Literary criticism has existed since ancient Greece. Early critics like Plato and Aristotle focused on morality and structure. Later critics examined additional elements like language, social context, and reader response. Literary criticism serves two main purposes: evaluating quality and assessing cultural/moral values. There are several approaches to criticism, including formalism examining literary elements, moralism viewing literature through ethics, and sociology analyzing social context. Psychology also draws on theory to understand text, author, and reader deeper.