The Oxford Encyclopedia of Literary Theory

The Oxford Encyclopedia of Literary Theory gives a comprehensive coverage of every aspect of literary theory, both traditional and contemporary. Around 180 full-length essays written by a wide range of experts and distinguished scholars explore the problems, the concepts, and the methodologies that arise when we discuss literary texts. They ask what systems of value go into making this category, separating literary" from other kinds of text or other language games; what a "text" is, what kinds of text there are, and who decides; what it means to "read" a text: to understand it literally, to react to it emotionally, to look for broader structures of meaning, to understand it in relation to the context in which it was written or the contexts in which it was later understood; who "we" are who read; how reading relates to writing, and who or what the author of a text is and what authority they have over its reception; what background understandings shape our reading, how we acquire a knowledge of the normsand conventions that govern reading, how our class or our gender or our ethnicity form our understanding and the differences between our understandings; and whether some readings can be said to be better than others. Ranging across the analysis of formalconcepts, of the institutions that support the production, dissemination, interpretation, and valuation of literary texts, of the identities of the real and textual persons who interact in the study of texts, and of the systematic methodologies of literary interpretation and understanding, the Encyclopedia is the most advanced and comprehensive collection of essays on literary theory ever published"--