Literary Criticism Volume 1

Covers authors who are currently active or who died after December 31, 1959. Profiles novelists, poets, playwrights and other creative and nonfiction writers by providing criticism taken from books, magazines, literary reviews, newspapers and scholarly journals.

The history of the most hotly debated areas of literary theory, including structuralism and deconstruction.

Surveying the beginnings of critical consciousness in Greece and proceeding to the writings of Aristophanes, Plato, Aristotle, and Hellenistic and Roman authors, this volume is not only for classicists but for those with no Greek or Latin who are interested in the origins of literary history, theory, and criticism.

From Plato to Virginia Woolf, Structuralism to Practical Criticism, Introducing Literary Criticism charts the history and development of literary criticism into a rich and complex discipline. Tackling disputes over the value and meaning of literature, and exploring theoretical and practical approaches, this unique illustrated guide will help readers of all levels to get more out of their reading.

Leslie Stephen was best known to his contemporaries as a literary critic. Essays on literature and literary figures dominate his two best-known series of books, Hours in a Library and Studies of a Biographer. But in an array of essays on general literary topics, most of which have remained uncollected until this volume, Stephen discusses the broad outlines of his view of the art and craft of literature. He addresses the notion that authors write too much; the purpose of criticism; the relation between art and morality; and such topics as humor, autobiography, and the interrelation of science and romance. In these bracing essays, Stephen brings his characteristic clarity of thought, pungency of expression, and keen insight into literature from both an aesthetic and sociopolitical perspective. The result is a series of essays written over more than thirty years that vividly capture the state of literature and criticism in the waning years of the Victorian age in England.

Essential anthology of Poe's critical works reviews works by Dickens, Hawthorne, many others. Includes Theory of Poetry ("The Philosophy of Composition," "The Rationale of Verse," "The Poetic Principle"). Introduction.

This comprehensive guide to the history of literary criticism from antiquity to the present day provides an authoritative overview of the major movements, figures, and texts of literary criticism, as well as surveying their cultural, historical, and philosophical contexts. Supplies the cultural, historical and philosophical background to the literary criticism of each era Enables students to see the development of literary criticism in context Organised chronologically, from classical literary criticism through to deconstruction Considers a wide range of thinkers and events from the French Revolution to Freud’s views on civilization Can be used alongside any anthology of literary criticism or as a coherent stand-alone introduction