Literary

Theories
and Criticism
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 Introduction
What is the purpose of Literary Theories and Criticism?

Literary theory and criticism can shed light on those underlying meanings,
allowing you to better understand the themes, symbols, motifs presented in
a text, and  analyze an author’s style.
Relationship of Literary
Theory and Literary Criticism

● Literary Criticism is the practical

application of Literary Theory to a
literary text. In literature critic
theories are used in literary
criticism.
 John Dryden
Samuel Johnson regarded Dryden as the
"father of English criticism" precisely
because he contributed so much to the
canon of English literature's ouevre of
literary criticism.
Three Main Areas of Study:

1 2 3

Literary Theory Literary Criticism History of

Literature
Consists of numerous Interpretation od Literature Examines the literary past
academic, philosophical, works and poets as a process or one of its
and political frameworks stages
 01
Theory
Definitions, Examples,
Types, and Authors
 Literary Theory
• It teaches the structure of any literary work
(general poetics).
• investigates the evolution of artistic structures
and their constituent elements, such as genres,
plots, and stylistic images
• literary analysis that facilitates readers in
evaluating literature
• Literary theory can be applied to all aspects of
life, not just texts. When we attempt to analyze
literature, we are also attempting to analyze the
world in which we live.
Structuralism
• Any literary work has a specific structure.
•  it focused instead how human behaviour is determined by
cultural, social and psychological structures. 
Example:
This is not a Pipe
-Rene Magritte
Deconstruction
• refers to determining what is clearly presented and what the
author does not reveal.

Example:
Six Lines for Louise Bogan
-Michael Collier
Eco-Criticism
• aims to connect literature to the natural environment in the hope that
we can take action against climate change and habitat destruction

Example:
The Future of Environmental Criticism
-Lawrence Buell
Feminist & Gay-Lesbian-Queer
Theory
• attempt to reshape one's sexual identity and preferences It is looking for a cultural
and political space. Where homosexuals are no longer considered immoral,
unnatural against moral codes, or afflicted with heterosexual illnesses. Considered
to be normal and ordinary members of society.

Example:
We the Animals
-Justin Torres
Modernism & Postmodernism
• Modernism marks a clear and intentional
departure from the conventional prose and poetry
styles.
Example:
Ulysses
-James Joyce

• Postmodernism is characterized by a general mistrust of theories, the

purposeful use of earlier styles and conventions, and the blending of
various artistic styles and media.
Example:
Lolita
-Vladimir Nabokov
Narratology
• examines the similarities and differences between different narratives.

Example:
Morfologiya skazki (1928; Morphology of the
Folk Tale) - Vladimir Propp
New Historicism & Marxist Criticism:

• New Historicism issues with combining the study

of literary text with non-literary or reference text.
Example:
Sense & Sensibility
-Jane Austen

• Marxist Criticism tend to concentrate on how class conflict is portrayed in

literature, as well as how class distinctions are emphasized
through literature.
Example:
The Hunger Games
-Suzanne Collins
Colonial & Post-colonial Criticism:
• Colonial Theory focuses especially on how
literature produced by the colonizing culture
fabricates experiences and realities and imprints
inferiority.
Example:
Mansfield Park(1814)
-Jane Austen

• Post-Colonial Criticism examines the interactions

between colonizers and colonized during the
post-colonial era.
Example:
Orientalism
-Edward Said
 02
Literary
Criticism
You can enter a subtitle here
if you need it
Literary Criticism
• practice of debating, evaluating, interpreting, and
contrasting literary works.
• provides readers with fresh perspectives on an author's
work.

Purpose:
• By summarizing, interpreting, and analyzing an author's
work, literary criticism aims to deepen the reader's
understanding of it. After carefully reading the text, a
critic develops a thorough literary analysis that can either
support or contradict the interpretation of another reader.
Literary criticism makes it possible for readers to better
comprehend the complexity and beauty of the world
through literature.
11 types of Literary Criticism:
Historical-biographical Moral-philosophical
criticism criticism
 Literature is examined through the  based on the moral assertions and
lens of the author's historical setting conclusions the author and
through the practice of criticism. characters make throughout the
Example: literary text, evaluate literary works.
Lord of the Flies Example:
By: William Golding An Essay on Man
By: Alexander Pope
11 types of Literary Criticism:
Sociological criticism Psychoanalytic criticism
 evaluates literature in light of its
impact on society.  investigates the author's social
Example: standing as well as the impact of the
Animal Farm literary work on its audience within
By: George Orwell the society
Example:
The Sins of the Fathers:
Hawthorne’s Psychological
Themes (1966)
By: Frederick Crews
11 types of Literary Criticism:
Practical criticism Formalism
 encourages readers to examine the  compels readers to evaluate literary
text without regard for any external artistic merit by examining formal
context, such as the author, the date elements such as language and
and location of writing, or any other technical skill
contextual information that may Example:
enlighten the reader Metamorphosis
Example: By: Franz Kafka
The Well wrought Urn
By: Cleanth Brooks (1947)
11 types of Literary Criticism:
Reader-response criticism New criticism
 focused on the formal and structural
 is based on the belief that a reader's elements of literature rather than the
reaction to or interpretation of a text emotional or moral elements
is just as valuable as the text itself as Example:
a source of critical study. Hamlet and His Problems
Example: By: T.S Eliot
Paradise Lost
By: John Milton
11 types of Literary Criticism:
Post-structuralism Deconstruction
 abandoned ideas of formal and  dissect a text's ideas or arguments
structural cohesion, calling into for contradictions that make any
question any assumed universal truths single reading of the text
as dependent on the social structure impossible.
that influenced them. Example:
Example: The Perks of being a
A Lover’s Discourse Wallflower
By: Roland Barthes By: Stephen Chbosky
11 types of Literary Criticism:

Feminist criticism
 seeks to explore patriarchy and female oppression
throughout history and has a long legacy of political
controversy. 
Example:
A Vindication of the Rights of Women
By: Mary Wollstonecraft(1792)
Famous Literary Critics:
Hideo
Kobayashi
Japanese author, who established literary
criticism as an independent art form in
Japan
Ivor Armstrong Richards
English educator, literary critic,
poet, and rhetorician. His work
contributed to the foundations of
the New Criticism
Harold
Bloom
American literary critic and the Sterling
Professor of Humanities at Yale University, he
was described as "probably the most famous
literary critic in the English-speaking world."
Edgar Allan
Poe
best known for his poetry and short stories,
particularly his tales of mystery and the
macabre
Famous Literary Critic
Northrop Frye
Canadian literary critic and literary
theorist, considered one of the most
influential of the 20th century.

Meyer Howard Abraham

an American literary critic, known for
works on romanticism, in particular
his book The Mirror and the Lamp. 
 Famous Literary Critics:
Samuel
Johnson
an English writer who made lasting contributions
as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, critic,
biographer, editor and lexicographer
Jacques
Darrida
an Algerian-born French philosopher. He developed
a philosophical approach that came to be known as
deconstruction
John
Dryden
 an English poet, literary critic, translator, and
playwright who in 1668 was appointed
England's first Poet Laureate
Hayden
White
an American historian in the tradition of
literary criticism, perhaps most famous for his work
Metahistory: The Historical Imagination in
Nineteenth-Century Europe (1973/2014).
 “ A Reader lives a
THOUSAND lives before he
dies “
— George R. R. Martin
 Thanks
Do you have any questions?
Theories&Criticism@freepik.com
+91 620 421 838
Theories&Criticism_Literature.com

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