Portal:Literature
Introduction
Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, plays, and poems. It includes both print and digital writing. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include oral literature, much of which has been transcribed. Literature is a method of recording, preserving, and transmitting knowledge and entertainment. It can also have a social, psychological, spiritual, or political role.
The term is sometimes used synonymously with literary fiction, which encompasses fiction written with the goal of literary merit.Literature, as an art form, can also include works in various non-fiction genres, such as biography, diaries, memoirs, letters, and essays. Within its broad definition, literature includes non-fictional books, articles, or other written information on a particular subject. (Full article...)
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The Coral Island: A Tale of the Pacific Ocean is a novel written in 1858 by Scottish author R. M. Ballantyne. One of the first works of juvenile fiction to feature exclusively juvenile heroes, the story relates the adventures of three boys marooned on a South Pacific island, the only survivors of a shipwreck.
A typical Robinsonade – a genre of fiction inspired by Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe – and one of the most popular of its type, the book first went on sale in late 1857 and has never been out of print. Among the novel's major themes are the civilising effect of Christianity, 19th-century British imperialism in the South Pacific, and the importance of hierarchy and leadership. It was the inspiration for William Golding's 1954 dystopian novel Lord of the Flies, which inverted the morality of The Coral Island; in Ballantyne's story the children encounter evil, but in Lord of the Flies evil is within them.
The novel was considered a classic for elementary-school children of the early 20th century in Britain, and in the United States it was a staple of suggested reading lists for high-school students. Modern critics consider The Coral Island to feature a dated imperialist view of the world, but although it is less popular today than it once was, it was adapted into a four-part children's television drama broadcast by ITV in 2000.
Selected excerpt
“ | I don’t know why it should be so, but it is an undeniable fact that there is nothing makes a man look so supremely ridiculous as losing his hat. The feeling of helpless misery that shoots down one’s back on suddenly becoming aware that one’s head is bare is among the most bitter ills that flesh is heir to. And then there is the wild chase after it, accompanied by an excitable small dog, who thinks it is a game, and in the course of which you are certain to upset three or four innocent children—to say nothing of their mothers—butt a fat old gentleman on to the top of a perambulator, and carom off a ladies’ seminary into the arms of a wet sweep. | ” |
— Jerome K. Jerome, Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow |
More Did you know
- ... that Meralda Warren and several children on Pitcairn Island wrote the first book published in both English and Pitkern, a South Pacific creole language?
- ... that octogenarian poet Joyce La Mers donated $500,000 to Light Quarterly, the US's only literary magazine devoted to light verse?
- ... that the non-fiction book The Siege: The Attack on the Taj is set during the 2008 Mumbai attacks?
- ... that Lancelot de Carle, an eyewitness to the trial and execution of Anne Boleyn, wrote a poem detailing her life and the circumstances surrounding her death?
- ... that writer Hu Yepin was betrayed by rival communists, arrested by the British police, and executed by the Kuomintang?
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Did you know (auto-generated) -
- ... that literary agent Jacques Chambrun sold unauthorized, scandalous excerpts of a Marilyn Monroe memoir to a British tabloid?
- ... that the poet Fernando Pessoa considered Alberto Caeiro, one of his own heteronyms, to be his master?
- ... that Edo literature was influenced by British colonialism in the late 19th century, which introduced the Roman script and Christianity to the Edo people?
- ... that the cultural scholar Hermann Bausinger wrote a book about the history of literature from Swabia from the 18th century to the present, published for his 90th birthday?
- ... that literary fiction novel Agatha of Little Neon's title stems from a house that is "the color of Mountain Dew"?
- ... that Soviet German literary critic Richard Knorre was injured in an explosion during the siege of Leningrad?
Today in literature
- 19 BC - Virgil, Roman poet died
- 1542 - Juan Boscán Almogáver, Spanish poet died
- 1719 - Johann Heinrich Acker, German writer died
- 1832 - Sir Walter Scott, Scottish writer died
- 1866 - H. G. Wells, English writer born
- 1895 - Sergei Yesenin, Russian poet born
- 1902 - Luis Cernuda, Spanish poet born
- 1937 - J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit is published.
- 1938 - Ivana Brlić-Mažuranić Croatian writer died
- 1944 - Fannie Flagg, American actress and novelist born
- 1947 - Stephen King, American author born
- 1947 - Marsha Norman, American playwright born
- 1972 - Henry de Montherlant, French writer died
- 1974 - Jacqueline Susann, American novelist died
- 2002 - Robert Forward, American writer died
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Regions: | Australian literature · Indian literature · Persian literature |
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