Lecture 1: Literature and Literary Studies

Added: 2026-05-09

[00:00:16]Hello dear learner, a very warm welcome to you all in this 8-week course entitled understanding literary genres and devices. I am Dr. Vishal Singh assistant professor department of English Vashanta College forum Rajgart Waransi admitted to the privileges of Banarus Hindu University. This course is in collaboration with professor Mjari Janjun Walam. She is a professor in department of English was college forum in Rajgad.

[00:00:53]Over the next eight weeks, we will explore the major genres of English literature, examining their defining characteristics, historical development and key examples.

[00:01:10]Alongside this, we also discuss important literary devices that enhance meaning, structure and artistic expression of literary text.

[00:01:23]This course is designed to build a strong foundation in literary studies.

[00:01:32]Whether you are a student of literature or simply passionate about reading and understanding text more deeply. I look forward to our discussion and discoveries together.

[00:01:51]Let's begin this literary journey.

[00:01:55]Under the module one, we are going to read foundations of literature.

[00:02:02]In this week one, in this lecture number one which titled literature and literary studies.

[00:02:14]First we'll talk about the outline of the lecture. what we are going to cover in this particular lecture.

[00:02:21]These are here what is literature?

[00:02:24]What does mean by the literature?

[00:02:27]Definition of the literature.

[00:02:30]Role of literature.

[00:02:32]Literary versus non literary text.

[00:02:36]Why study literature?

[00:02:39]Functions and value of literature.

[00:02:42]What is literary studies?

[00:02:45]literary studies perspectives and then finally we will discuss literary theory a glimpse moving forward let's take one question what is literature when this word we hear what comes in our mind first a play a drama a novel a short story or a fiction or a rap music or cinema.

[00:03:28]It means literature is not that much limited in which we can limit it only with a particular genre or form of any work of art.

[00:03:44]If we discuss its root meaning or from where this word came. So let's talk about this I mean ethmology of the word literature.

[00:03:58]This word derived from a Latin word litera which means letters. Actually I'm talking about the literal meaning of this word literature.

[00:04:10]And if we discuss in a narrow sense, I mean narrow definition of the literature, then we may say any work of art which is imaginative fixes.

[00:04:28]It may be creative, it may be critical one that is called literature.

[00:04:35]For example, what we can discuss in this category, it may be pros, it may be poetry, it may be drama or fiction, anything. But if you are going to discuss this word literature in detail or we may say in a broader sense what literature covers what this word covers what are the things which comes under this word literature.

[00:05:07]So it's not only limited to the approach, poetry, drama or novel.

[00:05:13]Literature also covers different genre beside these mentioned forms of art. It may be biography, it may be autobiography, it may be traalog, it may be memoir, even rap music or we all know it may be cinema.

[00:05:38]So in broader sense, literature covers so many kinds of writing or you may say work of art.

[00:05:47]We all know literature is interdisciplinary thing where we can know about the society, culture, history, values, everything through literature.

[00:06:09]Whatever is happening in the society, literature is also getting produced because of that.

[00:06:18]We cannot uh ignore effect of society in literature. It means it's a kind of mirror of society. They both are related to each other so closely.

[00:06:32]Moving forward, let's discuss a definition which is given by Norto Fry who was a critic. He said, "Literature speaks the language of the imagination and the study of literature is supposed to train and improve the imagination.

[00:06:52]It means literature is the product of our creative thinking, imagination.

[00:07:00]it may be also critical. So any work of art based on the imagination of the writer, author, poet, anyone may be behind that. And the study of literature is supposed to train and improve the imagination.

[00:07:19]Extensive reading or any kind of reading, it used to train us. It used to inculcate among us a kind of habit, a kind of thinking, a kind of understanding.

[00:07:42]We have a very good example for that. We have Francis Beckan. If you'll read essays of Becken, you must find how educative those essays are which have been written by Francis Beckan. They are completely objective in the approach and they are is still relevant in the society and also we can see timelessness of the literature from his essay.

