What is Literature? Why does Literature Exist?

Literature is any form of writing that can be interpreted by the audience in different ways and poses discussions and arguments. It challenges the thoughts of others and each time you read the piece you can discover a new point, which allows one to interpret the reading in yet another way. Literature exists to challenge the minds of the audience and let them interpret and question their own thoughts. Literature opens up a whole new perspective for some people and allows for many great discussions.


Response to Reading:

Right off the bat while reading, Why Read The Classics, I agreed with the very first definition. "The classics are those books about which you usually hear people saying: 'I'm rereading'.... never 'I'm reading'..." After reading that line it made me think of the last time I saw somebody reading what I consider to be a classic. The Great Gatsby is a book that I have loved reading and rereading and cannot think of a time that I have seen somebody reading it for the first time. These books are so enjoyable and they pose so many different points and have hidden messages that are discovered time after time. That brings me to the point that is also stated in Why Read The Classics that says "A classic is a book which with each rereading offers as much of a sense of discovery as the first reading. "After reading a classic new things can be discovered and one can pick up and understand so much more than they had the first time around.”

The more we think we know a book, the more we can discover in a book. This goes along with the point presented above that new things can be discovered when rereading a novel. When one is reading a novel and thinks they know what is coming, that's when something comes that the audience couldn't imagine. Even if one has read the novel before, it leaves way for them to reimagine or discover something new in the piece. That's why the point 'classics are books which, the more we think we know them though hearsay, the more original, unexpected, and innovated we find them when we actually read them.' In the novel, The Boy In The Striped Pajamas, the ending was a complete twist to the whole novel. It is something that even after having read it before I was still shocked to find out the ending. It makes me think differently and think about what has happened in a different light. What was the father thinking? Did the son do the right thing? These are the things that make classics classics. They make us question and rethink what we thought was right or what we thought was going to happen, even if we have read the classic before.