Reader-Response Criticism: From Formalism to Post-Structuralism

by Jane Tompkins (Editor)

Reader-Response Criticism: From Formalism to Post-Structuralism collects the most important theoretical statements on readers and the reading process. Its essays trace the development of reader-response criticm from its beginnings in New Criticism (Walker Gibson) through its appearance in structuralism (Gerald Prince, Jonathan Culler), stylistics (Michael Riffaterre), phenomenology (Georges Poulet, Wolfgang Iser, Stanley Fish), psychoanalytic criticism (Norman N. Holland, David Bleich), and post-structuiralist theory (Fish, Walter Benn Michaels). The editor shows how each of these essays treats the problem of determinate meaning and compares their unspoken moral assumptions. In a concluding essay, she redefines the reader-response movement by placing it in historical perspective, providing the first short history of the concept of literary response. This anthology remains an indispensable guide to reader-response criticm. It is a valuable text for courses in literary criticism and theory as well as a superior refernce work for scholars and students of literature, critical theory, and the philosophy of art.

Genres: Theory, Nonfiction, Literary Criticism, Academic

304 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 1980

About the author

Jane Tompkins (born 1940) is an American literary scholar who has worked on canon formation, feminist literary criticism, and reader response criticism.[1] She has helped develop the idea of cultural work in literary studies.[2] She earned her PhD at Yale in 1966 and subsequently taught at Temple University, Duke University, and the University of Illinois at Chicago.[3]

Reviews

[Sirpa Grierson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really for a college level or higher, but the ideas are applicable to anyone interested in reader response criticism.

[Jeff Keehr · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this for my Literary Criticism course at Penn State.

[Jason · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'll admit that there are a few essays I did not read, but this is, on the whole, a great collection.

[TinTin Kalaw]

I have only read a few of the essays that are related to my thesis :))