[00:08:11]Those are applicable to all of us irrespect of the cast, class, creed even irrespect of the geographical background or time. Those says were written somewhere in 16th century but they are is still relevant and we feel a kind of connection we can relate ourself with doja sage. So of course literature speaks the language of the imagination and the study of literature is supposed to train and improve the imagination.

[00:08:45]Now moving forward about the definition of literature. What is literature? Just in general sense written works with emotional, artistic or intellectual value.

[00:08:59]We all know if anything is written it may be a poem. Because of certain emotional situation a writer used to write a poem.

[00:09:12]It may be sad, it may be on happy tone, it may be romantic poem, it may be heroic poem, it may be anything. So of course there is emotion later. If you are talking about just traditional definition of English literature or any kind of literature, it is a written works uplasting and artistic value.

[00:09:40]Artistic value again the same thing where we are talking about the imagination about the creativity and a kind of critical thinking. Now let's talk about the modern definition of the literature.

[00:10:00]Literature is all written or spoken creative expression including oral, digital and hybrid forms.

[00:10:10]Everything either it is oral form or it is in written form or even a speech that is a part of literature. We have a very good example of Aristotal. He has written two books. One is rhetoric which talks about the art of speaking. Another is poetics which talks about the art of writing.

[00:10:32]It means anything either it is written or it is in a speech form or it is oral. If it is a creative expression that comes under the definition of the literature. Now let's talk about the role of literature.

[00:10:53]how it is performing its role in the society. So there are various role of literature in the society. But if you're going to talk in a particular way, so we should take these two things in our consideration.

[00:11:12]The first thing is literature as an art and the second is literature as communication.

[00:11:20]So let's talk about this. What is literature as an art?

[00:11:28]When we discuss literature as an art, there are certain things. Literature is something which is imaginative with aesthetic expression.

[00:11:40]It produces beauty and of course emotional resonance.

[00:11:47]Literature has a timeless appeal. It is not born with the time or situation.

[00:11:54]For example, we can talk about words poem defodil.

[00:12:03]What is there? I'm just going to read four line of this poem.

[00:12:09]A host of golden daffodils beside the lake beneath the trees fluttering and dancing in the bridge.

[00:12:20]Just see how Wsworth is celebrating nature.

[00:12:26]How is talking about the beauty of nature though it is a very simple but it has a radiant charm.

[00:12:37]And if you are talking about the aesthetic expression of this poem, just see use of vivid imagery.

[00:12:46]Wsworth have used different kind of imagery in this poem.

[00:12:52]This creates a kind of visual delights.

[00:12:58]And when we are going to talk about the timeless appeal of this poem or the up these four lines, we can see eternal joy.

[00:13:09]What fawned in harmony with the nature.

[00:13:12]Wsworth was a great nature poet. He has described himself as a lover of nature, worshipper of nature, a student of nature and he had published so many works and his work lyrical ballot which published in 1798 is a landmark or we can say beginning of the romantic age in English literature.

[00:13:46]So we can see how he's talking about the beauty, aesthetic values and timelessness of the literation in his work.

[00:14:01]There is another example John Kits who was also romantic poet.

[00:14:09]Ke is known for his great oats and if you'll read his oat we will find how he has described about the beauty in his poems.

[00:14:25]There is a poem on a gracian.

[00:14:31]We can read that poem and we'll find how poet is saying that everything in this world is subject of decay, destroy, everything is a subject of mortality.

[00:14:46]Nothing is permanent in this world.

[00:14:49]But he's saying only we can immortalize something by our art.

[00:15:00]He has given different examples in this poem Odon Graciano.

[00:15:07]Now if you are talking about literature as a communication.

[00:15:12]So what is mean by communication?

[00:15:14]Communication is something in which we are transferring our thought, our ideas, our concept to each other. Especially it is related to information.

[00:15:28]So literature is something which is a vehicle of ideas not only ideas but also values, cultures and tradition of our society.

[00:15:43]It transmits collective memory of the past.

