Lecture 1: The Nature of Literature

Chapter One The Nature of Literature and its Historical Tradition Literature, like other arts, is essentially an imaginative act, that is, an act of the writer's imagination in selecting, ordering and interpreting life-experience. In the case of literature, words are the medium of expression and i...

Chapter One The Nature of Literature and its Historical Tradition Literature, like other arts, is essentially an imaginative act, that is, an act of the writer's imagination in selecting, ordering and interpreting life-experience. In the case of literature, words are the medium of expression and it makes little difference whether those words are recorded in the living memory of a people or by some mechanical means such as writing, sound recording, etc. Anything that can be said about the nature of literature holds true\ for both oral and written examples since they share a preoccupation with form, style and social function. The exact details of everyday life as we know it, or as an author knew it in a particular time and place, may or may not be reflected in a literary work. However, the quality or nature of the writer's conception and understanding of that experience is expressed by the complex structure of words that he or she creates. The point is that a work of literature does not necessarily give us accurate information about the way life is actually lived (although it may do so as a secondary consideration), rather it causes us to recognize truths about human existence through the direct presentation of selected experiences. Instead of telling us about the way people act and feel, it involves us in these actions and directs our responses to them. Literature springs from our inborn love of telling a story, of arranging words in pleasing patterns, of expressing in words some special aspect of our human experience. It is usually set down in printed characters for us to read, though some forms of it are performed on certain social occasions. There are a number of different branches such as drama, poetry, the novel, the short story; all these are works of the imagination arising from man’s capacity for invention. The primary aim of literature is to give pleasure, to entertain those who voluntarily attend to it. There are, of course, many different ways of giving pleasure or entertainment, ranging from the most philosophical and profound. It is important to note that the writer of literature is not tied to fact in quite the same way as the historian, the economist or the scientist, whose studies are absolutely based on what has actually happened, or on what actually does happen, in the world of reality. 7 Why is Literature Important? We soon discover, however that the literature which entertains us best does not keep us for long in the other-world of fantasy or unreality. The greatest pleasure and satisfaction to be found in literature occurs where (as it so often does) it brings us back to the realities of human situations, problems, feelings and relationships. The writers of literature, being less tied to fact than the historian or the scientist, have more scope to comment on the facts, to arrange them in unusual ways to speculate not only on what is, but on what ought to be, or what might be. Writers are sometimes, therefore people with visionary or prophetic insights into human life. Literature is an imaginative art which expresses thoughts and feelings of the artist on events around him. In most cases, it deals with life experiences. The author/artist uses words in a powerful, effective and captivating manner to paint his picture of human experience. Literature is a form of recreation. The three genres of literature are fiction, drama and poetry. You have seen that drama is a genre of literature. A person who writes a novel is called a novelist, the person who writes a play is a playwright while the poet writes poetry. All of us who read literature will find our knowledge of human affairs broadened and deepened, whether in the individual, the social, the racial or the international sphere; we shall understand the possibilities of human life, both for good and evil; we shall understand how we came to live at a particular time and place, with all its pleasures and vexations and problems; and we shall perhaps be able to make right rather than wrong choices. Literature can be in written or oral form. It could also be presented in form of performance. As readers, we must acknowledge and respond to the essential truths that underlie the surface reality of literature. The particular actions, characters and settings which the author chooses constitute the subject matter of the work, the surface meaning, in fact. If asked what Wole Soyinka's poem 'The Telephone Conversation' is about, one could say that it is about a young African in England who telephones a landlady in search of a room. Recognizing her hostility to Blacks, he teases her and hangs up. That is, after all, pretty much what happens in the poem. On another level, one can also say that it is a poem about race prejudice, and this latter statement is just as valid as the first. The theme of a work- that is, the abstract idea that the subject matter exemplifies- is also part of the meaning. A theme cannot exist in a work of 8 literature without the vehicle of subject matter, and it is in the relationship of one to the other that we see the truth the author aims at. Soyinka's poem has more to communicate than the mere facts of the action, character and setting. It also means more than a bare statement of its theme. The truth that the author is getting at is the presumption and stupidity of prejudice as well as the wit and intelligence that puts it in its place. The landlady's ill-disguised reaction and the student's cleverness with language in out-maneuvering her over the question of race prejudice is the point. Reading on the surface level alone is only partly satisfactory. A full understanding and appreciation of literature depends on the ability to analyze and generalize as well. First of all one must grasp the exact details of the piece, the surface level in terms of action, character, order of events and setting. Then one must begin to make deductions as to theme or themes, the