Routledge Guides to Literature are clear introductions to authors and texts most frequently studied by undergraduate students of literature. Each book explores texts, contexts and criticism, highlighting the critical views and contextual factors that students must consider in advanced studies of literary works.
Each guide presents a variety of approaches and interpretations, encouraging readers to think critically about 'standard' views and to make independent readings of literary texts. Alongside general guides to texts and authors, the series includes 'sourcebooks', which incorporate extracts from key contextual and critical materials as well as annotated passages from the primary text.
Some books in this series were originally published in the Routledge Literary Sourcebook series, edited by Duncan Wu, or the Complete Critical Guide to English Literature series, edited by Richard Bradford and Jan Jedrzjewski.
By Richard Bradford
May 04, 2001
There is a crying need for an accessible, comprehensive guide to John Milton for the thousands of students who make their way through his poetry every year on literary survey and seventeenth century literature courses. Where many previous guides have dragged their way through Paradise Lost, Richard...
By Stefan Hawlin
September 10, 2012
Accessibly written throughout, this guidebook covers biographical details, information on the historical and social contexts of Browning's work, an overview of the full range of his work and a survey of the major critical debates surrounding him and his work....
By Pelagia Goulimari
July 22, 2011
Toni Morrison's visionary explorations of freedom and identity, self and community, against the backdrop of African American history have established her as one of the foremost novelists of her time; an artist whose seriousness of purpose and imaginative power have earned her both widespread ...
By Angus Easson
January 12, 2011
Gerard Manley Hopkins was among the most innovative writers of the Victorian period. Experimental and idiosyncratic, his work remains important for any student of nineteenth-century literature and culture. This guide to Hopkins’ life and work offers: a detailed account of Hopkins life and ...
By D.C.R.A. Goonetilleke
November 05, 2007
Joseph Conrad’s novella, Heart of Darkness, has fascinated critics and readers alike, engaging them in highly controversial debate as it deals with fundamental issues of good and evil, civilisation, race, love and heroism. This classic tale transcends the boundaries of time and place and has ...
By Brendon Nicholls
October 19, 2010
Nadine Gordimer is one of the most important writers to emerge in the twentieth century. Her anti-Apartheid novel July's People (1981) is a powerful example of resistance writing and continues even now to unsettle easy assumptions about issues of power, race, gender and identity. This guide to ...
By Jan Jedrzejewski
June 19, 2007
As a woman in an illegal marriage, publishing under a male pseudonym, George Eliot was one of the most successful yet controversial writers of the Victorian period. Today she is considered a key figure for women’s writing and her novels, including The Mill on the Floss and Middlemarch, are commonly...
Edited
By Sonia Massai
January 31, 2008
William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night (c.1600) is one of his most captivating plays. A comedy of mistaken identities, it has given rise to thought-provoking debates around such issues as gender identity and role-playing, manipulation and deception. Taking the form of a sourcebook, this guide to ...
By Tony Sharpe
October 30, 2007
As both a politically engaged and stylistically versatile poet, W.H. Auden is one of the most influential writers of the twentieth century. His work is not only widely studied and read, but has been used in musical scores and quoted in Hollywood films. This guide to Auden’s compelling work ...
By Janet Beer, Pamela Knights, Elizabeth Nolan
August 30, 2007
Edith Wharton’s The House of Mirth (1905) is a sharp and satirical, but also sensitive and tragic analysis of a young, single woman trying to find her place in a materialistic and unforgiving society. The House of Mirth offers a fascinating insight into the culture of the time and, as suggested by ...
By Sarah Graham
April 18, 2007
J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye (1951) is a twentieth-century classic. Despite being one of the most frequently banned books in America, generations of readers have identified with the narrator, Holden Caulfield, an angry young man who articulates the confusion, cynicism and vulnerability of...
By Helen Stoddart
May 09, 2007
A highly original and influential work of modern British literature, Angela Carter’s Nights at the Circus combines a fantastically creative plot with a strong political undertone. The result is an emotive and provocative novel, which has attracted much critical attention from a range of ...