Norton Introduction to Literature

by Mays

"The Norton Introduction to Literature offers the ideal mix of the stories, poetry, and plays at the heart of every literature course. With abundant tools for close reading and thoughtful writing, thorough treatment of literary context, and the most comprehensive menu of teaching resources, The Norton Introduction to Literature help students understand, analyze, and write about literature better than any other text of its kind. New contemporary selections include a compelling array by authors such as Louise Erdrich, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Haruki Muakami, Ada Limon, Natalie Diaz, Evie Shockey, Claudia Rankine, and Lynn Nottage, complementing classroom favorites by Toni Morrison, Virginia Woolf, and Oscar Wilde, among others"--

Genres: Literature, Textbooks, Nonfiction, School, Reference, Poetry, College

1127 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

Reviews

[Rachel Nicole Wagner · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love literature. This book is such a wonderful tribute to such wonderful short stories and works of literary art.

[Nicholas Christenson · Rating 4 out of 5]

it's pretty good ..

[Caroline · Rating 3 out of 5]

By word count, this is mostly just an anthology. It's a nice one, containing a wide variety of well-known short stories, poems, and plays. I was hoping for more than that, but as an anthology, it was put together well enough to be worth it.

There are a few types of additional content beyond the included works. First, the main aspects of literature are discussed, such as plot, setting, symbolism, etc., but not in any more depth than I learned in high school. In the “plot” section (and similarly for other sections) there are several stories presumably chosen for having interesting plots, but the reasoning for their inclusion was not discussed.

There are also questions after many of the inclusions which I could see being interesting to discuss with a group, but didn't add much value to me reading through on my own. For example, after a story with a confusing ending, the book asks why the narrator burned with anguish and anger at the end. That’s exactly what I was wondering, so being asked with no answer is just frustrating! The book makes it clear that questions like this often don’t have a right answer, but I would have enjoyed seeing someone else’s perspective on the matter.

There are also some sections called "Exploring Contexts", each of which includes one story or several related stories and explains some of the context behind them. The context given includes biographical information about the author, historical information relevant to the work, grouping several works by the same author together with commentary on the similarities, and literary essays by prominent critics. These were my favorite sections, and I wish fewer works had been included so there would be space to include at least one essay about each included work.

Finally, there is a section at the with advice on how to write essays on literature, directed at college students. I found some of it informative, but there is also a lot of trivia, like how to properly source quotations.

Some of my favorite stories:

The Lives of the Dead: Had an interesting perspective on how people cope with death. I liked the parallel tales from the war and from his childhood.

A Pair of Tickets: This inspired me to read the entire book The Joy Luck Club, and I thought this story was even better in the context of the whole book than on its own. I liked seeing the main character grow to appreciate a closeness to her family that she didn't see at first.

Bloodchild: This was really creepy. I liked the bizarreness of the relationship.

A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings: A Tale for Children: I liked the contrast of the style here to how angels are usually portrayed in fiction.

Jesus Shaves: I thought this was very funny, mostly the relatable depiction of people learning a foreign language and trying to converse with their classmates the best they can.

A Hunger Artist: I liked the vivid depiction of the "artist" starving himself out of pride. Honestly I don't see the allegory for anything. It's just a weird story to me.

A Doll House: I really liked how this subverted the trope of a husband and wife fighting over how much the wife was spending. I also liked the main character's development, and that she left her jerk of a husband.

I'll also mention one story I particularly didn't like, Black Box: This short story was actually "published" as a series of tweets, each phrased as advice. It's a cool idea, but I found it felt gimmicky long before the story was over.

[Dani Kline · Rating 5 out of 5]

I probably read less than 1/4 of this book for my literature class, but it is a fantastic collection of literature, including short stories, plays, and poems.

[B. P. Rinehart · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is another book form the Norton Anthology series and it is an interesting one. It is an instructor's edition of a condensed edition. This book is meant to give you a thorough introduction to the editors' concept of literature. While the actual opinions are subjective (and I am always suspicious of the opinions of the Norton Anthology contributing editors), I come to these anthologies for the literary selections and this book comes through. It gives a very wide and diverse selections that demonstrate an idea of literary style. I don't know if I would come to this book for literary criticism, but to read literature itself--this book is a fine introduction.

[Sebastiaan Wortelboer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I did skim a good bit though

[Micah · Rating 1 out of 5]

I had to use this book this past semester for English Composition 2 and I COULD NOT WAIT to be done with the class. The author, Kelly J. Mays, is detailed but she’s extremely long-winded. Sentences are so overwritten and many of them seemed like run-on sentences. I frequently read but after reading just one assignment from this book, I remember feeling like I needed a drink. Important vocabulary terms were bolded but not clearly defined. Having to use this book made a four-and-a-half month semester feel like an entire year.

[Pash Chan · Rating 3 out of 5]

An easy guide to literature but bad that it doesn't include more analysis of each work

[Julia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Had to read this for class

[joie · Rating 4 out of 5]

only read 25% for class but it was really good

[Marti (Letstalkaboutbooksbaybee) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read for class

I read about 60% of this in class, and then another 25% on my own for funsies so you bet I’m counting it towards my reading challenge this year.

