馬克思和恩格斯的思想，是古典馬克思主義的磐石；毫無疑問，是他們成功地建構了今天歐美文學社會主義學說的主要輪廓。眼下國內文學研究者，常只注意到文學的內緣議題，鮮少對使得文學之所以成為文學的外緣事務和政、經、社會學相關的理論要處理的有較為深入的探討，因而本文除了就馬克思主義在文學理論上的影響，做一概括性的描述以外，尚探討「文學的社會學」概念，用今天歐美耳熟能詳的一些馬克思主義觀念，以及其文學理論領域內極具影響力的宗師，如偉伯、盧卡奇、阿圖塞、葛蘭西、伊果頓、威廉斯等人所主張的論點，再夾雜用英語世界莎學界運用馬克思主義的主要研究為例，闡釋文學理論與政經社會學（socio-political and socio-economic studies）的結構性關係，以說明二十一世紀文學以及文化界知識份子研究文學可以同時承擔的部分社會責任。

The groundwork of classical Marxism has long been laid by Marx and Engles in the nineteenth century; no doubt, it is they who have outlined the sociological approach in Euro-American literature today. Long time, too, have contemporary researchers and commentators of literature in Taiwan only paid attention to intrinsic litarary study, therefore seldom furthered their knowledge in extrinsic subjects--those dealt by socio-politically and socio-economically related theories--for these are what makes literature directly connected to social reality. In view of this factor, this paper not only tries to provide an overview of Marxism-affected literary aesthetics, but also discusses the concept of the sociological approach to literature using familar Marxist premises and the theories expounded by influential theoreticians such as Weber, Lukács, Althusser, Gramsci, Eagleton, and Williams. Using Marxism-affected Shakespearean studies as illustructions, I explain the homology between literary theory and socio-political, socio-economic studies, hoping to give an idea how the twenty-first century intellectuals in the field of literary-cultural studies can share a part of the social responsibilities that deeply affect our and our next generation's future.