"Before Literary Theory, there had been no textbooks for English. There had been guides to particular authors, and even periods, but no single one book that could claim to be "essential reading"... Eagleton's book-which clearly understands the discipline and institutions of English-offered this." (Times Literary Supplement, April 2009) "This book shaped the reception of theory in Britain for a generation." (Times Higher Education Supplement) Praise for the First Edition of Literary Theory "Literary Theory has the kind of racy readability that one associates more often with English critics who have set their faces resolutely against theory ... It's not just a brilliant polemical essay, it's also a remarkable feat of condensation, explication, and synthesis ... Stimulating and entertaining." (Sunday Times) "This concise and lucid volume offers a satisfying survey of all the major theories, from structuralism in the 1960s to deconstruction today, that have made academic criticism both intriguing and off-putting to the outsider." (New York Times Book Review) "A polemical, amusing and very informative introduction ... indispensable." (Jonathan Culler) "The best handbook to those arcane ics and isms, both for academy members and for any civilians who, having heard the distant roar of professorial cannons, might wonder what the skirmishing is about." (Voice Literary Supplement)

Terry Eagleton is John Edward Taylor Professor of English Literature at the University of Manchester. His recent publications include How to Read a Poem (2006), The English Novel (2004), Sweet Violence: The Idea of the Tragic (2003), The Idea of Culture (2000), Scholars and Rebels in Nineteenth-Century Ireland (1999), and The Illusions of Postmodernism (1996), all published by Blackwell Publishing.

Preface to the Anniversary Edition. Preface to the Second Edition. Preface to the First Edition. Introduction: What is Literature?. 1. The Rise of English. 2. Phenomenology, Hermeneutics, Reception Theory. 3. Structuralism and Semiotics. 4. Post-Structuralism. 5. Psychoanalysis. Conclusion: Political Criticism. Afterword. Notes. Bibliography. Index