Literature appeals to our sense of beauty and thus gives us pleasure. Literature reaches the intelligence through the heart or feelings. Its emotional and rational appeal chiefly inspires us. Prose is the language of reason, while poetry is the literature of emotion. Love, hatred, joy, sorrow, fear, pity, anger, jealousy, revenge, charity such are the emotions that poetry stirs in varying degrees. The intense the emotion, the greater the appeal of poetry. The poetry of Shelley, Keats and Tennyson is highly charged with emotion.
In this article we will see what the essence of literature is and what it should be? How literature reflects human emotions, life, complexities, problems and heartedness?
(1) RAW MATERIAL FOR LITERATURE. Human life is the raw material for literature: human joys, pleasures, sorrows, feelings, emotions, expressions, human virtue and vices, human greatness and degradation, human aspirations, courage, hope, disappointment, success, failure, encouragement, appreciation, anger and frustrations are the stuff of which it is made. Literature may thus be regarded as a mirror of life or in the language of literary criticism, an imitation of life, it depicts human beings, their motives, goals, targets, and ambitions, the ups and downs of human life, thoughts and deeds.
(2) THE ESSENTIAL QUALITY. An essential quality of literature is that it appeals to the intellect through emotions. This emotional quality is its distinguishing mark and the reason of its universal appeal.
(3) DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SCIENCE AND LITERATURE. Science and especially the natural science appeals to mind of man through rationality, experimentation, empiricism and intellect but literature stirs his heart. It is because of its emotional appeal that literature is so widely read in highly developed and industrialized countries. Science having a purely intellectual and brainy appeal is focused and studied by only a minority of general public.
(4) VARIETIES IN LITERATURE. There are many varieties of literature, each having its own peculiar characteristics and each possessing its singular and eccentric appeal. Poetry, drama, novel, fiction, short story, long play and biography are the chief sub-divisions of literature, all of which enjoy immense popularity; a taste for these kinds of literature has spread even to the common man.
(5) LITERATURE IS A BLESSING. Literature is one of the greatest blessings of life, because it exists primarily to give us pleasure. It is a source of keen delight to read the lyrical poetry of Shelly, the sensuous poetry of Keats, the narrative poems of Coleridge, Scott and Byron, the Nature poetry of William Wordsworth, the sweet and musical verse of Tennyson and Rossetti and the melancholy poetry of Matthew Arnold. The comedies of Shakespeare with their rich wit and humor are a source of unending joy. The novels of such writers as Jane Austen, Dickens, Hardy, Stevenson, Arnold Bennet and H.G Wells, have given pleasure and lessons of life to innumerable readers. Indeed, the study of literature is one of the richest sources of human pleasure. It provides with and escapes from our personal circumstances and problems. We find ourselves in a new and beautiful world. We move about in the company of such characters as Falstaff, Mr. Pickwick, Mr. Micawber and Colonel Newcome.
(6) MORAL INSTRUCTIONS AND CHARACTER BUILDING. The study of literature is also a source of moral instruction. It depicts good as well as bad characters and presents them in such a way that we feel compelled to follow the example of good characters and avoid the follies and errors of evil ones. Most works of literature show us the working of a moral order in the universe, so that we can derive suitable lessons for our own guidance in life. Milton's Paradise Lost, Dante's The Divine Comedy, the novels of Tolstoy and the tragedies of Shakespeare are full of deep moral significance. The study of such works is bound to uplift and ennoble us. Literature brings us face to face with the eternal problems of life. It compels us to meditate over those problems in order to find a satisfactory solution. Literature has a role in the character building of humans.
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