Introduction 1 1 Hamburg Dramaturgy (1769) 8G. E. Lessing 2 Of the Standard of Taste (1777) 32David Hume 3 Critique of Judgment (1790) 45Immanuel Kant 4 On the Aesthetic Education of Man (1795) 65Friedrich Schiller 5 On the Study of Greek Poetry (1797) and Philosophical Fragments (1798–1800) 74Friedrich Schlegel 6 Lectures on Dramatic Art (1811) 88A. W. Schlegel 7 Preface to Lyrical Ballads, with Pastoral and Other Poems (1802) 104William Wordsworth 8 Biographia Literaria (1817) 124Samuel Taylor Coleridge 9 Aesthetics: Lectures on Fine Art (1835) 134G. W. F. Hegel 10 The Function of Criticism at the Present Time (1864) 148Matthew Arnold 11 The Birth of Tragedy (1872) 166Friedrich Nietzsche 12 The Art of Fiction (1884) 188Henry James 13 Crisis of Verse (1897) 202Stéphane Mallarmé 14 Art as Technique (1917) 210Viktor Shklovsky 15 The Uncanny (1919) 226Sigmund Freud 16 Tradition and the Individual Talent (1919) and The Function of Criticism (1923) 252T. S. Eliot 17 A Room of One’s Own (1929) 265Virginia Woolf 18 The Storyteller (1936): Reflections on the Works of Nikolai Leskov 282Walter Benjamin 19 Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote 299Jorge Luis Borges 20 What is Literature? (1948) 306Jean-Paul Sartre 21 Literature and the Right to Death (1948) 320Maurice Blanchot 22 Language (1950) 349Martin Heidegger 23 Trying to Understand Endgame (1958) 363Theodor W. Adorno 24 The Meridian (1960) 389Paul Celan 25 What is an Author? (1969) 398Michel Foucault 26 Sorties: Out and Out: Attacks/Ways Out/Forays (1975) 411Hélène Cixous 27 What is a Minor Literature? (1975) 426Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari 28 Literature and Life (1993) 437Gilles Deleuze 29 The Literary Absolute (1978) 441Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe and Jean-Luc Nancy 30 Orientalism (1978) 459Edward W. Said 31 Autobiography as De-facement (1979) 479Paul de Man 32 Che cos’è la poesia? (1988) and Before the Law (1982) 489Jacques Derrida 33 Signs Taken for Wonders (1986): Questions of Ambivalence and Authority under a Tree Outside Delhi, May 1817 519Homi K. Bhabha 34 What is the History of Literature? (1997) 538Stephen Greenblatt 35 A Critique of Postcolonial Reason (1999) 558Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak 36 Literature for the Planet (2001) 576Wai Chee Dimock 37 The Politics of Literature (2003) 596Jacques Rancière 38 Close Reading in an Age of Global Writing (2013) 609Rebecca L. Walkowitz Index 621

AN ESSENTIAL VOLUME ON LITERARY THEORY AND CRITICISM IN THE EUROPEAN TRADITION Many of the most influential thinkers and writers in fields as diverse as literary criticism, philosophy, psychoanalysis, sociology and history have posed the question: "What is literature?". Attempts to define literature lead to further questions: What is literature for? Who decides whether a written work is literature? What are the criteria? What sets literary language apart from ordinary language? What is Literature? A Critical Anthology??addresses these and other fundamental questions in literary studies, bringing together essays spanning more than two centuries to explore our conceptions of literature and its meanings, values, and purposes. Focusing on the Western literary tradition, this volume includes an introduction which discusses literature's foundations in ancient Greek philosophy, explores the emergence of literature as a distinct form in the eighteenth century, and provides insights into modern literary theory. The anthology features essays by figures central to the definition of literature as an idea, including Immanuel Kant, G.W.F. Hegel, Friedrich Nietzsche, Virginia Woolf and T.S. Eliot, and a selection of those who have called that idea into question, such as Jacques Derrida, Hélène Cixous, Edward Said, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak and Jacques Rancière. Offering a carefully curated examination of the nature of literature, this book: Presents diverse perspectives and reflections on the meanings of "literature"Offers a wide-ranging selection of significant texts on literary theoryIncludes essays by contemporary voices on literature and criticismFeatures many complete and substantial selections, rather than excerpts. A unique and thoughtful approach for understanding the idea of literature, What is Literature? A Critical Anthology??is an important resource for students and scholars of literature and literary criticism.