[30][note 1]. Certain scientific works endure as literature long after their scientific content has become outdated. Corrections? The following, by the award-winning British author William Boyd on the short story, might be applied to all prose fiction: [short stories] seem to answer something very deep in our nature as if, for the duration of its telling, something special has been created, some essence of our experience extrapolated, some temporary sense has been made of our common, turbulent journey towards the grave and oblivion. [144] This new term is not applied retroactively; works that had entered the public domain between 1999 and 2018 by expiration would remain in the public domain. The earliest form of which there exists substantial knowledge is Greek drama. literature definition: 1. written artistic works, especially those with a high and lasting artistic value: 2. all the…. [37][38] Drama and satire also developed as urban culture provided a larger public audience, and later readership, for literary production. At the college or graduate level, English literature tends to refer to British literature. [132] The form is combined with music and dance in opera and musical theatre (see libretto). [73], American Literature (academic discipline), The widespread education of women was not common until the nineteenth century, and because of this literature until recently was mostly male dominated. Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. What is English literature? [146], A notorious example of censorship is James Joyce's novel Ulysses, which has been described by Russian-American novelist Vladimir Nabokov as a "divine work of art" and the greatest masterpiece of 20th century prose. [25], Writing systems are not known to exist among Native North Americans before contact with Europeans. [32] Though in both ancient Egypt and Mesoamerica, writing may have already emerged because of the need to record historical and environmental events. [103] Possibly as a result of Aristotle's influence (his Poetics), "poetry" before the 19th century was usually less a technical designation for verse than a normative category of fictive or rhetorical art. The Samhitas (vedic collections) date to roughly 1500–1000 BC, and the "circum-Vedic" texts, as well as the redaction of the Samhitas, date to c. 1000‒500 BC, resulting in a Vedic period, spanning the mid-2nd to mid 1st millennium BC, or the Late Bronze Age and the Iron Age. Social Media Marketing. A value judgment definition of literature considers it as consisting solely of high quality writing that forms part of the belles-lettres ("fine writing") tradition. Etymologically, the term derives from Latin literatura/litteratura "learning, a writing, grammar," originally "writing formed with letters," from litera/littera "letter". Yet through words literature elevates and transforms experience beyond “mere” pleasure. Updates? Special Lecturer, University of California, Santa Barbara. An excellent example is Gilbert White’s Natural History and Antiquities of Selbourne (1789). I n time, the canon, formerly the province of reviews and magazines, was annexed by institutions of higher learning, which cultivated eminent professors of English and comparative literature and later recruited famous poets and writers to act as gatekeepers. Plato (428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) and Aristotle (384–322 BC) authored philosophical texts that are the foundation of Western philosophy, Sappho (c. 630 – c. 570 BC) and Pindar were influential lyric poets, and Herodotus (c. 484 – c. 425 BC) ) and Thucydides were early Greek historians. Rome’s great orator Cicero was to have a decisive influence on the development of English prose style. And indeed its central meaning, at least, is clear enough. Why should we spend our time reading novels and poems when, out there, big things are going on? [28][68] As Islam spread, the Quran had the effect of unifying and standardizing Arabic. Part of. [8] In spite of this, the term has also been applied to spoken or sung texts. Section A Modern texts: students will answer one essay question from a choice of two on their studied modern prose or drama text. Addressing humanity. (...) Indeed, if these final decades of the millennium have taught us anything, it must be that oral tradition never was the other we accused it of being; it never was the primitive, preliminary technology of communication we thought it to be. Learn more. See more. [17], The earliest poetry is believed to have been recited or sung, employed as a way of remembering history, genealogy, and law. [17] Modern archaeology has been unveiling evidence of the human efforts to preserve and transmit arts and knowledge that depended completely or partially on an oral tradition, across various cultures: The Judeo-Christian Bible reveals its oral traditional roots; medieval European manuscripts are penned by performing scribes; geometric vases from archaic Greece mirror Homer's oral style. The essay was once written deliberately as a piece of literature: its subject matter was of comparatively minor importance. [45][46] The Vedas are among the oldest sacred texts. Indeed, it becomes more and more difficult to