Literature
With the development of language, the human imagination has found a way to create and communicate through the written word. A literary work can transport us into a fictional, fantastic new world, describe a fleeting feeling, or simply give us a picture of the past through novels, poems, tragedies, epic works, and other genres. Through literature, communication becomes an art, and it can bridge and bond people and cultures of different languages and backgrounds.
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Featured content, April 15, 2024
Where Does the Concept of a “Grim Reaper” Come From?
Harvester of souls since when?
12 Novels Considered the “Greatest Book Ever Written”
How many of these great novels have you read?
Diagnosing 9 of Charles Dickens’s Most Famous Characters
Dickens had a knack for expertly portraying human diseases.
What did Sir Walter Scott write?
What did Sir Walter Scott write?
Yiddish literature
Yiddish literature, the body of written works produced in the Yiddish language of Ashkenazic Jewry (central and eastern European...
Icelandic literature
Icelandic literature, body of writings in Icelandic, including those from Old Icelandic (also called Old Norse) through Modern...
rhetoric
Rhetoric, the principles of training communicators—those seeking to persuade or inform. In the 20th century it underwent...
French literature
French literature, the body of written works in the French language produced within the geographic and political boundaries...
Literature Quizzes
A Book Review: Fact or Fiction?
In The War of the Worlds, were the enemies of Earth from Venus? Unlock your imagination and discover the literary...
Literary Character Study: Fact or Fiction?
Is Jane Eyre a fictional explorer and adventuress? Was Sherlock Holmes a real detective? Sort fact from talking pigs, Christmas...
Test Your Literacy Rate: Fact or Fiction?
Were most people literate in ancient times? Was reading once considered a form of physical exercise? Exercise your mental...
Author Showcase: Fact or Fiction?
Is Frankenstein a novel by Percy Bysshe Shelley? From Jane Austen and Jack London to Mark Twain and Maurice Sendak,...
Literary Fun Facts: Fact or Fiction?
Does Starbucks Coffee take its name from the novel Moby-Dick? Is the film Apocalypse Now based on a classic...
The Works of Edgar Allan Poe
You may know what the raven "quoth," but in what story does the narrator confess a murder? What woman is buried not quite...
ABCs of English
What letter begins more English words than any other? What letter does not appear in the English numbers 1 through 100? Learn...
Official Languages
What is the official language of Grenada? What language do most Argentineans speak? Translate your smarts into a high score...
Languages of the World
What is the last letter of the Greek alphabet? From which language does the motto of the United States come? Dot your I’s...
From What Language...
From "Ubuntu" and "vindaloo" to "syrup" and "pajamas", test your knowledge of word origins and world languages in this quiz.
Literature Videos
Literature Subcategories
Folk Literature & Fable
Step into the world of folklore, fables, legends, tall tales, and epics, in which heroes are known to undertake arduous journeys and dragons, fairies, and giants abound. Stories such as these circulated long before systems of writing were developed; ballads, folktales, poems, and the like were transmitted exclusively by word of mouth before written languages took over, and they continue to captivate listeners and readers to this day.
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Tristan and Isolde
legendary figures
- oral literature
- folk literature
Fictional Characters
Here you'll find some of your favorite fictional characters from literature, film, television, and the like, whether it's the analytical mastermind Sherlock Holmes and his endearing associate Dr. Watson or the menacing and helmeted Darth Vader, the ill-tempered Donald Duck, or the teenage sleuth Nancy Drew.
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Hamlet
fictional character
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Thor
fictional character
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Green Lantern
comic-book character
Journalism
Extra, extra! Although the content and style of journalism and the medium through which it is delivered have varied significantly over the years, journalism has always given us a way to keep up with current events, so that we always have our fingers on the pulse.
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Bob Woodward
American journalist and author
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Ida B. Wells-Barnett
American journalist and social reformer
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Seymour Hersh
American journalist
Libraries & Reference Works
Looking to impress your friends with your expansive knowledge of historical events, philosophical concepts, obscure words, and more? We may be biased, but it seems fair enough to say that reference works such as dictionaries, encyclopedias, and textbooks have provided such a service for years (in some cases, hundreds or even thousands of years). You can look for them at your local public library, which likely stores books, manuscripts, journals, CDs, movies, and other sources of information and entertainment.
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E.O. Wilson
American biologist
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Georges-Louis Leclerc, count de Buffon
French naturalist
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Pliny the Elder
Roman scholar
Literatures of the World
Literature knows no geographical bounds; authors can be found in nearly all corners of the globe. Find out more about regional literary styles and forms.
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New Journalism
American literary movement
- Latin American literature
- Arabic literature
Literary Criticism
Everyone's a critic. But not all literary criticism involves judging the quality of a text; it can also focus on interpreting the meaning of a work or evaluating an author's place in literary history.
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Edward Said
American professor and literary critic
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Harold Bloom
American literary critic and author
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Charles Baudelaire
French author
Literary Terms
Want to be able to distinguish your limericks from your haikus and your paeans from your panegyrics? Dive deep into literary terms and forms.
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novel
literature
- nonfictional prose
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tragedy
literature
Nonfiction
The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth! Or that's the idea, at least. Nonfiction works center on facts and real events. Although there is some debate about which kinds of literature qualify as nonfiction, the genre typically includes books in the categories of biography, memoir, science, history, self-help, cooking, health and fitness, business, and more.
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essay
literature
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diary
literature
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Unsafe at Any Speed
work by Nader
Novels & Short Stories
Whether it's Don Quixote, Pride and Prejudice, The Great Gatsby, or The Fall of the House of Usher, novels and short stories have been enchanting and transporting readers for a great many years. There's a little something for everyone: within these two genres of literature, a wealth of types and styles can be found, including historical, epistolary, romantic, Gothic, and realist works, along with many more.
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The Great Gatsby
novel by Fitzgerald
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The Book of Negroes
novel by Hill
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Dracula
novel by Stoker
Oratory
I have a dream... Four score and seven years ago... It's not a fluke that these phrases came to be so widely known and remembered. Truly great and persuasive speeches elicit strong emotional reactions in their audiences and may have broad historical repercussions. Martin Luther King's I Have a Dream speech and Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, quoted above, are two iconic examples of successful oratory, as are Elizabeth I's speech to the troops at Tilbury and Winston Churchill's first speech as prime minister to the House of Commons.
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Quintilian
Roman rhetorician
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John Donne
English poet
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Tacitus
Roman historian
Plays
All the world's a stage, as Shakespeare put it in As You Like It; and the stage is where you'll find performances of works by such famed playwrights as Anton Chekhov, Eugene O'Neill, and the Bard himself, among many others.
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Hamlet
work by Shakespeare
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Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
play by Albee
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Henry IV, Part 1
work by Shakespeare
Poetry
Poetry is a vast subject that encompasses much more than just your average Roses are red, violets are blue poem. Delve into the category of literature that Percy Bysshe Shelley called a mirror which makes beautiful that which is distorted; sonnets, haikus, nursery rhymes, epics, and more are included.
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Songs of Innocence and of Experience
poetry by Blake
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Leaves of Grass
work by Whitman
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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
work by Coleridge