Werth provides a theory of how we manage to see the worlds of texts through reading their sentences. He shows the complex ways in which readers interact with texts, bringing along shared knowledge of both language and the world to do so. He examines extracts from particular texts in considerable detail to explain how text worlds are built up as we read. In so doing, he sheds new light on a wide range of aspects of textual understanding, including text and discourse analysis, discourse presentation, textual deixis, textual reference and presupposition, theories of how shared knowledge operates and aspects of cognitive linguistics, including mental spaces and metaphor. (Publisher book description)