Publisher's Synopsis
This book is motivated by the desire to continue the book, Literary Criticism: An Overview (2017). Departments of English literature teach academic literary criticism theory and major critics which creates the motive to present an overview of English literary criticism (Book two) from the Victorian period to the present time. The book depends on a big number of recent books of literary criticism, in addition to online encyclopedia and critics biographies to enrich the survey of the book and to introduce recent documented information of academic literary criticism. That book draws attention to the criticism of the Victorian period, Modernism, Postmodernism, Colonialism, and Post-colonial criticism. The content of the book overviews the general principles of literary criticism and literary critical figures to offer readers and students a well-documented and a brief introduction of modern criticism. It offers a quick study and revision to readers, post graduate and graduate students as well as it talks about the fundamental concepts of literary criticism. Chapter one presents the 19th century criticism of the Victorian period. An overview of the cultural, literary and critical background is presented. William Hazlitt and Walter patter are two important prose writers of the Victorian criticism. Those two literary figures are introduced as leaders of the Victorian prose writers and criticism. Some important movements and schools of criticism like Aestheticism is also tackled. This chapter introduces the father of modern criticism Mathew Arnold and some of his important works of criticism. Chapter two of the book is about Twentieth century literary criticism. The movements of Modernism and New Criticism are surveyed to present the cultural and literary background of the early 20th century. The main literary figure and critic of the 20th century, T. S. Eliot is presented and his works are summarized and analyzed to discuss his Tradition and Individual Talent and his theory of poetry and modern criticism. The chapter also tackles I. A. Richards and his theory of practical criticism.Chapter three demonstrates the new movement of postmodernism and its features. A discussion of the definition of the term and the changes that took place at this period are briefly presented. The literary figures, Ihab Hassan as an important critic of postmodernism is introduced and his books are analyzed and summarized to present the overview of criticism of postmodernism.Chapter Four introduces Feminism as a school of literary criticism. First, a definition is discussed followed by the main features of feminism and the main feminists critics who influenced literary movement at 20th century criticism. Chapter five is devoted to the most recent movements of criticism, like colonialism and post colonialism. A discussion of the developments of the terms and their implications in the field of literary criticism is presented. This chapter also presents Edward Said as an important literary figure and critic of post colonialism. His main book Orientalism is surveyed as an important work in post colonialism criticism. In addition, the important theorist in this period Homi K. Bhabha is presented as a cultural theorist and critic. His book The Location of Culture is briefly surveyed and analyzed. This book is meant to serve a number of objectives. The first objective is to give extensive brief study to the history of modern literary criticism. The academic literary criticism is becoming increasingly important in the field of literary studies, therefore, the second objective is to give readers and students of literature an advanced overview about modern critics and theories of criticism across different periods and backgrounds. Finally, a more general objective is to expose readers not only to concepts and ideas of schools and movements of criticism but also to the intellectual and cultural background of these periods and theories.
