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Literary Theory
The Basics
This accessible guide provides the ideal first step in understanding
literary theory. Hans Bertens:
• leads you through the major approaches to literature which
are signalled by the term ‘literary theory’
• places each critical movement in its historical (and often
political) context
• illustrates theory in practice with examples from much-read
texts
• suggests further reading for those especially interested in a
particular critical approach
• shows not only that theory can make sense but also that it can
radically change the way you read.
Covering all the basics and much more, this is the ideal book for
anyone interested in how we read and why that matters.
Hans Bertens
is based at the University of Utrecht, the Netherlands.
He is the author of
The Idea of the Postmodern
(Routledge, 1995).
Preface
There was a time when the interpretation of literary texts and
literary theory seemed two different and almost unrelated
things. Interpretation was about the actual meaning of a poem,
a novel, or a play, while theory seemed alien to what the study of
literature was really about because its generalizations could
never do justice to individual texts. In the last thirty years,
however, interpretation and theory have moved closer and closer
to each other. In fact, for many contemporary critics and theo-
rists interpretation and theory cannot be separated at all. They
would argue that when we interpret a text we always do so
from a theoretical perspective, whether we are aware of it or
not, and they would also argue that theory cannot do without
interpretation.
The premise of
Literary Theory: The Basics
is that literary
theory and literary practice – the practice of interpretation – can
indeed not very well be separated and certainly not at the more
advanced level of academic literary studies. One of its aims,
then, is to show how theory and practice are inevitably
connected and
have
always been connected. The emphasis is on
the 1970s and after, but important earlier views of literature get
their full share of attention. This is not merely a historical
exercise. A good understanding of, for instance, the New
Criticism that dominated literary criticism in the United States
ix
PREFACE
from the mid-1930s until 1970 is indispensable for students of
literature. Knowing about the New Criticism will make it a lot
easier to understand other, later, modes of reading. More impor-
tantly, the New Criticism, like other more traditional
approaches to literature, has by no means disappeared. Likewise,
an understanding of what is called structuralism makes the
complexities of so-called poststructuralist theory a good deal
less daunting and has the added value of offering a perspective
that is helpful in thinking about culture in general.
This book, then, is an introduction to both literary theory
and a history of theory. But it is a history in which what has
become historical is simultaneously actual: in the field of literary
studies a whole range of approaches and theoretical perspec-
tives, political and apolitical, traditional and radical, old and
new, operate next to each other in relatively peaceful coexistence.
In its survey of that range of positions
Literary Theory: The
Basics
tries to do equal justice to a still actual tradition and to
the radicalness of the new departures of the last decades. We still
ask ‘what does it mean?’ when we read a poem or novel or see a
play. But we have additional questions. We ask ‘what does it
mean to whom?’ And ‘why does it mean what it means?’ Or,
more specifically, ‘who wants it to have this meaning and for
what reasons?’ As we will see, such questions do not diminish
literature. On the contrary, they make it even more important.
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