Portal:Literature

The Literature Portal

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 prose, fiction, drama, poetry, and including both print and digital writing. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include oral literature, also known as orature much of which has been transcribed. Literature is a method of recording, preserving, and transmitting knowledge and entertainment, and can also have a social, psychological, spiritual, or political role.

Literature, as an art form, can also include works in various non-fiction genres, such as biography, diaries, memoir, letters, and essays. Within its broad definition, literature includes non-fictional books, articles or other written information on a particular subject. (Full article...)

General images -

The following are images from various literature-related articles on Wikipedia.

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  European output of manuscripts 500–1500 (from History of books)
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  Peruvian poet César Vallejo, considered by Thomas Merton "the greatest universal poet since Dante" (from Latin American literature)
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  Ivan Bilibin (1876-1942)'s illustration of the Russian fairy tale about Vasilisa the Beautiful (from Fairy tale)
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  Folio from a manuscript of the Shanamah (Book of Kings) (from History of books)
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  Walter Crane's chromolithograph illustration for The Frog Prince, 1874. (from Children's literature)
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  The scene in Botticelli's Madonna of the Book (1480) reflects the presence of books in the houses of richer people in his time. (from History of books)
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  Illustration from Robert Louis Stevenson's 1883 pirate adventure Treasure Island (from Children's literature)
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  The Codex Manesse, a German book from the Middle Ages (from History of books)
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  John Bauer's illustration of trolls and a princess from a collection of Swedish fairy tales (from Fairy tale)
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  Statue of Minnie the Minx, a character from The Beano. Launched in 1938, the comic is known for its anarchic humour, with Dennis the Menace appearing on the cover. (from Children's literature)
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  Page from a Jain manuscript depicting the birth of Mahavira, c. 1400 (from History of books)
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  Dresden Codex (page 49) (from History of books)
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  Willy Wonka (from Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory), and the Mad Hatter (from Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland) in London (from Children's literature)
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  Pages from the 1819 edition of Kinder- und Haus-Märchen by the Brothers Grimm (from Children's literature)
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  An early Mexican hornbook pictured in Tuer's History of the Horn-Book, 1896. (from Children's literature)
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  A picture by Gustave Doré of Mother Goose reading written (literary) fairy tales (from Fairy tale)
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  Natias Neutert performing Diogenes Synopsis as at Künstlerhaus Bethanien Berlin, 1986 (from Performance poetry)
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  Estimated medieval output of manuscripts in terms of copies (from Medieval literature)
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  A 15th-century Incunable. Notice the blind-tooled cover, corner bosses, and clasps. (from History of books)
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  Hugo Ball performing at the Cabaret Voltaire (from Performance poetry)
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  Cutlery for children. Detail showing fairy-tale scenes: Snow White, Little Red Riding Hood, Hansel and Gretel. (from Fairy tale)
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  1900 edition of the controversial The Story of Little Black Sambo (from Children's literature)
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  J. K. Rowling reads from her novel Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (from Children's literature)
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  The Violet Fairy Book (1906)
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  Gabriel García Márquez, one of the most renowned Latin American writers (from Latin American literature)
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  An author portrait of Jean Miélot writing his compilation of the Miracles of Our Lady, one of his many popular works. (from History of books)
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  Galway Kinnell performing a poetic piece in Vermont (from Performance poetry)
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  The European fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf in a painting by Carl Larsson in 1881. (from Fairy tale)
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  The Story of Mankind (1921) by Hendrik van Loon, 1st Newbery Award winner (from Children's literature)
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  European output of printed books c. 1450–1800 (from History of books)
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  In 1901, French poet and essayist Sully Prudhomme (1839–1907) was the first person to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, "in special recognition of his poetic composition, which gives evidence of lofty idealism, artistic perfection, and a rare combination of the qualities of both heart and intellect." (from Nobel Prize in Literature)
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  Roberto Bolaño is considered to have had the greatest United States impact of any post-Boom author (from Latin American literature)
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  Gabrielle Roy was a notable French Canadian author. (from Canadian literature)
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  French author Albert Camus was the first African-born writer to receive the award. (from Nobel Prize in Literature)
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  A mother reads to her children, depicted by Jessie Willcox Smith in a cover illustration of a volume of fairy tales written in the mid to late 19th century. (from Children's literature)
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  The Adventures of Pinocchio (1883) is a canonical piece of children's literature and one of the best-selling books ever published. (from Children's literature)
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  A Sumerian clay tablet, currently housed in the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago, inscribed with the text of the poem Inanna and Ebih by the priestess Enheduanna, the first author whose name is known
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  Folio from the Shah Jahan Album, c. 1620, depicting the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan (from History of books)
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  Calliope, the muse of heroic poetry (from History of poetry)
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  Statuta Mutine Reformata, 1420–1485; parchment codex bound in wood and leather with brass plaques worked the corners and in the center, with clasps. (from Medieval literature)
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  Page from the Blue Quran manuscript, ca. 9th or 10th century CE (from History of books)
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  Beauty and the Beast, illustration by Warwick Goble (from Fairy tale)
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  The character which means "poetry", in the ancient Chinese Great Seal script style. The modern character is 詩/诗 (shī). (from History of poetry)
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  Goethe's Italian Journey between September 1786 and May 1788 (from Travel literature)
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  A Tagore illustration of a Hindu myth (from Children's literature)
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  Kings' Fairy Tale, 1909, by Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis (from Fairy tale)
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  A poet with a few enraptured fans (from Performance poetry)
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  Hemingway's telegram in 1954 (the academy has alternately used for Literature and in Literature over the years, the latter becoming the norm today) (from Nobel Prize in Literature)
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  Short story writer Alice Munro won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013. (from Canadian literature)
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  Handwritten notes by Christopher Columbus on a Latin edition of The Travels of Marco Polo (from Travel literature)
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  A late 18th-century reprint of Orbis Pictus by Comenius, the first children's picture book. (from Children's literature)
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  Photograph of a printing press in Egypt, c. 1922 (from History of books)
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  A Chinese bamboo book (from History of books)
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  The New England Primer (from Children's literature)
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  Jikji, Selected Teachings of Buddhist Sages and Seon Masters, the earliest known book printed with movable metal type, 1377. Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris. (from History of books)
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  Illustration from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, 1865 (from Children's literature)
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  Statue of C. S. Lewis in front of the wardrobe from his Narnia book The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (from Children's literature)
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  The Book of the Dead of Hunefer, c. 1275 BCE, ink and pigments on papyrus, in the British Museum (London) (from History of books)
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  Number of children's books titles published by the trade sector in 2020 (from Children's literature)
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  Father Frost acts as a donor in the Russian fairy tale Father Frost, testing the heroine before bestowing riches upon her (from Fairy tale)
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  The former Canadian Parliamentary Poet Laureate George Elliott Clarke (2015) (from Canadian literature)
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  Postal stamp of Russia celebrating children's books. (from Children's literature)
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  Hop-o'-My-Thumb and the ogre in an 1865 illustration (from Fairy tale)
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  Charles G. D. Roberts was a poet that belonged to an informal group known as the Confederation Poets. (from Canadian literature)
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  Sculpture of Alfonso Reyes writer of influential pieces of Mexican surrealism. (from Latin American literature)
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  Woman holding wax tablets in the form of the codex. Wall painting from Pompeii, before 79 CE. (from History of books)
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  European output of books 500–1800 (from History of books)
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  H. O. Tanager performs at a bookstore in Boise, Idaho. (from Performance poetry)
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  12-metre-high (40 ft) stack of books sculpture at the Berlin Walk of Ideas, commemorating the invention of modern book printing (from History of books)
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  Peter Pan statue in Kensington Gardens, London (from Children's literature)
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  Newbery's A Little Pretty Pocket-Book, originally published in 1744 (from Children's literature)
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  The Crescent Moon by Rabindranath Tagore illus. by Nandalal Bose, Macmillan 1913 (from Children's literature)
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  The first page of Beowulf (from Medieval literature)
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  Octavio Paz helped to define modern poetry and the Mexican personality. (from Latin American literature)

