World Literature in Theory provides a definitive exploration of the pressing questions facing those studying world literature today.

• Coverage is split into four parts which examine the origins and seminal formulations of world literature, world literature in the age of globalization, contemporary debates on world literature, and localized versions of world literature
• Contains more than 30 important theoretical essays by the most influential scholars, including Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Hugo Meltzl, Edward Said, Franco Moretti, Jorge Luis Borges, and Gayatri Spivak
• Includes substantive introductions to each essay, as well as an annotated bibliography for further reading
• Allows students to understand, articulate, and debate the most important issues in this rapidly changing field of study

David Damrosch is Ernest Bernbaum Professor of Comparative Literature at Harvard University. He is the founding general editor of the six-volume Longman Anthology of World Literature (2004), the editor of Teaching World Literature (2009), and co-editor of the Princeton Sourcebook in Comparative Literature (2009). He is also the author of How to Read World Literature (Wiley-Blackwell, 2008) and The Buried Book: The Loss and Rediscovery of the Great Epic of Gilgamesh (2007). His current research projects include a book on the discipline of comparative literature and a book on the role of global scripts in the formation of national literatures. He is the founding director of the Institute for World Literature at Harvard University.