Critical Theory: A Reader for Literary and Cultural Studies
by Robert Dale Parker · Robert Dale Parker
An Oxford University Press anthology pairing Parker's explanatory introductions with primary essays across formalism, structuralism, deconstruction, psychoanalysis, Marxism, feminism, queer theory, and postcolonial criticism. Readers learn to recognize each school's assumptions and apply them when interpreting literary and cultural texts.
This link may earn us a small commission at no extra cost to you. Affiliate disclosure
More resources on Literary Criticism
The Paris Review
Long-running literary quarterly whose online archive holds the Writers at Work interviews with major twentieth- and twenty-first-century novelists and poets, alongside fiction and essays. Useful for understanding how modern authors think about craft, influence and revision.
Poetry Off the Shelf
Producer Helena de Groot talks to poets about language, dreams, love and loss, identity, connection, anger, discomfort, the creative process, the state of the world and the world of the soul. Hard conversations are welcomed—laughter is, too.
Lit Century
Host Catherine Nichols and guests choose one book for each year of the twentieth century (Nella Larsen's Passing, 1936, Jacqueline Susann's Valley of the Dolls, 1966; Mohandas Gandhi's Indian Home Rule, 1909) and talk about it in its historical and literary context. Tune in to find out what the 20th century was all about.
Introduction to Theory of Literature
Explore literary theory with Yale's Paul Fry! This introductory course covers key concepts and critical approaches to literature.
Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature
Twenty essays reading single passages from Homer to Woolf to trace how Western writing represents reality, each chapter a sustained demonstration of stylistic analysis. Shows what literary criticism looks like when practised at full strength rather than described. Rather than naming methods it performs criticism across three millennia of texts, which is the only way to learn judgement. Demanding: assumes broad literary background and multiple traditions.
How to Read Literature
Close-reading companion working through openings, tone, rhythm, syntax, ambiguity, character and narrative in passages from Shakespeare to Beckett. Builds the sentence-level analytical habits that theory presupposes but seldom teaches directly. It teaches the actual mechanics of analysing a passage.