For being the “shortened version” it was still 2k+ pages long


I thought this was actually quite a nice lil arrangement of short fiction, poetry, and plays all rolled into one with a solid introduction on common literary things like theme, plot, setting, character etc.

Perfect for a LIT 101 course

Which is exactly the course I read it for.

[Judy · Rating 1 out of 5]

I use this textbook in my course (the Norton "Portable" edition) and wanted to explore the ebook offering recommended by the publisher. This Kindle ebook is the text of the "Shorter" edition. The chapter numbers don't match up and that would be fine except that this book is not hyperlinked at all. Even a student whose professor was using the "Shorter" edition would have trouble using this book. Minimally, the table of contents should be hyperlinked. Hyperlinking to the works from the "Index of Authors" the end would be even better. Most college instructors don't assign students to read straight through a text of this sort--they pick and choose. And the lack of hyperlinks--even minimal hyperlinks--makes this volume difficult to reconcile with a course syallbus.

[Norma Jesus · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think this is an excellent book, especially as we used it for teaching literature at home. For us, the most useful feature was the step-by-step examples of how to read a piece, what the reader should be looking for, and then examples of other writers' analysis and writing. It is so well done and great for those students who want to mull over a concept at their own speed. The examples used are interesting and my daughter said, "This doesn't feel like a textbook."

[Hen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This sine qua non of English lit majors seemed to overwhelm (and that's an understatement) my own students, most of whom are decidedly not lit majors. Most of them hate to read, which saddens me. But I'll always feel nostalgia for Norton lit tomes--they're beautiful.

[Lyndsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've had so much fun teaching intro to literature. I can't wait to do it again.

[Jaylene Alarcón · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bought this text book for my English Composition II class and kept it because there are so many great poems written by great authors. Overall, very good!

[Eve O. Spellman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good English book filled with fantastic short stories.

[Salem Alazemi · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was amazing trip with this Book, I love every page on this Book, I advice literature students to read it.

[clara · Rating 1 out of 5]

TRASH.

[Farouk Adil · Rating 5 out of 5]

دليل نورتن الادبي (قاموس نورتن للادب ).

[Grace Robinson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Had to read for college

[Raman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I got this book for my class, mainly to read works by Morrison, Shakespeare and other authors I will encounter in my further scholarly studies. Anyhow, I think this is a great book, and I've alredy marked some titles that cought my eye for future reading. Overall, I would say that this is an excellent collection of diverse texts!

[Emma Frances · Rating 3 out of 5]

**PUPPY - GEORGE SAUNDERS REVIEW**
(couldn’t find it on here, but here is the textbook i read it our of)

cool story but i fear i was very confused at times. loved the meaning though and think the writing was brilliant

[Nonya-bi-niss · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had to read this book for class and this book had some very interesting stories. I was somewhat confused by some of the work but overall I can still say it was interesting.

[Grace]

Used for school

[Kimberly · Rating 5 out of 5]

This textbook was incredibly good! Very easy to understand with excellent examples and explanations. I can see myself referring to this book often throughout my college career.

[Ellora Wyntrs · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was such a good textbook to read for my first literature class. I learned so much from it and a lot of the amazing stories throughout really helped fuel and grow my writing overall.

[Mars Cannon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Synopsis: The shorter twelfth edition of this book by Kelly J Mays covered fiction, poetry, drama, how to wrote a research paper, and historical contexts.

Pro: Numerous examples of different types of genres of literature were given in this edition. If you are wanting an entire collection of great examples this may be the book for you or your class. The format of this book was easy to follow and understand. The sections within this book labeled as "suggestions for writing" had thought-provoking questions related to the text for students or other readers for which they could draw ideas. This is a rather lengthy book to get through for a one-semester class, but it is possible to read the entire collection in that timespan. I would definitely recommend this book for college English classes.

Con: Prepare for tons of gloomy stories about divorce, abortion, death, outdated gender roles, being a prisoner like in "The House of Asterion", and arson like in "Barn Burning". The majority of the stories I read in my English II class were on these topics.

[Maria · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book I read for my English Literature class, that I followed as an exchange student at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea.
Although we had to read only a selection of stories from this book, I ended up reading it all, from cover to cover :)
The book is conveniently divided into sections (fiction, poetry, drama) and gives clear information on how to read these different works of literature as well as how to go about researching them and writing essays.
It even helped me to prepare writing my thesis, even though my thesis will not necessarily be a literary "essay". Many allusions in the works included are also explained through footnotes, which gave more insight in the background and settings of the works.
I gave 4 stars because of enjoyment (sometimes the pages were so full of text and with so many different fonts that it got really hard to focuss on what I was reading).

[Lilly · Rating 4 out of 5]

No I did not read the full textbook. However, I am adding this for the multiple short stories I read for AP Lit, participating in discussions. Including in order: "Hills Like White Elephants," "The Story of an Hour," "Cathedral," "The Lady with the Dog," "The Yellow Wallpaper," A Hunger Artist," "A Rose for Emily," "Flowering Judas," and "A Good Man is Hard to Find." Somewhere in there, my own group presented "Sonny's Blues." After the short story unit, we got into Edith Wharton.