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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What role does reception theory examine?

2. According to Eagleton, William Empson "insists on treating poetry as a species of ______language."

3. According to Eagleton, formalism is the application of what to the study of literature?

4. Why is the example Eagleton gives of the sign in the London Underground system that "dogs must be carried on the escalator" a case of estrangement?

5. According to Eagleton, Stanley Fish's model excludes the possibility that there is a ______ of interpretations?

Short Essay Questions

1. During the eighteenth century, how was art perceived in England and why is it significant?

2. How did the Russian formalists answer the question "what is literature?" and why was it significant?

3. What does "concretize" mean and why is it significant?

4. What is "Tristram Shandy" and why is it significant?

5. How is Martin Heidegger's philosophy similar to that of the Russian formalists?

6. Why does Eagleton call the emergence and development of literary theory a "theoretical revolution" and what does it signify?

7. What was the dominant ideology of eighteenth-century England?

8. How has the population in higher education changed in Britain since the 1960s and what it its significance?

9. What is the reach of the "theoretical revolution" and why is it significant?

10. How does Eagleton define elitism in literary studies and why is it important?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

What is the basic problem of literary theory, according to Eagleton? Why does Eagleton that "literature" should not be any more important in terms of a field of study as film or television shows? For Eagleton, why is rhetoric a more comprehensive and constructive discipline and methodology?

Essay Topic 2

Compare and contrast the arguments for and against literary theory.

1) According to Eagleton, why have people opposed literary theory?

2) What is Eagleton's position regarding literary theory?

Essay Topic 3

Discuss Eagleton's argument for a movement that would reform the academy and society at large by identifying and analyzing the 4 major goals of this political movement.

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