An Introduction to Literary Studies provides the beginner with an accessible and comprehensive survey of literature. Systematically taking in theory, genre and literary history, Klarer provides easy to understand descriptions of a variety of approaches to texts. This invaluable guide includes sections on: fiction poetry drama film covering: a range of theoretical approaches an extensive glossary of major literary and cinematic terms guidelines for writing research papers.
Lively, original and highly readable, An Introduction to Literature, Criticism and Theory is the essential guide to literary studies. Starting at ‘The Beginning’ and concluding with ‘The End’, chapters range from the familiar, such as ‘Character’, ‘Narrative’ and ‘The Author’, to the more unusual, such as ‘Secrets’, ‘Pleasure’ and ‘Ghosts’. Now in its fifth edition, Bennett and Royle’s classic textbook successfully illuminates complex ideas by engaging directly with literary works, so that a reading of Jane Eyre opens up ways of thinking about racial difference, for example, while Chaucer, Raymond Chandler and Monty Python are all invoked in a discussion of literature and laughter. The fifth edition has been revised throughout and includes four new chapters – ‘Feelings’, ‘Wounds’, ‘Body’ and ‘Love’ – to incorporate exciting recent developments in literary studies. In addition to further reading sections at the end of each chapter, the book contains a comprehensive bibliography and a glossary of key literary terms. A breath of fresh air in a field that can often seem dry and dauntingly theoretical, this book will open the reader’s eyes to the exhilarating possibilities of reading and studying literature.
Literary Studies: A Practical Guide provides a comprehensive foundation for the study of English, American, and world literatures, giving students the critical skills they need to best develop and apply their knowledge. Designed for use in a range of literature courses, it begins by outlining the history of literary movements, enabling students to contextualize a given work within its cultural and historical moment. Specific focus is then given to the use of literary theory and the analysis of: Poetry Prose fiction and novels Plays Films. A detailed unit provides clear and concise introductions to literary criticism and theory, encouraging students to nurture their unique insights into a range of texts with these critical tools. Finally, students are guided through the process of generating ideas for essays, considering the role of secondary criticism in their writing, and formulating literary arguments. This practical volume is an invaluable resource for students, providing them with the tools to succeed in any English course.
This innovative introduction to literary studies takes 'the life of texts' as its overarching frame. It provides a conceptual and methodological toolbox for analysing novels, poems, and all sorts of other texts as they circulate in oral, print, and digital form. It shows how texts inspire each other, and how stories migrate across media. It explains why literature has been interpreted in different ways across time. Finally, it asks why some texts fascinate people so much that they are reproduced and passed on to others in the form of new editions, in adaptations to film and theatre, and, last but not least, in the ways we look at the world and act out our lives. 'The Life of Texts' is designed around particular issues rather than the history of the discipline as such. Each chapter concentrates on a different aspect of 'the life of texts' and introduces the key debates and concepts relevant to its study. The issues discussed range from aesthetics and narrative to intertextuality and intermediality, from reading practices to hermeneutics and semiotics, popular culture to literary canonisation, postcolonial criticism to cultural memory. Key concepts and schools in the field have been highlighted in the text and then collected in a glossary for ease of reference. All chapters are richly illustrated with examples from different language areas.
Service learning can help students develop a sense of civic responsibility and commitment, often while addressing pressing community needs. One goal of literary studies is to understand the ethical dimensions of the world, and thus service learning, by broadening the environments students consider, is well suited to the literature classroom. Whether through a public literacy project that demonstrates the relevance of literary study or community-based research that brings literary theory to life, student collaboration with community partners brings social awareness to the study of literary texts and helps students and teachers engage literature in new ways. In their introduction, the volume editors trace the history of service learning in the United States, including the debate about literature's role, and outline the best practices of the pedagogy. The essays that follow cover American, English, and world literature; creative nonfiction and memoir; literature-based writing; and cross-disciplinary studies. Contributors describe a wide variety of service-learning projects, including a course on the Harlem Renaissance in which students lead a community writing workshop, an English capstone seminar in which seniors design programs for public libraries, and a creative nonfiction course in which first-year students work with elderly community members to craft life narratives. The volume closes with a list of resources for practitioners and researchers in the field.
Directions in Empirical Literary Studies is on the cutting edge of empirical studies and is a much needed volume. It both widens the scope of empirical studies and looks at them from an intercultural perspective by bringing together renowned scholars from the fields of philosophy, sociology, psychology, linguistics and literature, all focusing on how empirical studies have impacted these different areas. Theoretical issues are discussed and solid methods are presented. Some chapters also show the relation between empirical studies and new technology, examining developments in computer science and corpus linguistics. This book takes a global perspective, with contributors from many different countries, both senior and junior researchers. Broad in scope and interdisciplinary in nature, it contributes with the state-of-the-art developments in the field.
In this second edition of Beginning Theory, the variety of approaches, theorists, and technical language is lucidly and expertly unraveled and explained, and allows readers to develop their own ideas once first principles have been grasped. Expanded and updated from the original edition first published in 1995, Peter Barry has incorporated all of the recent developments in literary theory, adding two new chapters covering the emergent Eco-criticism and the re-emerging Narratology.
