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This comprehensive guide to the history of literary criticism from antiquity to the present day provides an authoritative overview of the major movements, figures, and texts of literary criticism, as well as surveying their cultural, historical, and philosophical contexts.

A valuable resource not only for students and teachers of literary criticism and theory but also for those studying literature of all periods, this magnificent volume contains clear and comprehensive introductions to the major periods of literary study, from the classical and medieval eras through the renaissance, reformation, neo-classicism, and romanticism to realism, modernism, and postmodernism. It offers detailed accounts of major events and movements such as the Protestant reformation, the enlightenment, and the French revolution, as well as detailed introductions to major figures such as Plato, Aristotle, Horace, Augustine, Dante, Aquinas, de Pisan, Sidney, Pope, Kant, Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, Feud, De Beauvoir, Woolf, and Heidegger.

This book will be an invaluable companion for all students seeking to learn about the intellectual and broader historical contexts of literary study.