categorize literature, for in modern civilization words are everywhere. The 11th edition of Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary considers literature to be “writings having excellence of form or expression and expressing ideas of permanent or universal interest.” The 19th-century critic Walter Pater referred to “the matter of imaginative or artistic literature” as a “transcript, not of mere fact, but of fact in its infinitely varied forms.” But such definitions assume that the reader already knows what literature is. Today most essays are written as expository, informative journalism, although there are still essayists in the great tradition who think of themselves as artists. Classical Greek genres included philosophy, poetry, historiography, comedies and dramas. [125] Publishers and literary award societies typically consider a novella to be between 17,000 and 40,000 words. Hence, it can be said that English is a subset of literature. [103][104][105] This distinction is complicated by various hybrid forms such as the sound poetry, concrete poetry and prose poem,[106] and more generally by the fact that prose possesses rhythm. Internet Archive Digital eBook Collection, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Literature&oldid=1002440340, Articles with dead external links from January 2021, Pages containing links to subscription-only content, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles with unsourced statements from November 2020, Articles to be expanded from November 2020, Wikipedia articles needing clarification from October 2020, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 24 January 2021, at 13:37. Ring in the new year with a Britannica Membership, https://www.britannica.com/art/literature. [98][99][100], The King James Version of the Bible has been called "the most influential version of the most influential book in the world, in what is now its most influential language", "the most important book in English religion and culture", and "the most celebrated book in the English-speaking world". [54] Modern scholars consider these accounts legendary. By signing up for this email, you are agreeing to news, offers, and information from Encyclopaedia Britannica. In ancient India, literature originated from stories that were originally orally transmitted. She has a unique place in our age. The earliest known Greek writings are Mycenaean (c.1600–1100 BC), written in the Linear B syllabary on clay tablets. Prior to printing, distributed works were copied manually, by scribes. A literature review summarizes and synthesizes the existing scholarly research on a particular topic. [69], Controversial, religious, political and instructional literature proliferated during the European Renaissance as a result of the Johannes Gutenberg's invention of the printing press[70] around 1440, while the Medieval romance developed into the novel,[71]. [120], Although there are many historical prototypes, so-called "novels before the novel",[121] the modern novel form emerges late in cultural history—roughly during the eighteenth century. [66] Literature in latin would flourish for the next six centuries, and includes essays, histories, poems, plays, and other writings. Publishing became possible with the invention of writing, but became more practical with the invention of printing. [145] Generally such bodies attempt to ban works for political reasons, or because they deal with other controversial matters such as race, or sex. The plays of Aristophanes (c. 446 – c. 386 BC) provide the only real examples of a genre of comic drama known as Old Comedy, the earliest form of Greek Comedy, and are in fact used to define the genre. All literature, whether it be poems, essays, novels, or short stories, helps us address human nature and conditions which affect all people. taking a more critical look at the signs and words surrounding us every day All of the world’s classic surveys of history can stand as noble examples of the art of literature, but most historical works and studies today are not written primarily with literary excellence in mind, though they may possess it, as it were, by accident. [34] The primary genres of the literature of ancient Egypt—didactic texts, hymns and prayers, and tales—were written almost entirely in verse;[35] By the Old Kingdom (26th century BC to 22nd century BC), literary works included funerary texts, epistles and letters, hymns and poems, and commemorative autobiographical texts recounting the careers of prominent administrative officials. [4] In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include oral literature, much of which has been transcribed. As noted above, prose generally makes far less use of the aesthetic qualities of language than poetry. in addition to canonical works, popular and minority genres. English Literature. "The Emergence of "Literature": Making and Reading the English Canon in the Eighteenth Century. Some literatures are treated separately by language, by nation, or by special subject (e.g., Arabic literature, Celtic literature, Latin literature, French literature, Japanese literature, and biblical literature). 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