[00:15:49]It has also role in building cultural identity of any nation or any individual.

[00:15:59]For example, we can discuss about trashed with destiny. This was a speech given by Javal Nehu on the eve of Independence Day in which he was talking about a newly born nation.

[00:16:18]He has discussed about the expectations of a new nation.

[00:16:27]expectations from the people what we are supposed to do as a newly born country.

[00:16:41]So what is our role? How we have to build our nation? What kind of message we have to circulate and how we have to move forward in our life to develop to grow our nation to establish it as a strong nation in the world.

[00:17:03]What we are supposed to do all these things have been discussed by Jawal Nehu in his lecture trusted with destiny.

[00:17:14]So that speech is carrying forward those values, those cultures or those ideas which was actually discussed by Javahal Nehu at that time.

[00:17:29]So in that way we can say literature has a very good role of communication.

[00:17:41]Though we know literature is a very broad term. It covers different kind of text under this it is not limited to the academic text only or the literary text.

[00:17:57]So we have another categorization of literature that literature have a literary text also and non literary text also.

[00:18:11]Okay. So what are the literary text?

[00:18:16]Let's talk about that and what are the characteristics of these literary text and how they differ from non literary text.

[00:18:26]As we know, pros, poetry, drama, all these things comes under the category of literary text.

[00:18:41]Now let's talk about the characteristics of these texts.

[00:18:45]So we all know they are open to interpretation.

[00:18:51]There may be various kind of interpretation.

[00:18:54]They may be readerentric. They may be authorentric.

[00:19:02]Language of these text sometime plain, simple or sometime with atheetic language, aesthetic values.

[00:19:17]And also these texts are full of symbols.

[00:19:22]There are so many symbolic meanings also in literary text. Now let's discuss it one by one.

[00:19:29]When we are saying open to interpretation, what does it mean? Means as a reader, we can read a text on the basis of our understanding and we can infer our meaning.

[00:19:43]It may vary from person to person. It is not something which is fixed.

[00:19:52]Let's take example waiting for God.

[00:19:57]This is a play. This was written by Samuel Beckett somewhere in 1950s based on the existentialism philosophy. This is an absurd play.

[00:20:14]If you are going to read this play first time, if you are going for the literal meaning, you may feel that this work is meaningless.

[00:20:25]This is not intelligible.

[00:20:27]You may say this work has no meaning at all. You may laugh at it.

[00:20:36]You may feel bored.

[00:20:39]But at the another hand if you are going to read it in depth you are going to find its deeper meaning.

[00:20:49]And if you are aware about the theory of existentialism if you are aware about the absodism then you will understand what kind of deep meaning in this text and you will be also able to correlate this text with your own life. How it is talking about the nothingness?

[00:21:11]How it is talking about the existence?

[00:21:13]There's a very famous line in this text.

[00:21:16]Nothing happens. Nobody comes. Nobody goes.

[00:21:21]It's awful.

[00:21:23]What does it mean?

[00:21:27]Means everything is just assert.

[00:21:36]Nothing is fixed. Nothing is planned but we all are struggling. Why?

[00:21:46]So when we'll read in deep even we can correlate this text with our own life also because what we all are doing in our life. We are just trying to prove ourself. We're just trying to prove our identity.

[00:22:04]I hope you're getting now.

[00:22:07]There are another example the road not taken by Robert Fost. It's a great poem.

[00:22:13]We all know about this.

[00:22:16]So what is there in that poem?

[00:22:22]The character is in the forest.

[00:22:26]Poet is in the forest and he's watching.

[00:22:28]There are two ways and he don't know which is the right path. Which one he should select. So if you are going for the general meaning this is just in a literal sense about the confusion of two ways in the forest two paths in the forest but if you are going a deeper meaning it means about the choices of life what we are going to opt what we are going to prioritize in our life.

[00:22:58]So literature or literary text are free to interpret.

[00:23:06]This is the meaning of open to interpretation. Second thing about the aesthetic language we all know I was just discussing about John Keits.

