I read the first chapter of this before giving it up as a bad job. The book reads like the author swallowed a book on theory and puked it up all over the page. He spends pages and pages failing to commit to any intellectual positions, while saying "oh, I kind of agree with this thing, but it's not convenient for the way I want to talk about literature, so I'll be ignoring part of it".

Widdowson says that he'd like to consider this book as a long essay, and I've got to agree--it's like the kind of rambling, unfocused essay that undergraduates get marked down for. If the book were more concise, the chatty tone it takes might soften the rather involved theoretical questions the book (no doubt) addresses, but as it is, it's just annoying.

Much though I wanted to read a book on this topic, this book isn't it. ( )