larger ideas that are represented by the particular incidents of the work. A paraphrase of the plot or story, an account of what actually happens, is only the first step in the study of serious literature. The generalizations which follow must link the details of the subject matter to a specific technical element of the composition (character, action, order of events, setting, etc.) as well as to a relevant aspect of the theme which is being expressed. Such vague comments as 'realistic portrait', 'exciting events' or 'emotive and forceful language' are meaningless unless they are actual deductions from a serious discussion of the subject matter as an element of the literary composition which contributes to the expression of an underlying central idea in the work. The effectiveness of literature, a particular passage or even an isolated technique can only be explained or justified in specific relation to the theme. What effect does the given example have on a reader's response to or appreciation of that particular fictional world on the one hand and to the theme it exemplifies on the other? The generalizations which one makes in working towards a statement of theme and its relationship to the subject matter or surface level are neither hidden nor arbitrary. In fact, they are signalled by the author at every step through the choice of incidents, the kind of characters included, the ordering of events, the nature of the setting and the character of the language. The purpose of the present discussion is to make you aware of what to look for while reading and how to evaluate the author's method in expressing his particular view of life. There are certain kinds of mental processes and generalizations which are basic to the criticism or appreciation of literature. Once these are mastered, reading becomes a more fulfllling and satisfying 9 experience. Function of Literature Literature has long been held to instruct and entertain, but the instruction has never been in the form of tidy little object lessons which can be summed up in a proverb: 'Honesty is the best policy' or 'Pride goeth before a fall'. If works of literature continue to instruct through various ages, it is because living experience and not abstract information is communicated. Unfortunately, there is a widespread and popular belief that novels, plays and poems are built up around ethical precepts and that a work can be reduced to a handy catchphrase or tag by which to govern one's life. In fact, literature presents situations, interactions and oppositions. It suggests a spectrum of values, even of attitudes, but it rarely hands down formulated judgments and conclusions. The reader not only enters into the experience of the action and characters as it unfolds, but he is also left to his own conclusions and evaluation of that experience, of its truthfulness and relevance to real life. Moral conduct, in the sense of the relative correctness of responses to given human situations, may be used as the subject of literature, especially in works which concern themselves with man in society, but this is very different from expecting that all works of literature deliver up a moral lesson. Literature instructs by opening our eyes to a wider range of experience and a deeper understanding of it. Reducing the rich texture and complexity of a literary work to a single moral statement, or even a phrase which merely states its theme, cancels out its very existence as literature. Fables and religious parables are the only forms of literature whose avowed intention is to teach moral lessons and which are rightly interpreted in terms of a concisely stated precept or proverb. Authors go to infinite lengths to create a satisfying literary composition which adequately expresses their perception of life's complexities. They care at least as much about the construction and texture of a work as they do about its subject matter or meaning. Literature is not a coded message which has to be deciphered, but rather it is a pleasing and satisfying structure or composition in which both reader and writer experience pleasure in each victory over the difficulties of exact expression, in each perception of truth about the human condition. After all, the object of a football match is not 10 merely to move the ball from one end of a playing field to the other. If that were true, the creation of an opposing team and complex rules of play would be unnecessary. The pleasure of player and spectator alike lies in the skill with which the limitations imposed are overcome by expertise and technical accomplishment. In the case of literature, and of the arts in general, such aesthetic pleasure is not just a vague and general awareness of beauty, but rather a precise recognition of design and pattern. There is, on the one hand, the larger structure and composition of events, characters and setting which should be both striking and original. On the other hand, there is the recurrence of situations, attitudes and stylistic characteristics which build up and reinforce our consciousness of a single concept or theme. At one and the same time we respond emotionally to the subject matter or surface level through our sympathy for human experience and we also respond intellectually to the design and pattern of the construction which focuses our attention on a larger and more universal truth about that experience. Distinguishing Characteristics of Literature Whereas design and patterning of action raise a piece of writing to the level of art, style or level of language is one of the most important elements in the composition of literature and accounts for a number of its peculiar characteristics. Language - that is, words as they are spoken or written - is the artistic medium or material of all literature, and because words follow one another in sequence, the effect is progressive or cumulative, not immediate. It takes time to listen to or read even the briefest work; the structure or design is not perceived all at once, especially in longer forms such as novels, which are not taken in at a single sitting. The mind or imagination must register the basic elements of the construction as they occur, store them up, and later re-create the unity of the whole and the interdependence of the parts. Separate levels of consciousness are required of the reader. On the one hand an emotional and sympathetic response to the human situation of the surface level is needed, and on the other, an intellectual and analytic reaction to the form and texture (language) of the composition. The two activities must be exercised together, and the beginner should be very careful to note the features of design and technique as they become evident. Otherwise, analysis and appreciation which develops from a recognition of the relationship between an author's method and his or her subject matter is impossible. 