Approaches to Literature

Literature is a complex phenomenon that can be analysed and studied from a multitude of perspectives. Approaches to Literature presents a wide range of scholarly approaches that take different views on what literature is and how it should be examined.

The volume is divided into four sections. They present approaches that take as their starting point (1) the author, (2) the text, (3) the reader, and (4) the world. The fourth section ranges from social, historical, and cultural approaches to ecocriticism, posthumanism, and such interdisciplinary approaches as cultural memory studies and contextualist narrative studies.

The volume is written in an accessible style for educators and students of literature. It discusses approaches to literature by taking into account both their historicity and the ways in which many approaches developed in the past are still present in how literature is examined today.

The contributors represent a wide variety of literary studies and other disciplines.