This study was designed to (1) determine whether prospective English teachers who had taken a course in literary criticism differed significantly from those who had not, and (2) discover what books on critical theory students had read and whether a relationship existed between number of books read and scores on a literary criticism test. A test was developed to measure students' critical vocabulary and their understanding of the theories of the New Criticism, New-Aristotelianism, and Archetypal Criticism. It was validated by selecting only those items from an experimental form of the test on which a group of specialists agreed. The test was administered to 262 seniors enrolled in English teacher-training programs at 10 Illinois colleges and universities during 1967-68. Results indicated (1) that undergraduate students who had taken a literary criticism course had a greater, more systematic understanding of critical theory than those who did not; (2) that independent reading had little or no effect on test scores; (3) that a majority of the books read dealt with New Criticism; and (4) that undergraduate courses are more effective in imparting an understanding of critical theory than in conveying a critical lexicon. (The test is included.) (LH)