The Humanist Critic examines the careers of Lionel Trilling and Edward Said in two contexts: on one hand, it focuses on the changing shape of literary criticism as it occurred alongside the advent of critical theory and, on the other hand, it addresses each critic's understanding of the gradual emergence of modernism in the nineteenth-century. Nutters argues that Trilling and Said each drew upon their favorite modern writers to reimagine the role of the humanist tradition at a time when the academic study of literature began to lose faith in humanism and fragment. The Humanist Critic thus studies the influence of Matthew Arnold and Thomas Mann on Trilling and the influence of Joseph Conrad and Gerard Manley Hopkins on Said while putting the careers of Trilling and Said in dialogue with structuralist and deconstructive thought. The Humanist Critic is ultimately a focused genealogy of literary studies; a study of influence; a critique of current trends in critical culture; and a renewed justification for the humanist vocation.

Assessments of the history of literary criticism suffer from two errors. On one hand, they often ignore the relationship between critical history and literary history. On the other hand, they tend to assume a progressive vision of history where literary movements or critical schools of thought build upon each other. As a result, such assessments either privilege the present and praise its progress or express nostalgia for the past.

The Humanist Critic: Lionel Trilling and Edward Said demonstrates the poverty of these tendencies. By examining the careers of two of the most significant figures in literary-critical history, it demonstrates how Said inherits and revises an older style of criticism that Trilling practices, and conversely, we see how Trilling anticipates future directions in criticism that Said will scrutinize. At the same time, The Humanist Critic argues that developments in critical history and developments in literary modernism represent a parallel story. Recognizing these intertwined narratives is key to lessening the perceived antagonism between modernism, continental critical theory, and what each presumably displaced.

The Humanist Critic thus studies the influence of Matthew Arnold and Thomas Mann on Trilling and the influence of Joseph Conrad and Gerard Manley Hopkins on Said while also putting the careers of Trilling and Said in dialogue with structuralist and deconstructive thought. The Humanist Critic is ultimately a focused genealogy of literary studies; a study of influence; a critique of current trends in critical culture; and a renewed justification for the humanist vocation.