The Introduction (by Neil Gilroy-Scott, although the volume’s overall editor is Christopher Brumfit) describes a frequent assumption in language education that students would be able to deal with literature once they had learned the language, and that meanwhile they needed to be ‘protected’ from literary texts. As a consequence, students were not only ill-equipped for future literary study, but also denied potential language-learning activities. In contrast with the resistance by many to the use of literature in the English language classroom, a few practitioners were involved in innovative work, often related to the developing field of literary stylistics. According to Gilroy-Scott, the authors included in this volume ‘share a willingness to take a fresh look at what is involved in the reading and studying of literature and its language’.
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