Accessibility StatementFor more information contact us atinfo@libretexts.org. It has been much investigated to establish its authenticity and its date. Try to think of at least 10, but a larger sample size is better. For example, while women make up about half of the population, over 80% of the most popular novels were written by men ("Battle"). But not everything expressed in wordseven when organized and written downis counted as literature. He was baptized in Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon on April 26, 1564, his mothers third child, but the first to survive infancy. Some are in a highly polished literary style; others, couched in a privately evolved language, win their standing as literature because of their cogency, insight, depth, and scope. The circumstances of Shakespeares speaker, in contrast, are not those of a courtier but of a male of the upwardly mobile middling sort. Especially in the young man sonnets, there is a marked class anxiety, as the speaker seeks to define his role, whether as a friend, a tutor, a counselor, an employee, or a sexual rival. What "single stories" do you know? The poet, critic, and professor breaks down how she builds spaces to gather and exchange in her poems, the lineages she pulls Our magazine founder explains the Bards genius. While there are many possible reasons for this discrepancy in representation (which could be the focus of an entire textbook), what does this mean for scholars of literature? Man is subject to a continuous flood of communication. Many novelscertainly all the worlds great novelsare literature, but there are thousands that are not so considered. Douglass, Frederick. That is one reason why the current study of literature is so exciting. For the poet, Sundays were not for church, but for Shakespeare. On the contrary, a scientific exposition might be of great literary value and a pedestrian poem of none at all. Apparently, "literary means not only what is written but what is voiced, what is expressed, what is invented, in whatever form" in which case maps, sermons, comic strips, cartoons, speeches, photographs, movies, war memorials, and music all huddle beneath the literary umbrella. While Aristotle was most famous for his contributions to science and philosophy, he is also considered one of the first literary critics. What about video games, like Skyrim, or memes, like Grumpy Cat? Most critics would not admit advertising copywriting, purely commercial fiction, or cinema and television scripts as accepted forms of literary expression, although others would hotly dispute their exclusion. For students? Venus and Adonis was printed by Richard Field, a professionally accomplished printer who lived in Stratford. (Photo by Stock Montage/Getty Images), Hark, hark! In Joel Finemans analysis, Shakespeare creates a radical internalization of Petrarchism, reordering its dynamic by directing his attention to the speakers subjectivity rather than to the ostensible object of the speakers devotion: the poetry of praise becomes poetry of self-discovery. 1929. Variations are played on Elizabethan conventions of erotic discourse: love without sex, sex without love, a master-mistress who is prickd out for womens pleasure as the ultimate in unattainable (to my purpose nothing, 20) adoration. Here are some explanations to some of the allusions that appear in his texts and might not be widely understood today. So how can we differentiate between such works? Legal. literature, a body of written works. Can this be considered on the same level of literary achievement as Hamlet? My chihuahua's face looks silly and very dramatic. Other tragedies, fairly or not, are often judged on their quality in comparison to Sophocles' works. Why? This is especially important given the history of the canon. Here's a quick and simple definition: A tragic hero is a type of character in a tragedy, and is usually the protagonist. The historically validated interpretationfor Shakespeares readers, descendants of Brutus in New Troyis figured by Brutus, who pluckd the knife from Lucreces side. He steps forward, casting off his reputation for folly and improvising a ritual (involving kissing the knife) that transforms grief and outrage at Lucreces death into a determination to publish Tarquins foul offense and change the political system. Shakespeare's plays often conclude with an epilogue in which one of the characters delivers a speech that neatly sums up the outcome of the play's events. Wherefore such madness? The oratory of the American Indian, for instance, is famous, while in Classical Greece, Polymnia was the muse sacred to poetry and oratory. And if those who had the means to read and write had to jump through absurd hoops just to have their works published? Dont turn the page until you have written them down. The woman is a city besieged by an eloquent wooer (how deceits were gilded in his smiling), whose essence is dissimulation (his passion, but an art of craft). According to Meyer (1997) [16] the concept of Literature could be described as: "written texts that are marked by careful use of language, including features such as creative metaphors,. My name is Will, declares the speaker of 136. litr-a-tr, n. the science of letters or what is written: the whole body of literary compositions in any language, or on a given subject: all literary productions except those relating to positive science and art, usually confined, however, to the belles-lettres. adj. Two different approaches to the definition of literature (criterial and prototypical) are described, and some features of a prototypical literary work are outlined. With the partial exception of the Sonnets (1609), quarried since the early 19th century for autobiographical secrets allegedly encoded in them, the nondramatic writings have traditionally been pushed to the margins of the Shakespeare industry. The Greeks thought of history as one of