This timely volume presents a rich and absorbing selection of extracts from over two hundred leading literary critics of the last several decades, writing on many of the most widely studied literary texts in English, from Shakespeare to Toni Morrison. Structured chronologically, working through familiar literary periods, this book presents illuminating and stimulating examples of critical readings of familiar texts, demonstrating a variety of methods and approaches to critical practice. The range of critical voices represented -- from Abrams and Adelman to Zimmerman and Žižek -- provides students with eloquent and insightful models of how to read, think and write about texts so that they can form their own critical responses and develop as independent readers. The book also shows how criticism has developed over time and how it has always been intimately involved in wider cultural, social and political debates. Connections between criticism, culture and politics are explored in the book's wide-ranging first chapter. In his warm, clear, and engaging style, Richard Jacobs provides the perfect introduction to literature and criticism. Literature and the Critics is a book to which students will want to return to throughout their courses as they read more widely and encounter new texts and critical voices"

Introduction 1. Literature, criticism, culture, and why they matter 2. Shakespeare 3. Early modern literature 1590-1690 4. Early romantic writings 1750-1800 5. Later romantic writings 1790-1830 6. Realist fiction in England and America 1840-1870 7. Realism towards modernism: English and American fiction 1870-1900 8. Modernisms: British, Irish and American literature 1890-1970 9. Postmodernity and the contemporary novel 1970-2020