LITERATURE THEORIES

1. According to Henry Van Dyke, literature consists of those writings which interpret the meaning of nature and life, in words of charm and power, touched with the personality of the author, in artistic forms of permanent interest.

2.According to Imam Ja’far al-Sadiq (Muslim scholar and philosopher), literature is the garment which one puts on what he says or writes so that it may appear more attractive.

3. According to Roman Jacobson (Russian formalist), literature is organized violence committed on ordinary speech.

4. According to Ezra Pound, great literature is simply language charged with meaning to the utmost possible degree.

5. According to Peter Lamarque, part of what is involved in appreciating a work of art as a work of art is to appreciate it as an artifact designed for a purpose.

6. According to McRae (1991), a literary text as any imaginative material that stimulates a response in the reader, including songs, cartoons, idioms and proverbs.

7. According to Halliday (1985), the text as an expression of experience can be the closest definition of literature, and if readers can identify with events or characters and project themselves into them imaginatively, then a certain truth to experience can be created.

8. Maley (2001) believes that in the post-modern, deconstructionist age, the definition of literature took on a new shape to include texts such as advertising copy, graffiti and public notices which use literary devices like parallelism, rhyme, rhythm and metaphor.

9. Williams (1976) believes that literature is a difficult word, in part because its conventional contemporary meaning appears, at first sight, so simple.

10. Miller (2002) believes that literature is associated with the gradual rise of almost universal literacy in the West.