Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century

Name: Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century
Price: 44.99 AUD
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ISBN: 9780691265704

Dan Sinykin, Johanna Winant

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English

Princeton Book Company
21 October 2025

Literary studies: general; Reference

Series: Skills for Scholars

A user's guide to the fundamental practice of literary studies, providing context, examples, and practical exercises

Close reading-making an argument based in close attention to a text-is the foundation of literary studies. This book offers a guide to close reading, treating it as a skill that can be taught and practiced. It first explains what close reading is, what it does, and how it has been used across theoretical schools ranging from affect studies to Black studies to queer theory to Marxism. It then presents a series of master classes in the practice, with original contributions by scholars from a range of different institutions. Finally, it provides practical materials, worksheets, and suggested activities for instructors to use in the classroom. The tone throughout is encouraging and accessible, inviting readers of all backgrounds to hone their craft.

The book divides the practice of close reading into five steps, coining a term for each step: scene setting, noticing, local claiming, regional argumentation, and global theorizing. It traces the roots of close reading, showing how it has spread far beyond its origins in practical criticism and New Criticism. In twenty-one short chapters, contemporary scholars discuss close readings by such prominent literary critics as Erich Auerbach and Helen Vendler, describing how their arguments work and how to achieve similar results. An essential resource for instructors and students at the undergraduate level and beyond, this book shows how understanding close reading can make us better readers, thinkers, and writers.

By: Dan Sinykin, Johanna Winant
Imprint: Princeton Book Company
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 235mm, Width: 156mm,
ISBN: 9780691265704
ISBN 10: 0691265704
Series: Skills for Scholars
Pages: 288
Publication Date: 21 October 2025
Recommended Age: From 16 years
Audience: College/higher education , College/higher education , Professional and scholarly , A / AS level , Primary
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Dan Sinykin is the Winship Distinguished Research Professor of English at Emory University and the author of Big Fiction: How Conglomeration Changed the Publishing Industry and American Literature. Johanna Winant is associate professor of English and humanities at Reed College and the author of Lyric Logic.

Reviews for Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century

""Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century offers a much-needed clarity on the exact work of close reading. . . . Sinykin and Winant’s book ultimately makes the parlor of close reading public and revels in its promise.""---Douglas Dowland, Los Angeles Review of Books ""If it attempts to construct a how-to taxonomy of what close reading is, for me the book is even more a testament to how we fall for it in the first place—as thunderstruck, usually mute admirers watching someone else’s magic show, slowly coming to think, I could do that too.""---Nicholas Dames, Public Books