The argument of this paper is that many texts of the Western literary canon rather than being vehicles of establishment values are critical of these values. Teaching these texts allows educators to challenge the interests of those who hold power in society as well as conventional sexual morality and gender stereotypes. Many important works of literature, in addition to denouncing hypocrisy, self-righteousness and all forms of exploitation, undermine occidental cultural preconceptions regarding the status of European civilisation and attitudes to religion and male-female relations. Yet there is an ambivalence in some texts that deal with racism and Europe's colonial legacy, and this ambivalence is also considered.