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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 is the "final logical move" for literary theory, according to Eagleton?

2. According to Eagleton, why is Sigmund Freud's discussion of women problematic?

3. According to the Soviet semiotician Yury Lotman, a poetic text is "semantically _________."

4. According to Eagleton, structuralism is a ________of inquiry whereas semiotics is a ______ of study.

5. How are "writable" texts different from ones that can be read?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is Sigmund Freud's Oedipus complex and why is it significant?

2. What is Eagleton's main critique of the some forms of post-structuralism and why is it significant?

3. What is significant about the ways in which Sigmund Freud treated women and men?

4. For Roland Barthes, what does literature embody and why is it significant?

5. Why does Eagleton argue that politics should engage with questions of sexual ideology?

6. What was the significance of the Prague structuralists?

7. How did post-structuralism develop and why is it significant?

8. How does the philosopher Jacques Derrida conceive of language?

9. What is structuralism's lasting impact on literary theory and what is Eagleton's critique of their methodology?

10. Who is Ferdinand de Saussure and what was his contribution to the field of literary theory?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Choose two Russian formalists and discuss their work.

1) How did they define literature?

2) What aspects of literary production did they focus on?

Essay Topic 2

Discuss the ways in which the concept of literature has changed from the seventeenth century to the twentieth century.

1) What was considered literature in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries?

2) How do the romantic movement transform the definition of literature?

3) What was the function of literature during the Victorian era?

Essay Topic 3

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?

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