The Structure of Literature

About “The Structure of Literature”

The Structure of Literature is a 1954 book of literary criticism by Paul Goodman. It is the published version of his doctoral dissertation in the humanities. The book presents a method of formal literary analysis called "inductive formal analysis." This approach involves identifying a formal structure within a single literary work, examining how its parts interact to form a whole, and using these insights to analyze other works. Goodman supports his theory with close readings of multiple literary works and discussions of genre. (Summary adapted from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.)