Praising It NewMarked by a rigorously close textual reading, detached frombiographical or other extratextual material, New Criticism was thedominant literary theory of the mid twentieth century. Since thattime, schools of literary criticism have arisen in support of or in opposition tothe approach advocated by the New Critics. Nonetheless, the theory remainsone of the most important sources for groundbreaking criticism and continuesto be a controversial approach to