Selected work

Featured articles are displayed here, which represent some of the best content on English Wikipedia.

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Pilgrim at Tinker Creek is a 1974 nonfiction narrative book by American author Annie Dillard. Told from a first-person point of view, the book details an unnamed narrator's explorations near her home, and various contemplations on nature and life. The title refers to Tinker Creek, which is outside Roanoke in Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains. Dillard began writing Pilgrim in the spring of 1973, using her personal journals as inspiration. Separated into four sections that signify each of the seasons, the narrative takes place over the period of one year.

The book records the narrator's thoughts on solitude, writing, and religion, as well as scientific observations on the flora and fauna she encounters. Touching upon themes of faith, nature, and awareness, Pilgrim is also noted for its study of theodicy and the inherent cruelty of the natural world. The author has described it as a "book of theology", and she rejects the label of nature writer. Dillard considers the story a "single sustained nonfiction narrative", although several chapters have been anthologized separately in magazines and other publications. The book is analogous in design and genre to Henry David Thoreau's Walden (1854), the subject of Dillard's master's thesis at Hollins College. Critics often compare Dillard to authors from the Transcendentalist movement; Edward Abbey in particular deemed her Thoreau's "true heir".

Selected biographies -

Featured articles are displayed here.

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  Vonnegut in 1965

  
  Kurt Vonnegut (/ˈvɒnəɡət/ VON-ə-gət; November 11, 1922 – April 11, 2007) was an American writer and humorist known for his satirical and darkly humorous novels. He published 14 novels, three short-story collections, five plays, and five nonfiction works over fifty-plus years; further collections have been published since his death.
  
