Prior to the advent of the American School, the scope of comparative literature in the West was typically limited to the literatures of Western Europe and Anglo-America, predominantly literature in English, German and French literature, with occasional forays into Italian literature (primarily for Dante) and Spanish literature (primarily for Miguel de Cervantes). One monument to the approach of this period is Erich Auerbach's book "", a survey of techniques of realism in texts whose origins span several continents and three thousand years.