the seven arts, inspired by a goddess, the muse Clio. While the London theaters were closed, some actors tried to make a living by touring outside the capital. Hear Clinton Terrell share his experience of going from solitary confinement to UC Berkeley. The fact of prior circulation has important implications for the sonnets. In short, all artistic skill (arguably) considered equal, why do some authors predominantly feature in the Canon while others do not? Sonnet 146: Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth, Sonnet 147: My love is as a fever, longing still, Speech:Now is the winter of our discontent, Speech:To be, or not to be, that is the question, Mere Air, These Words, but Delicious to Hear, Suzi F. Garcia in Conversation with Ada Limn, Ye Elves of Hills, Brooks, Standing Lakes and Groves, Philippa Berry, "Women, Language and History in, Margreta De Grazia, "The Scandal of Shakespeare's Sonnets,", Katherine Duncan-Jones, "Much Ado with Red and White: The Earliest Readers of Shakespeare's, Robert Ellrodt, "Shakespeare the Non-dramatic Poet," in, Thomas M. Greene, "Pitiful Thrivers: Failed Husbandry in the Sonnets," in, C. H. Hobday, "Shakespeare's Venus and Adonis Sonnets,", Coppelia Kahn, "The Rape in Shakespeare's, Arthur F. Marotti, "'Love is not Love': Elizabethan Sonnets and the Social Order,", Marotti, "Shakespeare's Sonnets as Literary Property," in, Katherine E. Maus, "Taking Tropes Seriously: Language and Violence in, Peter Stallybrass, "Editing as Cultural Formation: The Sexing of Shakespeare's Sonnets,", Gary Taylor, "Some Manuscripts of Shakespeare's Sonnets,", Nancy M. Vickers, "'The Blazon of Sweet Beauty's Best': Shakespeare's, Linda Woodbridge, "Palisading the Elizabethan Body Politic,". Friedrich, Caspar David. Yet neither are the Sonnets a random anthology, a loose gathering of scattered rhymes. However, even when trying to publish The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (1845)his publishers were forced to prove that it was, in fact, an enslaved personwho wrote the story and not a white man who wrote it for him. While there may be some debate, most students usually respond that Friedrich's painting is more artistic. It also led to attempts to relate them to what was known or could be surmised about Shakespeares life. While the second image appears to be produced with a simple doodle, and quickly composed, the first indicates more complexity, attention-to-detail, and craft. On the other end, Shakespeare's Hamlet definitely fits the definition of "lasting," in that it has survived hundreds of years. ", "Banned Books of Guantnamo: 'An American Slave' by Frederick Douglass. Aristotles analysis of Tragedy was so influential that it is still used today, over two thousand years later! How could Black writers enter the canon en masse if they were not allowed to read or write? Or James Hogg, a Scottish contemporary of Wordsworth who was a lower-class shepherd? What Is a Shakespearean Tragedy? A history and how-to guide to the famous form. Where is this waste land they inhabit? The concept is difficult to precisely define, though many have tried; it's clear that the accepted definition of literature is constantly changing and evolving. In The This spectrum can be a helpful way to think about literature because it provides a more open-ended way to discuss writing as art than simply labeling works as literary or not. Tragic heroes typically have heroic traits that earn them the sympathy of the audience, but also have flaws or make mistakes that ultimately lead to their own downfall. Where Shakespeare and his contemporaries drew their boundaries cannot be fully determined, but they were fascinated by the Platonic concept of androgyny, a concept drawn on by the queen herself almost from the moment of her accession. There is evidence that some contemporary readers were disturbed by the transgressive and experimental features of 1590s erotic writing. Many professors who teach Literature use the concept of Big L Literature vs. little l literature (Rollison). Literature is a form of human expression. There were no further children from the union. Additionally, the authors of such magazines are striving for quick entertainment rather than leaving a meaningful impression on the reader. The literary work has its own definition taken from each different literature expert. Why? Similarly, while most readers have encountered F. Scott Fitzgerald or Edgar Allen Poe in their high school literature classes, how many have read Frederick Douglass in these same classes? Not only are comparisons drawn from the world of the professional theater (As an unperfect actor on the stage in sonnet 23), but also from the world of business: compared to the prodigal Unthrifty loveliness of the youth (sonnet 4), Making a famine where abundance lies (1), the speaker inhabits a bourgeois world of debts, loans, repayment, and usury, speaking in similar language to the Dark Lady: I myself am mortgaged to thy will (134). To use the word writing when describing literature is itself misleading, for one may speak of oral literature or the literature of preliterate peoples. The art of literature is not reducible to the words on the page; they are there solely because of the craft of writing. Not to be confused with the large metal tube that shoots bombs popular in the 16th through the 19th centuries (cannon), the Literary Canon is a collection of works that are considered by the powers that be to constitute literature. His capacity for assimilationwhat the poet John Keats called his "negative capability"means that his work is comprehensively accommodating; every attitude or ideology finds its resemblance there yet also finds itself subject to criticism and interrogation. Most would concede there is a difference in quality between these two texts. Shakespeares is no exception. 