Modern Literary Criticism and Theory: A History

by M.A.R. Habib

Written in concise and clear language, this book offers an historical overview of literary criticism and theory throughout the twentieth century along with a close analysis of some of the most important and commonly taught texts from the period.

Genres: Literary Criticism, Literature, Literary Fiction, Nonfiction

262 pages, Paperback

First published December 18, 2007

About the author

see Rafey Habib

Reviews

[Rakhi Dalal]

From the Epilogue:

In spite of our best intentions, we lovers of literature and proponents of radical theory have unwittingly conspired – through the very sophistication of our language – to deprive ourselves of any voice, to seal off our studies from their potential application to the important issues that engulf our lives.

[Lynne]

oh Habib...great intro to crit, with random facts about the scholars thrown in. as we related in our crit class, Habib made us challenge crit moreso than our Rivkin and Ryan reader, which made things seem more straightforward.

[libremilia]

I mean, it was definitely theory.

[RC]

An excellent survey of literary theory and criticism through the twentieth century, with admirable range, and an endearing willingness to take a few shots at some of the high priests and priestesses of the field, and a slightly pugnacious insistence that, somewhere along the way in the latter part of the century, with a sometimes obscurantist focus on textuality and language, literary theory and criticism became unmoored from reality, and the pressing issues that take place in reality, ethics, politics, etc. As Habib notes in the epilogue,

[i]f clarity was an early bourgeois virtue, obscurity is a late bourgeois vice: not just a linguistic or terminological obscurity but an epistemological refusal of clarity, as in a panicked and manic refusal of binary oppositions of identity, of distinction between entities . . . all is permissible in our ultra-pluralist world . . . . The endemic phenomenon of such blurring reaches further and further into the depth of liberal pluralism and particularism, into an indifference whose very premise is its political ineffectiveness. . . . Sadly, to the extent literary theory has mired itself in unnecessary obscurity, it has ensured its own political silence.

Pages 230-31.

This also left me compiling a reading list of books I've been meaning to read, but had never gotten to or forgotten to get around to. A great refresher for old hands, and a useful introduction for those new to the field.

[Yasmeen Adam]

One of the greatest books that discussed the literary critical theories.