Franco Moretti may be the hippest Marxist literary critic working today, and here he argues that the most important thing when you're studying literature is figuring out the big picture. Think of it as "literary geography"—Moretti is basically trying to figure out exactly who was writing and read what, and where, at any given time.
In the age of Google Earth, how far could you take the mapping of literary texts? To absurdity? Or to real insight? How could you apply this to today's bestsellers? Is there a geography that links, say, Divergent and The Hunger Games?