1564-1616. An example of this would be Aristotles Poetics, in which he identifies the defining qualities of a good Tragedy. The Atlantic, 2000. Catharsis is the process of releasing strong or pent-up emotions through art. Lucrece herself comments on her performance after the apostrophes to comfort-killing Night, image of Hell, Opportunity, and Time. In order for us to study literature with any kind of depth, first we must decide what constitutes literature. At least five are demonstrably Shakespearean. While works like William Shakespeares Romeo and Juliet and Harper Lees To Kill a Mockingbird are almost universally accepted as literature, other works are hotly debated, or included or excluded based on the context. Just like in the Shakespearean drama, the colon indicates what each character (me and the students, in this case) is saying or doing. Sonnet 53 is addressed to an inexpressible lover, who resembles both Adonis and Helen. And what about the stories told through tweets, like Jennifer Egans Black Box? While the definition of little l literature is fairly easy to understand and apply, the definition of Big L Literature remains amorphous. This is done primarily through a literary device called hyperbole, or exaggeration for rhetorical effect. His knowledge of love, inevitably, is not firsthand (I have heard it is a life in death, / That laughs and weeps, and all but with a breath). According to different definitions of literature by authors, it literally does the depiction of society; therefore, we call it ' mirror of society'. Circa 1600, English playwright and poet William Shakespeare (1564-1616). Elizabethan sonneteers, following Sir Philip Sidney, conventionally teased their readers with hints of an actuality behind the poems. When a work is officially decided to constitute literature, it enters something called the Canon. Shakespeare died on April 23, 1616, on what may have been his 52nd birthday. Shakespeares speaker descends as much from Astrophil as from Daniels more enigmatic persona, most obviously in the deployment of the multiple sense of will in 135 and 136. What is the message or idea behind the meme? Until recently few commentators have taken up the interpretative challenge posed by Brutus. Unlike Venus and Adonis, Lucrece is not set in a mythical golden age, but in a fallen, violent world. Why do you think this is. Because the best ones are #relatable; that is, they speak to a common human experience. It draws heavily on Spenser and Daniel and is the complaint of a wronged woman about the duplicity of a man. This is all to say that whether a text is literary or not is not as important as the methods of analyzing texts. Just because a work is not literary does not mean it is "bad," that it does not have value, or that one cannot enjoy it. As illustrated in the somewhat silly example above, one way we can define what constitutes literature is by identifying what is definitely not literature. Deriving from the Latin littera, a letter of the alphabet, literature is first and foremost humankinds entire body of writing; after that it is the body of writing belonging to a given language or people; then it is individual pieces of writing. Perfect for snowy days and long nights by the fire. While some might dismiss memes as shallow, when you start to unravel the layers of meaning, they can actually be very complex and even, dare I say, literary! An English Literature essay archive, written by our students, with subjects ranging from Shakespeare to Artistotle, and from Dickens to Hemingway. But if he is, then he argues that he must have never. The particular poems that were in circulation suggest that the general shape and themes of the Sonnets were established from the earliest stages. Yet the study of his nondramatic poetry can illuminate Shakespeares activities as a poet emphatically of his own age, especially in the period of extraordinary literary ferment in the last ten or twelve years of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. "Big L vs Little L Literature." The inequity of representation in literature -- which has arguably improved, but in many ways persists today -- can be remedied if more people from a wide array of backgrounds and walks of life are empowered to study and create Literature. However, consider a story about Kim Kardashians plastic surgery in People Magazine. This week, Suzi F. Garcia speaks with one of her literary sheroes, Ada Limn. In it he indirectly articulates the concerns of his generation and also, perhaps, of his young patron, who was already closely associated with the doomed earl of Essex. The writer need not even pursue it to attain it. Shakespeares first publication, Venus and Adonis (1593), was dedicated to the 18-year-old Henry Wriothesley, third Earl of Southampton. I told you in the course of this paper that Shakespeare had a sister; but do not look for her in Sir Sidney Lee's life of the poet. In 1598 or 1599 the printer William Jaggard brought out an anthology of 20 miscellaneous poems, which he eventually attributed to Shakespeare, though the authorship of all 20 is still disputed. Let's say you come to the conclusion that a meme, a gossip magazine, or the Twilight Series is not literary. However, just because a work is not as literary as another does not mean it cannot be enjoyed. Lecture. For breakups, heartache, and unrequited love. Each genre has its own conventions. Such lofty repudiation of the vulgar was calculated to appeal to the teenage Southampton. "written work valued for superior or lasting artistic merit" ("Literature" - OED), "Printed matter of any kind; esp. The poems had dealt in reversal and inversion and had combined elements of narrative and drama. As illustrated in the somewhat silly example above, one way we can define what constitutes literature is by identifying what is definitely not literature.For our intents and purposes of defining most terms in this textbook, we will use the Oxford English Dictionary's definitions.Many professors who teach Literature use the concept of Big L Literature vs. little l . Once you are finished, read on to the next paragraph. A meme is an image or video containing cultural values or ideas, often represented through allusion (implied reference to another work, without naming that work or its author). His signature is also on a deposition given to the Court of Requests in 1612 (Public Records Office, REQ 4/1), and in two documents relating to the mortgage purchase of a property in Blackfriars (one in the Guildhall Library, the other in the British Library, Egerton Ms. 1787). Yet both are classed as literature, while the speculations of other philosophers, ancient and modern, are not. Poems to read as the leaves change and the weather gets colder. 