Jonathan Culler Book order

What sort of thing is a lyric poem? An intense expression of subjective experience? The fictive speech of a specifiable persona? Theory of the Lyric reveals the limitations of these two conceptions of the lyric—the older Romantic model and the modern conception that has come to dominate the study of poetry—both of which neglect what is most striking and compelling in the lyric and falsify the long and rich tradition of the lyric in the West. Jonathan Culler explores alternative conceptions offered by this tradition, such as public discourse made authoritative by its rhythmical structures, and he constructs a more capacious model of the lyric that will help readers appreciate its range of possibilities. “Theory of the Lyric brings Culler’s own earlier, more scattered interventions together with an eclectic selection from others’ work in service to what he identifies as a dominant need of the critical and pedagogical present: turning readers’ attention to lyric poems as verbal events, not fictions of impersonated speech. His fine, nuanced readings of particular poems and kinds of poems are crucial to his arguments. His observations on the workings of aspects of lyric across multiple different structures are the real strength of the book. It is a work of practical criticism that opens speculative vistas for poetics but always returns to poems.” —Elizabeth Helsinger, Critical Theory

Focusing on the interplay between readers and texts, the book explores deconstruction through the lenses of psychoanalytic, feminist, and reader-response criticism. Jonathan Culler delves into how these critical approaches illuminate the complexities of interpretation and the role of the reader in understanding literature.

With an emphasis on readers and reading, Jonathan Culler considers deconstruction in terms of the questions raised by psychoanalytic, feminist, and reader-response criticism.

This work explores the role of the literary in theory, with wide-ranging analysis of key concepts and disciplinary practices.

Roland Barthes was the leading figure of French Structuralism, the theoretical movement of the 1960s which revolutionized the study of literature and culture, as well as history and psychoanalysis. But Barthes was a man who disliked orthodoxies. This book surveys Barthes' work in prose.

Culler's most famous work, Structuralist Poetics has never been out of print since first publication in 1975, selling over 20,000 copies. It introduced a new way of studying literature by attempting to create a systematic account of the structure of literary works, rather than studying the meaning of the work. Culler's new preface answers some of the criticisms levelled at his approach and details how it is still as relevant today as when it was first published.

This widely acclaimed work remains an important and vital work of literary scholarship. Covering semiotics, reader response criticism, and the value of the apostrophe, this work provides a detailed analysis of literary criticism

Culler offers insights into theories about the nature of language and meaning, looks at whether literature is a form of self-expression or a method of appeal to an audience, and outlines the ideas behind deconstruction and semiotics.

Examines the works, methods, and widespread influences of the father of modern linguistics, whom the author ranks with Durkheim and Freud