11 In addition, the very way in which language is used to express subject matter is likely to differ widely from everyday usage. Literary expression depends very heavily on subtle comparisons and contrasts of register which need not even be grammatically correct, as well as on complex schemes of rhetorical or figurative devices and pervasive patterns of musical effects. Reading serious literature requires special instruction and training over and above that for reading the newspaper or writing a business letter. After all, no one believes that merely because he or she is able to walk and run, they can compete seriously with trained athletes. If the inexperienced reader is unfamiliar with techniques of composition, he or she cannot appreciate the wider significance or excellence of literature even when the work reflects a familiar view of real life. Faced with works which are frankly non-realistic, the beginner may even fail to understand the language of the surface level because stylisation and distortion of reality have been used. It should be obvious in any case that the attempt to fictionalize a real event is bound to include a certain amount of distortion or falsification. Re-creating an incident in words involves selecting details according to their importance and relevance as well as putting them in a meaningful order. The process amounts to a refocusing of their importance and an interpretation. When constructing a complex plot, as opposed to merely recounting an incident, more distortion occurs because events and their interpretation must be regulated in order to form a coherent pattern and an ordered progression. The random and often unrelated events of real life are ordered and shaped through a reordering and reshaping of language for a definite purpose. It is, of course, possible for the reality of a fictional world to approximate to that of real life, to create an illusion of everyday reality, but it is also possible for a writer to express an idea, an ideal or a state of being with little apparent reference or relation to the details and actions of temporal existence as we know it. A literary convention has developed in West African folk tales, for example, in which the characters are often given animal or insect names as well as characteristics. It is a kind of distancing device (a mask or stylisation) which makes it possible to poke fun at human failings or celebrate strengths without making the point at uncomfortably close range. The distortion serves to delight us through the interplay of imagination as well as to signal a figurative or metaphoric understanding of the situation. Imaginative literature may go so far as to create worlds and events which never have existed or never can. Recognizable and familiar incidents may also be combined and projected in a new and original way. The illusion of reality in literature presents neither more nor less difficulty than the conscious distortion used to focus attention on an idea, a state of being or the quality of an emotional 12 experience. In both cases an understanding of the author's vision comes through a systematic appreciation of or response to the form and texture of the composition. The following chapters outline a scheme and method of approach for doing just this. Comparison with Other Art Forms Perhaps a comparison with other art forms is the best way to make the distinguishing characteristics of literature perfectly clear. Painting, for example, is two-dimensional and uses line, colour and texture as basic elements of composition. A picture is seen all at once, in a single glance. It is perceived as a unity and its design or structure is self-evident, it is right there on the canvas or wall. Of course, the viewer does examine a picture in detail, moving the eye from section to section in order to admire the technique and the interrelation of parts in addition to the effects created. Painting may or may not have 'meaning' in the conventional sense of the word, however. Visual art is readily 'understood' so long as the artist arranges recognizable objects into a composition which resembles the way in which those objects might appear together in real life. We are perfectly at home with portraits, landscapes or pictures that have a 'story' behind them, such as a representation of the adoration of the Magi or Akbar's victory over the Hindu forces of Hemu. But other pictures exist which distort the details of real life, combining them in unnatural ways. They may contain no recognizable thing at all because the shapes that are used are abstracted and reduced to the simplest possible pattern. In the first of these instances an idea about life or an ideal is being expressed. In the second, the concern is even more technical and the artist is experimenting with individual and uncombined elements of reality; the play of light, the illusion of depth or perspective, etc. As with literature, an imitation of real life is possible, but not necessarily desirable. The realistic element is incidental to the artistic composition and execution in painting, but literature is tied more closely to reality by the fact that words have meaning and any composition of words must make at least minimal sense. The other major arts offer a similar basis for comparison and should also be considered. Shape and texture alone are the constructional elements of sculpture, for example, which is a three-dimensional art and still more time- oriented than painting. Sculpture should not be viewed from a single point in space but rather from as many points as possible. Different aspects of a work are seen when moving around