Literary Studies Deconstructed

Description

Literary Studies Deconstructed critiques the state of Literary Studies in the modern university and argues for its comprehensive reconstruction. It argues that Literary Studies as currently practised avoids engaging with much of literary experience and prioritises instead the needs of critics as a professional community: to teach and assess students, to demonstrate the creation of knowledge, and to meet the demands of governments, funders and other bodies. The result is that many areas centrally important to lay readers are largely omitted from critical discussion. Moreover, critical writing and its conventions are framed so as to mask and repress the subject’s contradictions. This lively and provocative book will be of interest to undergraduate and postgraduate students with an interest in the critical profession or literary theory, as well as to Literary Studies academics. Front Matter ....Pages i-ix Introduction: The LITMUS Papers (Catherine Butler)....Pages 1-9 Not I? Critics Versus Readers (Catherine Butler)....Pages 11-41 The Uses of Embarrassment: Exploring the Limits of Critical Reading (Catherine Butler)....Pages 43-71 Attack of the Zombie Authors: Critics Versus Writers (Catherine Butler)....Pages 73-103 All Our Own Work: Originality and Creative Reading (Catherine Butler)....Pages 105-123 Inconclusion (Catherine Butler)....Pages 125-135 Back Matter ....Pages 137-149