ABSTRACT

This introduction to practicing literary theory is a reader consisting of extracts from critical analyses, largely by 20th century Anglo-American literary critics, set around major literary texts that undergraduate students are known to be familiar with. It is specifically targeted to present literary criticism through practical examples of essays by literary theorists themselves, on texts both within and outside the literary canon. Four example essays are included for each author/text presented.

chapter Chapter 1|60 pages

William Shakespeare

Hamlet

chapter Chapter 2|38 pages

William Wordsworth:

'Ode - Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood'

chapter Chapter 3|37 pages

Charlotte Brontë:

Jane Eyre

chapter Chapter 4|40 pages

George Eliot:

Middlemarch

chapter Chapter 5|58 pages

Oscar Wilde:

The Picture of Dorian Gray and The Importance of Being Earnest

chapter Chapter 6|42 pages

Joseph Conrad:

Heart of Darkness

chapter Chapter 7|56 pages

James Joyce:

Ulysses

chapter Chapter 8|51 pages

Bertolt Brecht:

Theory and Late Plays

chapter Chapter 9|66 pages

Toni Morrison:

Beloved

chapter Chapter 10|38 pages

Salman Rushdie:

Midnight's Children, Shame, The Satanic Verses