or through it, different contours and 13 relationships of parts to the whole. In this respect sculpture is more like literature than painting is. Its unity of effect cannot be experienced all at once, but only through an effort of imaginative re-creation. Sculpture may or may not represent natural objects, but here again, realism or naturalism is a secondary consideration. As in painting and literature, the natural object or subject matter which is presented is very likely to be associated with or representative of another and more abstract idea. On the other hand, uncombined elements of shape and texture may also be explored for their own sake. The basic elements of dance are physical gestures as they are arranged or patterned according to definite intervals of time and the medium is the human body, just as the compositional elements of sculpture are shape and texture while the medium is wood, stone or metal, and the elements of painting are line, colour and texture while the medium is canvas, board, or plaster, and paints of various kinds. Dance, as performed for the entertainment of spectators rather than the individual pleasure of participants, is an art form which is as time-oriented as literature. The movements are experienced separately and in sequence; their relationship is perceived as an imaginative re-creation because all the sequences are not present at one and the same time. Even when the movements are captured on film and can be viewed again and again, the parts are separated from each other by time. A progressive evaluation, sequence by sequence, is necessary to an appreciation of the whole. Dance may or may not imitate natural actions, but its mimetic possibilities are nearly as strong as those in any of the other arts. Dance can approach realism and suggest any kind of normal human activity by incorporating appropriate gestures in the basic vocabulary of movement which makes up the dance pattern. On the other hand, dance can also be abstract and directly expressive of ideas and states of mind, more so even than either sculpture or painting. Rhythmic movement of the body is perhaps more closely associated with emotion or feeling than are shapes and colours because a living human being is present. But dance is also capable of abstraction and concern for harmonies and patterns that have no other meaning or relevance to human situations than the beauty or accomplishment of their composition and technique. 14  The elements of a musical composition are sounds as arranged according to definite time intervals, and sound-producing instruments which are struck, scraped or blown into are its medium. Music is, of course, time- oriented and its effect is also cumulative, which means that as much effort must be put into progressive analysis and criticism while listening as is required by dance or literature. Although intimately associated with dance, music alone is much less capable of sustaining meaning or presenting a realistic imitation of life because it lacks inherent association with the human condition: actions, desires, frustrations, etc. Sounds varied in pitch and duration are themselves rather abstract and have little native relationship or relevance to everyday life, except in so far as they can approximate to natural sounds or imitate human moods and the quality of experience through design and patterning. Like all the arts, music expresses human emotions and states of mind, but it can also turn in on itself and exhibit an intellectual, almost mathematical, sense of pattern by concentrating on the elements of its composition. If such a concept as pure art existed, it would be found at that extreme of each art form where the artist is wholly concerned with exploring the uncombined elements of his basic materials or medium- that is, with questions of artistic form and texture. Reading literature with an eye to historical perspective, however, does not stop one from reassessing works according to the conventions and ideas of other ages, especially one's own. Whatever a work of literature meant to people at the time of its publication, its meaning and relationship to society is open to reinterpretation and reassessment. It may go out of fashion for long periods of time and then again become relevant depending on its relation to the changing aesthetics and ideals of a given society. The Metaphysical Poets, for example, were long out of fashion because their subjective themes and method of direct presentation through disjointed images did not appeal to an intervening literary age which preferred social satire and discursive rational presentation. When the early modernist poets turned to similar themes and methods of presentation, they rediscovered the Metaphysicals and brought them back to prominence as an important historical school. In the same way, cultural conventions and values may differ from one ethnic group to another within a single historical period, and a thorough understanding of the backgrounds involved is necessary for comparative study and assessment of influence or assimilation. For example, the interest 15 of European or American writers and critics in African, Caribbean and Black American literature can be easily accounted for with reference to cultural background. Contemporary disillusionment with Western society and frustration in finding new themes, forms and modes of expression inevitably welcomes a literature which mirrors those preoccupations but plays them off against a vital traditional culture while celebrating spirituality, emotion and communality in literary forms and styles derived from African oral tradition as well as modern Western norms. In order to understand particular works of art in the cultural context of their historical periods, it is best to have a clear outline of literary history in mind - that is, the historical development of aesthetic values and world-views. Familiarity with the general outline and characteristics of literary history, especially that of English literature which is an antecedent of all other literatures in English, is a great help to students as it provides an immediate context for individual works as well as identifying the general nature of a period or age- its identifying forms and themes. 16