What is Literature?

Introduction: What is Literature?

When we want to figure out the meaning of something in specific, sometimes we face with the different opinions that help us to understand the characteristics of a subject. But what’s more intriguing is the variety of perspectives in which you can discover the definition of a concept, where time, language, philosophy, history, and the tying that the reader and the author have it is going to help us to cast light on what the topic is about. So that in this case through Eagleton's Introduction: What is Literature? It will show the different definitions of what literature is about.

At the first sight, this chapter start getting controversial because it gives a lot definitions of what literature is; however, it points out the most important points that help us to build the meaning of literature. First of all, the definition of literature that is given by the Russian critic Roman Jakobson that belonged to The Formalist says: “…represents an organized violence committed on ordinary speech” (p.2). It means that literature transforms language, it is presented in peculiar ways where we do not find the ordinary speech as usual due to the fact that words change in its rhythm, texture and resonance, so we can say that literature is a special kind of language. This can be seen as if literature was another face of language, another world of words. Besides, through the development of the chapter it is observed that the meaning of literature covers different point of view; to illustrate, it is mentioned that literature has its own specific, laws, structures and devices. It means that it allows to analyze the different fields through the use of words.  Moreover, according to the chapter literature can be defined as a textual system that contains devices; among them are: “…sound, imagery, rhythm, syntax, narrative techniques” (Formalists, p.3).  From this it could be inferred that these ones help literature to intensified and transform language. As a matter of fact, literature can be taken as real, fictional or imaginative, but that depends on the perspective of the writer and the perspective of the reader because there are some aspects such as culture, background and experience that allow people to say -this is- and -this is not- because through this characteristics we create our own judgment to give an opinion. On the other hand, literature can be seen as Poetry that is what Formalists think, so that when most of the people heard the word literature they make reference to poetry, which is valid, but there are other kind of texts that have nothing to do with poetry and what happen with them? To me they are literature as well with a different structure, laws, and organization but it still continues being literature; that’s why I reach to the conclusion that whatever piece of writing is literature.  According to what is mentioned in Eagleton's Introduction: What is Literature? Finally, to reinforce that idea, it is convenient to remark this part of the chapter that says:

Literature operates rather like the word ´weed´: weeds are not particular kinds of plant, but just any kind of plant which for some reason or another a gardener does not want around. Perhaps ´literature´ means something like the opposite: any kind of writing which for some reason or another somebody values highly. (Ellis, p.9)

This fragment points out that each human being has a different perspectives depending to the environment that surround him, and that he can easily detonates concepts with different points of view. To conclude, according to the Eagleton's Introdution: What is Literature? It has not been found the definition of literature, but this term has a lot of characteristics that help us to understand what it is about; also, the definition of literature is going to be attached to time due to the fact that literature was something, it is something and will be something, which show us its evolution and the different aspects that it contents.

References

Eagleton, T. (1996). Literary Theory An Introduction. Retrieved from https://mthoyibi.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/literary-theory_an-introduction_terry-eagleton.pdf