1845. Like so many texts of the 1590s, it features an innocent hero, Adonis, who encounters a world in which the precepts he has acquired from his education are tested in the surprising school of experience. It is in some sense a companion to Lucrece and to Alls Well That Ends Well (circa 1602-1603) as much as to the sonnets. Circa 1600, English playwright and poet William Shakespeare (1564-1616). It also appealed to a sizable slice of the reading public. Now, as uncomfortable as it seems, label the gender/race/age/presumed sexual orientation of the authors you listed. Now, as in the past, some of the greatest essayists are critics of literature, drama, and the arts. The Romantic compulsion to read the sonnets as autobiography inspired attempts to rearrange them to tell their story more clearly. The twins, Hamnet and Judith Shakespeare, were baptized on February 2, 1585. They will use different color pallets to project, as accurately as possible, the feelings they are trying to evoke. Works that are literary tend to masterfully use genre conventions and literary devices to create a world in the mind of the reader. In his Petrarchism, for example, he adopts a mode that had become a staple of courtly discourse. How to use literature in a sentence. Aristotle coined the term catharsiswhich comes from the Greek kathairein meaning "to cleanse or purge"to describe the release of emotional tension that he believed spectators experienced while watching dramatic tragedy. Please select which sections you would like to print: Poet, writer, and painter. It is now generally accepted as Shakespearean and dated at some point between 1600 and 1609, possibly revised from a 1600 first version for publication in Thorpes volume. A blurb about Kim Kardashians latest plastic surgery, most would agree, does not constitute literature. London School of Journalism. It is much the same as a mirror, which reflects the picture of a thing put against it. Literature may be classified according to a variety of systems, including language, national origin, historical period, genre, and subject matter. Given the sometimes difficult task of determining whether a work falls into one camp or the other, it may be more helpful to think of Literature less as a dichotomy than a spectrum, with popular magazines on one end and works like Hamlet and Beloved on the other, and most written works falling somewhere between the two extremes. Alright, now look at your list. Generative question: do you think memes can be literary? Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, Original video available on TED Talk website, "Battle of the Authors: Are The Most Popular Rated Fiction Books Written by Men or Women? The purest (or, at least, the most intense) literary form is the lyric poem, and after it comes elegiac, epic, dramatic, narrative, and expository verse. While some literature falls into clear designations of literature or not literature, most works are open to debate. never say that I was false of heart, Sonnet 110: Alas, 'tis true I have gone here and there. She died youngalas, she never wrote a word. Literary genres include creative nonfiction, fiction, drama, and poetry. Yet Shakespeares linguistic performance extends beyond the middling sort. He was a great popularizer, translating court art and high artJohn Lyly, Sidney, Edmund Spenserinto palatable and sentimental commercial forms. For a physician, poetry serves as a magical antidote. As you read the textbook, consider the stories which were omitted, why they were omitted, and what works of Literature you would include in this class if you could. Wheatley, Phillis. On this episode, we get to talk on this episode with the legend, superstar, and self-proclaimed baby yoda Marilyn Chin. The better angel is a man right fair, Literature vs. literature. In places the narrator explicitly highlights the various rhetorical set pieces (Here she exclaims against repose and rest). Darby, Luke. This linguistic richness can also be seen as an act of social aspiration: as the appropriation of the ambiguity axiomatically inherent in courtly speech. Shakespearian tragedies have their own specific features, which differentiate them from other types of tragedies. In the Sonnets the relationship between the speaker and the young man both invites and resists definition, and it is clearly presented as a challenge to orthodoxy. Survey of World Literature I. Traditionally Lucrece has been dismissed as a bookish, pedantic dry run for Shakespeares tragedies, in William Empsons phrase, the Bard doing five-finger exercises, containing what F.T. 1773. In many ways, Shakespeare is the founder of the modern English that we use. Humanities LibreTexts - What is Literature. The nature of artistic merit is less easy to define than to recognize. Others have looked more closely at Thorpe, at Benson, and at the circulation of Shakespeares verse in the manuscript culture: these investigations have led to a reexamination of the ideas of authorship and authority in the period. Throughout this class, you will get the opportunity to encounter many different voices and stories from all over the world.