Literary criticism : an Introduction to Theory and Practice

Foreword 1 Defining Criticism, Theory, and Literature Listening to a Conversation Eavesdropping on a Literature Classroom Can a Text Have More Than One Interpretation? How to Become a Literary Critic What is Literary Criticism? What is Literary Theory? Making Meaning from Text The Reading Process and Literary Theory What is Literature? Literature Theory and the Definition of Literature The Function of Literature and Literary Theory Beginning the Formal Study of Literature 2 A Historical Survey of Literary Theory Plato (C. 427 – 347 B.C.E.) Aristotle (384-322 B.C.E) Horace (65-8 B.C.E.) Longinus (First Century C.E.) Plotinus (204-270 C.E.) Dante Alighiere (1265-1321) Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375) Sir Philip Sydney ((1554-1586) John Dryden (1631-1700) Joseph Addison (1672-1719) Alexander Pope (1688-1744) William Wordsworth (1770-1850) Perce Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822) Hippolyte Adolphe Taine (1828-1893) Matthew Arnold (18822-1888) Henry James (1843-1916) Mikhail Bakhtin (1895-175) Modern Literary Criticism 3 Russian Formalism and New Criticism Russian Formalism Bridging the Gap Between Russian Formalism and New Criticism Applying Russian Formalism to a Literary Text New Criticism Historical Development Assumptions Methodology Questions for Analysis Critiques and Responses Critical Essay “The Formalists Critics, Cleanth Brooks 4 Reader-Oriented Criticism Historical Development I.A. Richards Louise M. Rosenblatt Assumptions Methodology Structuralism Phenomenology Hans Robert Jauss Wolfgang Iser Subjective Criticism Norman Holland David Bleich A Two-Step Methodology Questions for Analysis Critiques and Responses Critical Essay: “The Case for Reader-Response Analysis,” Stanley Fish 5 Modernity and Postmodernism: Structuralism and Deconstruction Modernity Poststructuralism and Postmodernism Modernity and Modernism Structuralism: Its Historical Development Pre-Sausseren Linguistics Saussure’s Linguistic Revolution The Structure of Language Langue and Parole Saussure’s Redefinition of a Word Assumptions of Structuralism Methodologies of Structuralism Claude Levi-Strauss Roland Barthes Vladimir Propp and Narratology Tvetan Todorov and Gerard Genette Jonathan Culler A Model of Interpretation From Structuralism to Poststructalism: Deconstruction Deconstruction: Its Historical Development Deconstruction: Its Beginnings Derrida’s Starting Place: Structuralism Derrida’s Interpretation of Saussure’s Sign Assumptions of Deconstruction Transcendental Signified Logocentrism Binary Oppositions Phonocentrism Metaphysics of Presence Methodology Acknowledging Binary Operations in Western Thought Arche-writing Supplementation Differance Deconstructive Suppositions for Textual Analysis Deconstructive: A New Reading Strategy American Deconstructionists Questions for Analysis Critiques and Responses Critical Essay “What Is Criticism?” Roland Barthes Critical Essay “Convention and Meaning” Jonathan Culler 6 Psychoanalytic Criticism Historical Development Sigmund Freud Model of the Human Psyche: Dynamic Model Economic Model Typographical Models Freud’s Pre-Oedipal Development Phase The Oedipus, Castration, and Electra Complexes The Significance of Dreams Literature and Psychoanalysis Carl G. Jung Northrop Frye Jacques Lacan Lacan’s Model of the Human Psyche Lacan and Textual Analysis The Present State of Psychoanalytic Criticism Assumptions Methodologies Questions and Analysis Critiques and Responses Critical Essay: “On the Relation of Analytical Psychology to Poetry,” C.G. Jung 7 Feminism Historical Development Virginia Woolf Simone de Beauvoir Kate Millet Feminism in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s Elaine Showalter Geographical Strains of Feminism American French Present-day Feminist Criticisms Ecofeminism Assumptions Methodology Questions for Analysis Critiques and Responses Critical Essay: “Dancing through the Minefield: Some Observations on the Theory, Practice, Politics of Feminist Literary Criticism,” Annette Kolodny 8 Marxism Historical Development Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Russia and Marxism Georg Lukaes The Frankfurt School Antonio Gramsci Louis Althusser Marxist Theorists Today Assumptions Methodology Questions for Analysis Critiques and Responses Critical Essay: “Base and Superstructure in Marxist Cultural Theory,” Raymond Williams 9 Cultural Poetics or New Historicism A New-Critical Literature Old Historicism The New Historicism Historical Development Cultural Materialism New Historicism Assumptions Michael Foucault Clifford Geertz Text, History, and Interpretation What Cultural Poetics Rejects What Cultural Poetics Does and Accepts Methodology Questions for Analysis Critiques and Responses Critical Essay: Arthur Kinney 10 Postcolonialism Postcolonialism: “The Empire Writes Back” Historical Development of Postcolonialism Assumptions of Postcolonialism Methodology Questions for Analysis Critiques and Response Critical Essay: “An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness” 11 African-American Criticism Historical Development, Assumptions, and Methodology Questions for Analysis Critiques and Responses Critical Essay: “Talking Black: Critical Signs of the Times,” Henry Louis Gates Jr. 12 Queer Theory: Gay and Lesbian Criticism Historical Development and Assumptions Queer Critical Theorists Questions for Analysis Critiques and Response Critical Essay: “Epistemology of the Closet” 13 Ecocriticism What is Ecocriticism? Historical Development Assumptions Methodology Questions for Analysis Critiques and Responses Readings on Literary Criticism “The Formalist Critics” Cleanth Brooks “Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences” Jacques Derrida “Heroic Enthocentrism: The Idea of Universality in Literature” Charles Larson “Queer Theory” Annamarie Jagose “John Keats and Nature: An Ecocritical Inquiry” Charles Ngiewih TEKE Glossary Credits Index