What is Literature?

• Literature refers to any form of writing
• It is a body of literary work relating to a specific culture
• The term originated from the Latin word "littera," meaning "letter" or "acquaintance with letter."

Two Types of Literature

• Prose exhibits a greater variety of rhythm and has closer resemblance to everyday speech

• Prose comes from the Latin "prosa," meaning "straightforward"

• Prose is unadorned with obvious stylistic devices

• Poetry is written in verse

• Poetry is particular, with higher quality, great beauty, emotional sincerity, or profound insight

• Poetry is used for aesthetic qualities instead of its literal meaning

Prose: Fiction vs. Non-Fiction

• Fiction consists of not real stories and isn't based on facts, using imaginative form of narrative

• Fiction has the ability to evoke human emotions.

• Non-fiction is an account or representation of a subject and is presented as fact.

• Non-fiction can give a true or false account of the subject, but assumed truthful at time of composition

Poetry: Lyric, Narrative and Dramatic

• Lyric poetry is of a personal nature, reflecting the author's own feelings, states of mind, and perceptions

• Narrative poetry is a genre of poetry that tells a story

• Dramatic poetry is drama written in verse to be spoken or sung

Prose Fiction Types

• Fables feature animals

• Parables illustrate moral or religious lessons

• Folktales/folklore make up a body of expressive culture with tales, jokes, music, dance, beliefs, and customs

• Legends are about someone that did exist, passed on from generation to generation

• Myths are sacred story about origins of the world

• Fairytales feature folkloric characteristics such as goblins, elves, witches, and giants

• Short stories are more concise and to the point

• Novels are long, complex plots, divided into chapters

• Novelettes are pieces of short prose, they generally have a word count between 7,500 - 17,500 words

• Novellas are longer than novelettes but shorter than novels

Prose Non-Fiction Types

• Essays are short piece of writing, from a personal point of view, which may include arguments, criticism, or recollections

• Biographies are accounts of somebody's life written by another person

• Autobiographies are accounts of somebody's life written by that person

• Diaries or journals are personal records of events with personal thoughts and observations

• Documentaries are movies or TV programs presenting facts and info

Lyric Poetry Types

• Songs are musical compositions with lyrics for singers

• Sonnets are 14 lines with strict rhyme and structure

• Nursery rhymes are traditional for children

• Limericks are 5-line poems popularized by Edward Lear, limericks are witty, humorous, and obscene

• Couplets consist of two lines that rhyme and have the same meter

• Cinquains are any stanza or short poem with five lines

• Odes are long and dignified with subjects to celebrate an event, person, being or power-or for private meditation

• Elegies are mournful or reflective poems, a lament for someone who has died

Narrative Poetry Types

• Ballads are poems usually set to music, a story in a song

• Epics are lengthy poems detailing heroic deeds and events of a culture or nation

• Metrical tales are told in first person

• Free verse is written without strict meter or rhyme

• Blank verse has a regular rhythm and line length but no rhyme

• Idylls are short, depicting pastoral or rural scenes and the life of country folk

• Epigrams are short, expressing a single, satirical idea

Dramatic Poetry Types

• Tragedies are serious plays with a tragic theme, often involving a heroic struggle and the downfall of the main character:
• Comedies are comical plays with a humorous theme or that make fun of other people or stereotypes

Formal Poetry Measures

• Iambic is an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable.

• Trochaic is a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable

• Anapaestic consists of two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed syllable

• Dactylic contains a stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables

• Spondaic contains two successive syllables with approximately equal strong stresses

• Pyrrhic contains two successive unstressed syllables or lightly stressed syllables

Poetic Forms

• Blank verse follows the succession of unrhymed iambic pentameter lines

• Couplets are two lines of verse, couplet by rhyme

• Tercets are a stanza with three lines linked by a single rhyme

• Quatrains are a stanza of four lines, and may or may not rhyme

• Rhyme royal is seven line iambic pentameter stanza rhyming ABABBCC

• Ottava Rima is an eight line stanza with a rhyme scheme of ABABABCC

Specific Forms of Poems

• Sonnets are traditionally a poem of fourteen iambic pentameter lines

• Italian Sonnet rhyme scheme: ABBA ABBA CDE CDE

• English/Shakespearean Sonnet rhyme scheme: ABAB CDCD EFEF GG

• Spenserian Sonnet: ABABBCBCCDCED EE

• Sestina consists of six stanzas of six lines

• Villanelle are nineteen line poems with a French form

• Ballad is a poem of indetermined length and is composed of four line

• Robert Frost said "literature is a performance in words"

• Literature is an entertaining pleasure that gives interest

3 Pigeon Holes in Literary Theory

• Imitative theory: literature is a representation of life's realities
• Expressive theory: literature is an expression of feelings.
• Affective theory: literature arouses particular emotion in a reader.

General Literary Facts

• The Old Testament has 39 books and the New Testament has 27

• The Old Testament has 929 Chapters and the New Testament has 260

• The Old Testament has 23,114 Verses and the New Testament has 7,957

• The Old Testament has 602,585 and the New Testament has 180,552

• The Old Testament has 2,278,100 Letters and the New Testament has 838,380

• The middle book of the Old Testament is Proverbs and the New Testament ia 2 Thessalonians

Important Periods in the History of English Literature

• The Old English Period was from 450 AD to 1066 AD

• The Middle English Period was from 1066 AD to 1500 AD

• The Renaissance Period was from 1500-1600

• The Elizabethan Period was from 1558-1603

• The Jacobean Period was from 1603-1625

• The Caroline Period was from 1625-1649

• The Puritan Period was from 1649-1660

• The Restoration Period was from 1660-1670

• The Augustan Period was from 1700-1785

• The Romantic Period was from 1785-1830

• The Victorian Period was from 1830-1901

• The Modern Period was from 1890-1918

• The Inter War Period was from 1918-1939

• The Mid 20th Century was from 1939 Onwards

Literary Approaches

• Formalistic approach views literature for itself, regardless of the author and external factors

• Art for art's sake is part of the formalistic approach

• The moral or humanistic approach finds the nature of man central in literature

• It is close to the morality of literature

• Historical approaches define literature as a reflection of time, moment and milieu

• Sociological approaches define literature as an expression of man in a given situation, often economic

• A sociological approach expresses social relevance and social commitment

• Cultural Approach views literature is a principal manifestation and vehicle of race's culture tradition

• The the Psychological approach to Freud states literature is an expression of personality, of inner drives of neurosis

• Impressionistic Approach is very personal/very relative

• New Criticism theory is one where if a poem is understandable even if lines are taken away, it is not a good poem

• Hermeneutics is the theory of interpretation

• Readers have the freedom to assess and interpret based on their own experiences

Feminism

• Women have always been trivialized, marginalized, and stereotyped in literature

• Two waves of feminism:

  • 1830-1920, Suffrageete Movement fought to have the right to vote
  • 1960-Present, Woman’s Liberation addresses why women are more domestic than men, due to domestic chores

• Structuralism deals with binary oppositions

  • This involves two typical operations, which are dissection, examining into parts, and articulation
  • Some binary oppositions include: sun-moon, light-dark, day-night, and man-woman