Literary Studies
Literary Theory
This guide helps you get your bearings in Literary Theory before you start exploring the interactive timeline, framework graph, and concept maps.
Before You Dive In
- Literary theory is not one thing — it's a set of competing frameworks (formalism, structuralism, poststructuralism, feminist criticism, etc.) that rarely agree on what literature is for.
- The succession from New Criticism → Structuralism → Poststructuralism → Cultural Studies roughly tracks the 20th century, but earlier approaches never fully disappeared.
- Start with New Criticism or Formalism to see "close reading" in its purest form, then see how later schools challenged it.
- Theory and practice are tightly linked — each framework changes what you notice when reading a text.
Key Terms to Know
Close readingDetailed analysis of a text's formal elements (imagery, structure, tone) without external context.
HermeneuticsThe theory and methodology of interpretation, especially of texts.
DeconstructionDerrida's method of revealing contradictions and instabilities within texts.
CanonThe set of works considered most important or representative in a literary tradition.
IntertextualityHow a text's meaning is shaped by its relationships to other texts.
Common Confusions
Thinking theory is optional or separate from "actually reading" — all reading involves theoretical assumptions, even if implicit.
Assuming poststructuralism means "anything goes" — it has rigorous methods, just different premises than formalism.
Confusing literary theory with literary criticism — theory is about frameworks for interpretation, criticism is interpretation itself.
Recommended Reading
Literary Theory: An Introduction— Terry Eagleton
1983The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism— Vincent B. Leitch et al.
2010Beginning Theory: An Introduction to Literary and Cultural Theory— Peter Barry
2017How to Use the Interactive View
1
Explore the timeline
Open the interactive view and scan the framework timeline. Which frameworks came first? Which ones overlap? Where are the big transitions?
2
Read the articles
Click into individual frameworks to read what each one claims, where it came from, and how it relates to its neighbors.
3
Check the concept map
See how the key ideas within a framework connect. This is useful for figuring out what to learn first and what depends on what.
4
Test yourself
Take the quiz for any framework you've read about. It's a quick way to find out whether you actually understood the core ideas or just skimmed them.