David Lodge’s Modern Criticism and Theory: “book of major works of literary criticism. It is excerpts from original texts rather than articles on theoretical approaches.”
Ann Dobie’s Theory into Practice: (From Cengage Learning.) “book that explains theory.”
Peter Berry’s Beginning Theory: “explains the theory, and then demonstrates how it is used in actual literary analysis. Each chapter ends with a bibliography for further reading. It was designed as a textbook, and it does its job well.”
Terry Eagleton’s Literary Theory: “extremely popular.”
Kristi Siegel’s “Introduction to Literary Theory.”
Falling into Theory by David H. Richter
Ania Loomba’s Colonialism/Postcolonialism
Deal and Beal Theory for Religious Studies
Charles Bressler’s Literary Criticism: An Introduction to Theory and Practice: “structured, almost formulaic breakdown of the major schools of thought.”
from the Chronicle‘s fora