The Blackwell Guide to Literary Theory

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

This student-friendly text introduces students to the history and scope of literary theory, as well as showing them how to perform literary analysis.

Designed to be used alongside primary theoretical texts as an introduction to theory or alongside literary texts as a model for performing literary analysis.
Presents a series of exemplary readings of particular literary texts such as Jane Eyre, Heart of Darkness, Ulysses, To the Lighthouse and Midnight's Children .
Provides a brief history of the rise of literary theory in the twentieth century, in order that students understand the historical contexts for different theories.
Presents an alphabetically organized series of entries on key figures and publications, from Adorno to Žižek.
Features descriptions of the major movements in literary theory, from critical theory through to postcolonial theory.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• Acknowledgments (p. x)
• Introduction (p. 1)
• The Rise of Literary Theory (p. 15)
• Timeline (p. 57)
• The Scope of Literary Theory (p. 63)
• Critical Theory (p. 65)
• Cultural Studies (p. 72)
• Deconstruction (p. 79)
• Ethnic Studies (p. 86)
• Feminist Theory (p. 94)
• Gender and Sexuality (p. 102)
• Marxist Theory (p. 108)
• Narrative Theory (p. 115)
• New Criticism (p. 122)
• New Historicism (p. 129)
• Postcolonial Studies (p. 135)
• Postmodernism (p. 144)
• Poststructuralism (p. 154)
• Psychoanalysis (p. 163)
• Reader-Response Theory (p. 174)
• Structuralism and Formalism (p. 181)
• Key Figures in Literary Theory (p. 191)
• Theodor Adorno (p. 193)
• Louis Althusser (p. 194)
• Mikhail Mikhailovich Bahktin (p. 196)
• Roland Barthes (p. 197)
• Jean Baudrillard (p. 199)
• Walter Benjamin (p. 200)
• Homi Bhabha (p. 202)
• Pierre Bourdieu (p. 203)
• Judith Butler (p. 204)
• Hazel Carby (p. 206)
• Helene Cixous (p. 207)
• Teresa de Lauretis (p. 208)
• Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari (p. 209)
• Paul de Man (p. 211)
• Jacques Derrida (p. 213)
• Terry Eagleton (p. 214)
• Frantz Fanon (p. 216)
• Stanley Fish (p. 217)
• Michel Foucault (p. 219)
• Henry Louis Gates (p. 220)
• Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar (p. 222)
• Stephen Greenblatt (p. 223)
• Stuart Hall (p. 225)
• Donna Haraway (p. 226)
• Bell hooks (p. 227)
• Linda Hutcheon (p. 228)
• Luce Irigaray (p. 230)
• Wolfgang Iser (p. 231)
• Fredric Jameson (p. 233)
• Julia Kristeva (p. 234)
• Jacques Lacan (p. 236)
• Jean-Francois Lyotard (p. 237)
• J. Hillis Miller (p. 239)
• Edward Said (p. 241)
• Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick (p. 242)
• Elaine Showalter (p. 244)
• Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (p. 245)
• Raymond Williams (p. 247)
• Slavoj Zizek (p. 248)
• Reading with Literary Theory (p. 251)
• The Tempest (p. 253)
• Ode on a Grecian Urn" (p. 256)
• Jane Eyre (p. 259)
• Bartleby the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street (p. 264)
• Heart of Darkness (p. 267)
• Ulysses (p. 272)
• To The Lighthouse (p. 275)
• Their Eyes Were Watching God (p. 278)
• "Leda and the Swan" (p. 281)
• Endgame (p. 284)
• Midnight's Children (p. 287)
• Nights at the Circus (p. 290)
• Conclusion: Reading Literary Theory (p. 293)
• Recommendations for Further Study (p. 297)
• Glossary (p. 305)
• Index (p. 325)

Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

Castle (Arizona State Univ.) provides cogent summaries of a wide range of literary theories, but he is hampered by a misguided format. The author offers useful but compressed sections titled "The Rise of Literary Theory" (with a chronology) and "The Scope of Literary Theory" (a survey of 16 approaches, from Marxism to psychoanalysis), but thereafter his ambitions exceed his grasp. He should have dropped "Key Figures in Literary Theory" and provided longer and more bibliographically informative readings of fewer titles in "Reading with Literary Theory." The wonder is that Castle can do as much as he does in so few pages, e.g., three pages on James Joyce's Ulysses. This book is less engaging than Terry Eagleton's Literary Theory (CH, Feb'84; rev. ed., 1996) and less useful than The Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism, ed. by Michael Groden, Martin Kreiswirth, and Imre Szeman (2nd ed., CH, Jun'05, 42-5598; online, CH, Apr'98, 35-4311) or Critical Terms for Literary Study, ed. by Frank Lentricchia and Thomas McLaughlin (1990; rev. ed., 1995). Summing Up: Optional. Large undergraduate collections only. T. Ware Queen's University at Kingston