What is Literature Anyway?

[cathschaffstump]

After yesterday’s initial foray into the world of the break out novel, we were left with the daunting task of trying to figure out what a good book is, or what literature is. Unlike J. Evans Pritchard, PhD (Good for you, if you caught the Dead Poet’s Society reference!), I don’t think literature can be measured on a table. How do we do it then?

When my students and I talk about literature, the first place we start is with the definition of a “good” book. The concept of the good book conjures up a lot of stereotypes for my students: often books that employ artifice the student does not want to read, books that are long, or books written in a stilted or older language. Students enjoy genre books. They suggest these books are not the same as “good” books. I try to challenge their notions that some of them are INDEED good books, so we need to tweak the concept of what we conceive of as good.

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Originally published at Writer Tamago. You can comment here or there.

Comments

[mochimonkey.livejournal.com]

This was a very interesting article that you wrote here. It brings up a lot of the same issues that I, as a musician, experience in the music world. Relating the music we hear to the human experience becomes a lot less concrete and definable compared to the written word. I'd like to discuss with you more, but I will wait until I hear what you have to say about genre and break-out novels first. :)