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The book was published by Blackwell Press in the UK in 2007 and is Eagleton's latest work. Through a series of readings of poems by Yeats, Frost, Auden, Dickinson and others, it shows how literary theory becomes the basis for poetic understanding, providing students and ordinary readers with a fruitful and in-depth introduction to poetry. Some critics believe that this is "the only book that can truly show what poetry is."

In this accessible and entertaining book, Terry Eagleton asks a series of intriguing questions. In a brilliant analysis, Eagleton shows how to pay full attention to a literary work's tone, rhythm, texture, syntax, allusion, ambiguity, and other formal aspects when reading. He also examines broader issues of character, plot, narrative, creative imagination, the meaning of fictionality, and the tension between what literature says and what it represents. Authoritative and enjoyable, the author provides helpful commentary on classicism, romanticism, modernism, and postmodernism, and offers fascinating insights into writers ranging from Shakespeare and J. K. Rowling to Jane Austen and Samuel Beckett. This book is a first choice for beginning literature students and all other readers interested in deepening their understanding and enriching their reading experience.

Eagleton is a leading figure in international literary theory and is extremely creative and critical. This book is a monograph in which the author systematically introduces and comments on Western literary theories of the 20th century to general readers. The author sorts out the complicated 20th-century Western literary theory revolution that originated from Russian formalism and sorted out three main development lines from formalism, structuralism to post-structuralism, from phenomenology, hermeneutics to reception aesthetics and psychoanalytic theory, and conducted an in-depth analysis of its origin and evolution, problems and limitations. In this new edition, the author has added a new "Preface to the Twenty-fifth Anniversary Edition", giving new reflections on the development of literary theory.