What is Literature?

            Literature is the artistic expression of the thought which is filled with feelings and imagination.

According to Hudson :

            "Literature is a vital record of what men have seen in life what they have experienced of it what they have thought and fell above those aspects of it which have the most immediate and enduring interest for all of us. It is thus fundamentally an expression of life through the medium of language."

            Literature is expressed in such an un technical form as to make it indelible and give 'dichotic pleasure' and relief to the mind of the common man literature in the sense of the term is that kind of writing which is charged with human interest and characterized by permanence colouring of imagination and artistic embellishment.

According to Emerson :

            "Literature is a record of the best thoughts by literature we mean the written thoughts and feelings of intelligent Men and Women arranged in a way that shall give pleasure to the reader so the aim of a student of literature is to know the best that has been thought in the world."

            Literature is the representation of society it deals with the life of man and hi destinies on the earth. It expresses thoughts feelings emotions and attitudes towards life which are permanent and amivrsal which in other words do not change with the change of time and place. It is this permanence and University which distinguishes literature from Journalism or science subjects.

            We may say that literature consists of those books which have a broad human appeal to all men not as specialists and secondly these books have an aesthetic appeal.   

 According to Lord Morly :

            Literature consists of all the books where moral truth and human passions are touched with a certain largeness sanity and attraction of form.

            In other words literature heightens our awareness of human literature it enables us to look at nature with new eyes. It interprets with charm of language the experience and spiritual intuitions of man Hudson is of the opinion.

            Literature is composed of those books and those books only which in the first place by reason of their subject matter and their mode of treating it, are of general human interests and in which in the second place the element of form and pleasure which are to be regarded as essential a place of literature differs from a specialised treatise on astronomy, political economy philosophy or even history in part because it appeals not to a particular class of readers only but to men and women the object of the treatise is simply to imports knowledge one ideal and of the place literature whether it also imparts knowledge or not is yield aesthetic satisfaction by the manner in which it handles its theme.

Chief characteristics of Literature :

Universality : 

            Literature is because of its Universality literature does not deal with the specific society of a specific community but with the society of man as a whole. It is powerful enough to supersede the narrow interests of a class in favour of humanity as a whole literature appeals to the widest human interests emotions. It is occupied chiefly with elementary passions and emotions love and hole joy and sorrow fear and death which are an essential part of our nature Shakespeare, Shaw, Dickens, Eliot, Browning or Arnold are famous ever today because of their Universality. We find our representation in their works.

Permanence :

            This is one of the most important characteristic of a literary place. That literature is best which appeals forever which gives aesthetic pleasure forever literature expresses thoughts, feelings, emotions and attitudes towards life, which in other words do not change with the charge of time and place. Though four hundred years have passed since Shakespeare's dreams are written yet their appeal is fresh and permanent even today and it will remain the same in future also.

Suggestiveness :

            The next quality of literature is its suggestiveness. It appeals to our emotions and imaginations rather than intellect the artists open a door. Through which our imagination enters a new world of magic love beauty and heroism.

Holding the mirror up to Nature :

"Literature is the mirror of life"

According to Arnold :

"Literature is a criticism of life"

            Whatever we experience in our daily life reflected in to literature personal experience is the basis of all real literature. It means literature deals with the closeness of life our experiences habits, prejudices convertors all these we find in literature and that is why it is called the mirror of life.

Style :

            One of the most important and significant things literature is its artistic quality. In great writers thought and expression are equally method literature appeals to us by reason of its form this meant that literature is a fine arts it has its own laws and conditions of workmanship in order to give aesthetic pleasure a literature place must have lofty ideas and lofty treatment. The best work is caused by the noblest thoughts finding their natural expression in the noblest language.

Longinus a great critic is of the opinion :

            " Suability consists in a certain destination and consummate excellence in expression and it is from this end no other source that the greatest joined their eminence and immortal fame."

According to Terry Eagleton :

            Terry Eagleton is very difficult to define the literature in specific words. we can define it as  imagination writing in the sense of fiction, but that is insufficient 17th century English literature includes Shakespeare, Webster, Marvell and Milton. Moreover that it includes essays of Francis Bacon, the Sermons of John Donne, Bunyan's Spiritual autobiography, and even Sir Thomas Browne's Writings in the English date 16th and early 17th centuries the word 'Novel' used about both true and fictional events. If literature includes much 'Factual' writing it also includes quite a lot of fiction in short literature word indicate 'Creative' or 'Imaginative' writing.

            To all literature as 'Creative' or 'Imaginative' writing raises a question than History, Philosophy and Natural Science are uncreative or unimaginative? Eagleton argues that perhaps literature is definable not according to whether it is fictional or imaginative but because it uses language in peculiar ways.

            On this theory literature is kind of writing which According to Roman Jacobson represents an organised violence committed on ordinary speech. Sometimes we mean by literature a kind of 'Self-referential language'.

            The formalists started out by seeing the literary work as a more or less arbitrary assemblage of 'Devices'. Devices included sound, imagery, rhythm, syntax, metre and narrative techniques.

According to John M Ellis perhaps 'literature' means something like the opposite any kind of writing which for some reason or ant los somebody values highly.

            In conclusion we may say that for Terry Eagleton the word literature signifies its existence in accordance with value judgements by which it is constituted. These value judgements themselves have a close relation to social ideologies.