[00:23:17]He has written great oats. He discussed about the beauty.

[00:23:26]I'm just going to read few lines from his poem.

[00:23:32]A thing of beauty is a joy forever.

[00:23:36]Its loveliness increases. It will never pass into nothingness but still will keep a bow quiet for us and asleep full of sweet dreams and health and quiet breathing.

[00:23:55]So we can understand by reading this poem how he has explained about the beauty and how he has described the importance of beauty in his work.

[00:24:07]Further about the symbolic sense if you are going to read there's a very good example Lord of the Flies you will see this novel was written by William Golding in response of the coraland which was written by RM Valentine and this novel talks about world war talks about how children can lose their emotion and How even children are also subject of corruption. How they can get corrupted because of the situation only because of the condition.

[00:24:52]So there are several symbols in this novel. I won't go in detail. I'm just telling about the symbols. First one is the con cell. Cell is a symbol of law, order and democratic authority. In this novel, it was decided by the boyage, whoever will have a conch in hand, they will have authority to speak as a leader. Second symbol, Piggy's glasses. Piggy is a character in this novel and his glasses are also symbol of what? Of rationality. They represent intellect and the power of science.

[00:25:36]Another symbol, the signal fire.

[00:25:40]The fire is a symbol of hope in this novel.

[00:25:45]It also symbolizes rescue and connection to civilization.

[00:25:55]So there are various symbol in this novel. We can interpret them according to our understanding, according to our per perception.

[00:26:07]So we know that literary texts have a symbolic meaning also. They are not just with a literal meaning. They have symbolic meaning. Now moving forward about the non literary text, there are two things I can say. One is factual, another is functional. What does mean by factual? When we are saying factual means we are talking about data about certain facts. For example, news.

[00:26:44]News either it is a print media or it is in a digital media that used to provide you information only that is not open to interpretation like literary text. You just need to read it and gather information. It may be weather report, maybe anything. Second thing, functional. What is functional?

[00:27:06]Functional is actually related to the manuals to the guide book. Suppose you are going to purchase a new electronic appliance. Just let's take example of cell phone. You are purchasing a cell phone and there is guide book there is manual for what how to use it dos and don't. So when you are just going to read about the rules and guidelines of any product or anything that comes under this functional role of the non literary text. I hope it's clear to you literary text and non literary text.

[00:27:48]Now the next but very interesting question why study literature? What is the purpose of studying literature?

[00:27:58]So we all know literature reflects society. As I told you in the very beginning literature and society they affect each other. Literature is a mirror of society.

[00:28:08]It also reflects culture and history of society. In literature we can get information from the past also through literature through certain books.

[00:28:23]It also develops a kind of creative imagination among the readers. While we are reading certain text, we are visualizing that we are imagining the text and we are also creating or developing a kind of creative imagination. We may say then it also evoke empathy. When I'm saying evoke empathy, I'm talking about those literature which dealt with people who are not in the mainstream of the society like you may say the lit literature, women writing or disability literature anything can when we are reading these kind of literature it creates a kind of empathy not sympathy towards the people toward the sufferer towards the victims about which we are reading.

[00:29:25]It means literature also helps to boost critical thinking among the readers. We don't read only to get entertainment.

[00:29:34]We read to imagine, we read to think over it and we read to make our own understanding. So of course it helps in boosting our critical thinking.

[00:29:50]Further talking about the functions and values of literature.

[00:29:56]What are those?

[00:29:58]There are certain functions which have been mentioned here. Aesthetic or artistic. So I have already discussed.

[00:30:03]It provides pleasure, beauty through its language.

[00:30:11]It has another function cultural function. It mirrors the values beliefs of the past struggles of the society in the history. Literature has also political function. It works as a tool of resistance, critique or propaganda.

[00:30:30]It has of course educative purpose. As I mentioned while we are reading Francis Bacon we can learn so many things even now. So they are relevant even this time.

