Literature

Definitions

The literature is defined as a particular aspect of the verbal communication - oral or written - which brings into play an exploitation of all the resources of the language to multiply the effects on the recipient, that he is reader or listener. The literature - whose borders are necessarily fuzzy and variable according to the personal appreciations - is thus characterized, not by its supports and its kinds, but by its esthetic function: working of the message overrides the contents, thus exceeding the utility communication limited to the transmission of even complex information. Today the literature is associated with the age of the books by which the authors speak to us remotely, but it relates to also the various forms of the oral expression as the traditional poetry of the people without writing - whose our songs are the remote cousins - or the theater, intended to be received through the voice and the body of the actors.

The literature, in its direction more running, is thus a Art with whole share. But it is sometimes difficult to determine the limits of this art when philosophical writings are approached, plays or scenarios which also concern the Performing arts. Generally, the literature will gather works here having either an esthetic goal or a particular esthetic form. Esthetic dimension is thus the finality of the literature, criterion which differentiates it from the other types of writings like journalism or the policy answering certain specific constraints. At first sight, this definition thus excludes the purely philosophical, political or historical writings. But it is advisable to be particularly précautionneux in the categorization of the kinds and types of writings belonging or not to the literature. A text can thus have a certain literary dimension without the author not wanting it, or then without that not being its goal as a kind. The criteria of literary value of a work also were the subject of many debates between academicians, some establishing a hierarchy between the kinds, others sticking to conformity of a work compared to its kind or sticking to the supposed role of the literary text. Lastly, for some, a large literary work is before all that which resists the time proof, quality which would guarantee its universal range.

Indeed, rich person of its unbounded formal diversity as far as of its unceasingly revivified subjects which say the human condition, the literature is initially the meeting between that which, by his words, says itself and his world, and that which receives and shares this revealing.

Literature with the wire of the centuries

The definition of the literature as a whole of works with esthetic purpose is a rather modern design. Indeed, before, one rather tended to allot the statute of literature to works corresponding to rather strict formal criteria. In its Poetic , Aristote, one of the founders of literary criticism, concentrates mainly on the Tragédie and the epopee by founding formal rules governing these speeches. Moreover, for the Greeks, the Histoire is an art with whole share, inspired by the MUSE Clio.
The test also belonged to the field of the literature. Its subject was then not as important as in the contemporary tests which are not regarded any more as literary works. Philosophy as for it is not less ambiguous: the literary value of the Dialogs of Plato is not called in question today, nor that of the Pensées of the Roman Emperor Marc Aurèle. In addition, the Poésie was often regarded as the purest literary form, in which the esthetics of the literature is presented in its more strict simplicity. It thus appears that the literary value of a work is prone to the change and that the centuries saw the literature packing and incorporating forms increasingly diversified and popular.

Literary kinds

detailed Article: Kinds and literary forms .

Artist or craftsman?

The source of the artistic merit of a literary work is a subject which divided literary criticism much. As of the Antiquity, two different designs appear, which will be reflected through the various literary and artistic currents to come. Aristote, through its Poetic , insists on the formal quality of a work, with the detriment of the expressive aspects which he considers secondary. The work of a writer is connected then with that of an architect who builds a building, obeying strict rules, with a theory. On the other hand, the Pseudo-Longin, in its Treated Sublime , proposes the expression of the emotions. The Sublime transports, charms its reader or his audience and corresponds to perfection of the speech. One sees the craftsman who works, works the esthetic object in order to start an answer at the recipient, the other the gifted artist of inspiration, which is expressed and generated a feeling of identification in its public. This quarrel is found in the history of the Critique arts person and created contradictory currents like the Classicisme and the Romantisme or the Cubisme and the Expressionnisme.

Literatures according to the languages

History of the Western literature

Antiquity: Greek Literature and Latin Literature.
the Middle Ages: Romance S, French tale in verse X, joke S, Sotie S, Morality S and Mystery S.
XVI {{E}} century: humanism, poetic Pleiad.
XVII {{E}} century: traditional literature and Baroque, “libertinage scholar”.
XVIII {{E}} century: literature of the Lights and the Revolution.
XIX {{E}} century: Romanticism, Parnassus, realism and naturalism, symbolism and Décadentisme.
XX {{E}} century: Existentialisme, Theater of the absurd, New novel, committed Literature, Surrealism, Oulipo.
XXI {{E}} century

Literary theories

Structuralism
Formalism
Semiology and literary semiotics
Reception and reading
Postcolonialisme

See also Autotélisme.

Authors and writers

We distinguish authors and writer S. the writers write works of literature while the term authors gathers any person having written at least a book, whether it is political, historical, scientific or obviously arts person.

detailed Article: writer.

Literary meeting

The authors often gathered within meetings to be able to discuss various topics. These meetings regularly involved the creation of associations, academies, groups, of circles, even of specific currents.

detailed Article: literary Meeting, Literary circle, literary Living room, Recitationes.

Literary prize

To reward or appoint a particularly talented author or book, several rewards were created according to the sensitivities.

detailed Article: Literary prize.

Literary writing

detailed Article: literary writing.

The literary writing obeys to the standards of the Orthographe and the Grammaire, but also of the Rhétorique, the Poétique. The writer uses tools of languages which enable him to work a style, and it is also authorized poetic licenses, digressions, neologisms, so as to support its speech, to make esthetic its prose. Thus it is different and becomes artist.

Literature on line

Certain works are available on line.

detailed Article: Library in line.

Wikisource
LittéraureS & CompagnieS, resources on the Literature and social sciences
the review of the resources, resources on the Literature (files, criticisms, sounds)
Women writers and the literatures African.
island in island, great database on the insular French-speaking literature.
Contingencies, Writings and Writers French and foreigners

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