I think the type of literary critic I am is an intrinsic writer because I like to understand what I am reading and what the text is trying to say. The theoretical school I am interested in learning more about is the Marxist criticism because the social class seems like something I would enjoy reading about in literature.
My top 2 were understanding critical elements and the vocabulary as well and I agree that when you are reading a poem that was written in old english and clearly is not pertaining to anything this century, you really dont need any modern day trends because it is obviously not a modern day poem. All in all I agree with everything you are saying (probably because I'm an intrinsic thinker like you)
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