The author explores Western literary tradition by concentrating on the works of twenty-six authors central to the Canon. In this book, the author argues against ideology in literary criticism; laments the loss of intellectual and aesthetic standards; and tackles topics including multiculturalism, Marxism, feminism, neoconservatism, Afrocentrism, and the New Historicism. Insisting instead upon "the autonomy of the aesthetic," the author places Shakespeare...