This book introduces the three principal types or genres of literature: fiction, poetry, and drama in a way that helps students read literature with pleasure, intelligence, and discrimination.

With its 53 fiction readings, 314 poems and 14 plays, [This book] provides students with a grounding in the traditional canon that is a vital part of our literary heritage, while at the same time presenting the diverse voices that are an essential part of our cultural record and an exciting force in contemporary literature. Unlike other introductory texts, [this book] links the traditional elements of literature to the everyday culture students already know well. [The book] introduce[s] elements using everyday images, inviting students to draw the connections between them. The chapter on plot, for example, begins with storyboards form a television commercial; word choice, word-order, and tone, which a collection of personal ads; setting and staging with street murals. By showing that even pop culture uses the elements of the literature they study in class, [the book] helps students realize that the literary concepts simply reflect ideas that we all encounter in our daily lives, and that literature itself is simply a reflection of human experience.-Back cover.

In Reading for Preaching Cornelius Plantinga makes a striking claim: preachers who read widely will most likely become better preachers. Plantinga -- himself a master preacher -- shows how a wide reading program can benefit preachers. First, he says, good reading generates delight, and the preacher who enters the world of delight goes with God. Good reading can also help tune the preacher's ear for language -- his or her primary tool. General reading can enlarge the preacher's sympathies for people and situations that she or he had previously known nothing about. And, above all, the preacher who reads widely has the chance to become wise. This beautifully written book will benefit not just preachers but anyone interested in the wisdom to be derived from reading. Works that Plantinga interacts with in the book include The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini Enrique's Journey, by Sonia Nazario Silence, by Shusaku Endo "How Much Land Does a Man Need?" by Leo Tolstoy "Narcissus Leaves the Pool" by Joseph Epstein Les Miserables, by Victor Hugo . . . and many more!

Introduces students to the diversity of their literary culture. Through its discussions, expanded canon, critical perspectives, and juxtapositions of similar works by authors from different periods or traditions, the book encourages investigations of literature.

An enriching introduction to the diverse and exciting world of literature, this anthology offers a broad collection of short fiction, poetry, drama and nonfiction selections written by a diverse group of writers who represent different social classes, races, genders, cultures, and sexual orientations. Organizes selections around five socially relevant themes-- Growing Up and Growing Older; Women and Men; Money and Work; Peace and War; and Varieties of Protest. Shows how literary technique serves larger purposes-- the recreation of experience, the exploration of ideas, the analysis of social issues-- and how these larger purposes themselves shape literary form. Explains the ways in which literary form creates meaning, and provides a strong emphasis on writing about literature throughout, with a full chapter on all stages of the writing process -- generating ideas, developing a thesis, discovering a form, drafting, revising, and editing-- plus numerous excerpts from sample papers and journals. Now contains 42 new works, with more by Native American and Latino/Latina writers, as well as Bertolt Brecht's play Mother Courage" and Shakespeare's Othello"; also includes 18 works of nonfiction prose that have been chosen both for their literary technique as well as for their exploration of the five major themes.

Now in its 2nd edition, this guide helps students build the knowledge and tools needed to tackle poetry with confidence.

This comprehensive broadly-based collection gives the student a wide variety of selections in five major forms of literature. In addition, it offers a survey of the historical development of each genre; brief biographies of each author; a clear, concise editorial apparatus; lively introductions and critical remarks, as well as glossary and an index.

Representing the largest expansion between editions, this updated volume of Ottemiller's Index to Plays in Collections is the standard location tool for full-length plays published in collections and anthologies in England and the United States throughout the 20th century and beyond. This new volume lists more than 3,500 new plays and 2,000 new authors, as well as birth and/or death information for hundreds of authors.