[00:30:44]So it's not only Bacon there are several writers and several texts which have this kind of capacity.

[00:30:54]Further literature has also cathartic characteristics.

[00:31:01]Especially when we read Aristotal, we will find how he has discussed about the catharsis, about the pergation of the emotion, about purification of the emotion, how especially tresdy through pity and fear used to purify our emotion or pergate our emotion.

[00:31:19]These have been mentioned in poetics while he was talking about tragedy.

[00:31:25]Then of course last but not least literature has purpose of entertainment too. As we all know cinema is a part of literature, music is a part of literature. Everything comics books.

[00:31:37]There are so many story books. So readers used to read it to pass their time to entertain to enjoy. So that is also one of them in the function of literation.

[00:31:49]Then what is literary studies? We have discussed what is literature. Now talking about what is literary studies.

[00:32:02]Literary studies involve the analysis, interpretation and critique of literary text.

[00:32:11]It explores how text work, what they mean and their impact across time and culture. It means in simple literary text actually tells us how to read any work of art. What should be our approach?

[00:32:32]How can we infer the meaning?

[00:32:36]we can apply a different kind of critical approach to investigate to infer to understand any work of art. So everything whatever critical tools you are applying to read and to infer the meaning of any work of art that comes under literary studies. We can divide it also into two parts academic study and interdisciplinary study. analyzing text of literature in lit academic study.

[00:33:07]There's a very famous quote to be or not to be. This is a soli of uh play hamlet.

[00:33:15]And in that soluki actually if you are going for the literal meaning so it is just a kind of confusion either to live or to die. Protagonist is thinking Hamlet is thinking continuously.

[00:33:29]But if you are going in detail you will find that he's thinking either he has to kill Claudius or not who has killed his father.

[00:33:39]So you can analyze text in a different way with different perspective.

[00:33:47]Another example you may analyze context.

[00:33:51]How you analyze context? There is a very good example of George Orwell the novel 1984 which talks about a kind of government which is functioning as a dictator and there is a big brother who is watching always everyone.

[00:34:08]So in that uh novel you will find contextual analysis later the last one analyzing authorship there's a well-known novel Ulysis this is psychological novel by James Joyce in which is discussing or you may say explaining himself through the protagonist So in a way it is a semi-autobiographical novel also and it is about author himself. So we used to read text we used to interpret text from the life understanding of the writer and as an autobiographical study of Arthur.

[00:34:59]In interdisciplinary study, we find links with history, links with philosophy, links with psychology, links with disability.

[00:35:11]So what are those?

[00:35:15]For example, you may read deacons a tale of two cities which narrate the situation of England at that time.

[00:35:22]What kind of situation was there? How England and France they were struggling.

[00:35:29]They were fighting to each other. You may understand by reading this text. How literature is connected with philosophy.

[00:35:35]You can read Huxley's brave new world.

[00:35:37]You will find which kind of philosophy have been discussed in this text. Moving forward we can see how literature is connected with the psychology. So there is Golding's Lord of the Flies which I have already discussed that how this novel is full of symbols and how he's talking about the children's psychology how a human being either it is adult or child they may get influenced they may get corrupt in different kind of situation. So this is completely psychological. Moving forward, disability is connected with the literature. There are various literary texts, there are various literature, there are various writers who have written uh text based up disability study. How we should be empathized towards the people with disability and how we should create an accessible environment for the people with disability because they're not disabled but they are differently able.

[00:36:44]So we just need to provide them access in the society. We don't need to look them with this sympathy but empathy. So literature is related with disability also.

[00:36:57]Let's discuss what are the perspectives of literary studies. It may be textori oriented where we will discuss about the structure, form, language, style and literary elements. For example, we can read a novel by Mary title Frankstein.

[00:37:17]It was a kind of experiment in romantic age when they started to write Gothic novel. So we can see how this novel had been is structured in a different way.

[00:37:28]So we need to understand the structure of the novel. Another thing it may be author oriented as I just discussed.

