The present work explores the possibilities of adopting a language based approach to the teaching of literature in the English language classroom. The work is necessitated by the fact that there has been an urgent need to re-examine the traditional approach to the literature teaching which has relied on literary criticism. The teacher devotes most of his time to discussing the social and literary background and very little time to the literary work itself. An analysis of a literary work can no longer be treated as a matter of personal insight and understanding alone. The students can make use of their knowledge of linguistics and grammar in the literature class. Bright and McGregor begin their model lesson with the reading of the poem without any direct introduction because what is not in the poem does not matter. The literary work should be the focus of the lesson and not the background.