Few modern American critics have made contributions as important to the formal study of literature in general, and to the understanding of French literature in particular, as Michael Riffaterre. While his poetic theories have drawn the careful attention of critics from many different epistemological and ideological camps, there is little doubt that the pragmatic value of his analyses of specific texts, in and of itself, will assure him of a privileged position in the history of literary criticism. Indeed, from his earliest essays to his present-day research Riffaterre has never lost sight of the need and desirability of providing his reader with a practical application of certain theoretical points to particular works of literature. Yet this same pragmatic quality of his studies has been one of the main aspects of his work which many of his most vocal critics have called into question. In reading various critiques of...