[00:37:37]Ulysis is a novel which is somehow autobiographical novel.

[00:37:42]Same writer has written another novel a portrait of the artist as hangman where character or protagonist Stefan Dedillus is a mouthpiece of James Joy. So it is completely related from his life and it is a development of the writer himself.

[00:38:01]So that it has been also categorized as a building slowman novel. So in these kind of novel what we used to do we used to discuss or we used to read about the writer's own life. The third thing is it may be reader oriented. So meaning is not going to be controlled by the writer. Text is free to interpret.

[00:38:22]Reader can interpret text on the basis of its own understanding.

[00:38:29]As I already discussed this example of Robert first poem the road not taken.

[00:38:37]So it is about the life choices. If you are going to read it in a literal sense it is just about two path. But if you are going to read it in deep with deep meaning then you will find that it is about the choices of life. Which choice you are going to decide? Which choice you are going to make finally in your life.

[00:38:58]Then the last one about the context orientation of the literature. So it may be history oriented, maybe politics oriented, maybe society oriented, maybe anything. For example, you may discuss things fall apart by Chinuachi Bay. It is a postcolonial novel. It talks about the patism. It talks about postc colonial understanding of a person.

[00:39:26]Okono is a protagonist and what are his understanding about the society at that time. So we can read and we can understand about a particular time in the history through literary text also. So of course it is context oriented.

[00:39:47]Now moving forward we can have a glimpse of literary theory or we may say about the approach of reading any particular work of art though I mentioning here few of them these are not all formalism marxism feminism postc colonialism disability studies eco criticism, gender studies.

[00:40:22]So while we are going to read any work of art or any particular text, what we will do? We will apply certain parameters, how we have to interpret that text, how we have to generate meaning from that text. So these are certain approach. In formalism, what we do?

[00:40:46]We used to focus on the form, structure and language of text itself. We don't used to focus on the historical background of the text or about the writer's background or about the society of that time. We just used to focus on the language of the text and we used to try we used to infer meaning from that.

[00:41:13]Second, Marxism. It analyzes class, struggle, economic power and ideology in literature.

[00:41:22]Views literature as a product of material and social condition.

[00:41:28]Next, in feminism, what we used to do?

[00:41:31]Examine gender roles. How gender is a social construct while sex is a biological construct.

[00:41:40]We used to talk about patriarchy.

[00:41:43]We used to discuss about the female voices and experiences in literature, about the suffering of women, about the victimization of women, about the rights of women. Then in postc colonialism, we used to explore the effects of colonialism and cultural identity in literature.

[00:42:05]highlights voices of the colonized and critique euroentricism.

[00:42:11]What was the western point of view? We used to deconstruct that and we used to established our own point of view.

[00:42:23]Then eco-criticism under the ecoitism we used to study the relationship between literature and the natural environment.

[00:42:31]examines how text depict nature, ecology and environmental issues.

[00:42:39]And one more gender study. What we used to talk we used to focus on how literature constructs and challenges ideas of gender and sexuality. It explores intersectionality and non-binary identities.

[00:42:56]So these are certain approach through which we can read any work of art and we used to infer meaning we used to understand that particular text by applying these approaches.

[00:43:11]Now in summary what we discussed in today's lecture literature resist a single definition.

[00:43:21]It is diverse, complex and interpretive.

[00:43:26]It is not something which have a fixed meaning.

[00:43:30]Literature is not just what we read but how we read. What was our approach while we were reading any particular text? It is an art, cultural memory and political wise.

[00:43:45]It functions for aesthetic delight, cultural transmission and social critique.

[00:43:52]Present in all societies constantly evolving.

[00:43:58]And about literary studies, what we read, literary studies opens up critical and analytical approaches to reading.

[00:44:07]Literary studies does not enjoy text but interrogate how meaning is made, how text relate to society, person and how interpretation is shaped. Today's lecture we discussed what is literature in general and what is literary studies in general. Now uh dear learners it's all for today.

[00:44:33]Thank you so much.