  Born and raised in Indianapolis, Vonnegut attended Cornell University, but withdrew in January 1943 and enlisted in the U.S. Army. As part of his training, he studied mechanical engineering at Carnegie Institute of Technology and the University of Tennessee. He was then deployed to Europe to fight in World War II and was captured by the Germans during the Battle of the Bulge. He was interned in Dresden, where he survived the Allied bombing of the city in a meat locker of the slaughterhouse where he was imprisoned. After the war, he married Jane Marie Cox. He and his wife both attended the University of Chicago while he worked as a night reporter for the City News Bureau. (Full article...)
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  Carson in 1943

  
  Rachel Louise Carson (May 27, 1907 – April 14, 1964) was an American marine biologist, writer, and conservationist whose sea trilogy (1941–1955) and book Silent Spring (1962) are credited with advancing marine conservation and the global environmental movement.
  
  Carson began her career as an aquatic biologist in the U.S. Bureau of Fisheries, and became a full-time nature writer in the 1950s. Her widely praised 1951 bestseller The Sea Around Us won her a U.S. National Book Award, recognition as a gifted writer and financial security. Her next book, The Edge of the Sea , and the post-war reissued version of her first book, Under the Sea Wind, were also bestsellers. This sea trilogy explores the whole of ocean life from the shores to the depths. (Full article...)
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  Tolkien in the 1920s

  
  John Ronald Reuel Tolkien CBE FRSL (/ˈruːl ˈtɒlkiːn/, ROOL TOL-keen; 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.
  
  From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was the Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon and a Fellow of Pembroke College, both at the University of Oxford. He then moved within the same university to become the Merton Professor of English Language and Literature and Fellow of Merton College, and held these positions from 1945 until his retirement in 1959. Tolkien was a close friend of C. S. Lewis, a co-member of the informal literary discussion group The Inklings. He was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II on 28 March 1972. (Full article...)
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  Meeker in 1921

  
  Ezra Morgan Meeker (December 29, 1830 – December 3, 1928) was an American pioneer who traveled the Oregon Trail by ox-drawn wagon as a young man, migrating from Iowa to the Pacific Coast. Later in life he worked to memorialize the Trail, repeatedly retracing the trip of his youth. Once known as the "Hop King of the World", he was the first mayor of Puyallup, Washington.
  
  Meeker was born in Butler County, Ohio, to Jacob and Phoebe Meeker. His family relocated to Indiana when he was a boy. He married Eliza Jane Sumner in 1851; the following year the couple, with their newborn son and Ezra's brother, set out for the Oregon Territory, where land could be claimed and settled on. Although they endured hardships on the Trail in the journey of nearly six months, the entire party survived the trek. Meeker and his family briefly stayed near Portland, then journeyed north to live in the Puget Sound region. They settled at what is now Puyallup in 1862, where Meeker grew hops for use in brewing beer. By 1887, his business had made him wealthy, and his wife built a large mansion for the family. In 1891, an infestation of hop aphids destroyed his crops and took much of his fortune. He later tried his hand at a number of ventures, and made four largely unsuccessful trips to the Klondike, taking groceries and hoping to profit from the gold rush. (Full article...)
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  Cabinet card of W. S. Gilbert in about 1880 by Elliott & Fry

  
  
  
  Sir William Schwenck Gilbert (18 November 1836 – 29 May 1911) was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his collaboration with composer Arthur Sullivan, which produced fourteen comic operas. The most famous of these include H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and one of the most frequently performed works in the history of musical theatre, The Mikado. The popularity of these works was supported for over a century by year-round performances of them, in Britain and abroad, by the repertory company that Gilbert, Sullivan and their producer Richard D'Oyly Carte founded, the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company. These Savoy operas are still frequently performed in the English-speaking world and beyond.
  
  Gilbert's creative output included over 75 plays and libretti, and numerous short stories, poems and lyrics, both comic and serious. After brief careers as a government clerk and a lawyer, Gilbert began to focus, in the 1860s, on writing light verse, including his Bab Ballads, short stories, theatre reviews and illustrations, often for Fun magazine. He also began to write burlesques and his first comic plays, developing a unique absurdist, inverted style that would later be known as his "topsy-turvy" style. He also developed a realistic method of stage direction and a reputation as a strict theatre director. In the 1870s, Gilbert wrote 40 plays and libretti, including his German Reed Entertainments, several blank-verse "fairy comedies", some serious plays, and his first five collaborations with Sullivan: Thespis, Trial by Jury, The Sorcerer, H.M.S. Pinafore and The Pirates of Penzance. In the 1880s, Gilbert focused on the Savoy operas, including Patience, Iolanthe, The Mikado, The Yeomen of the Guard and The Gondoliers. (Full article...)
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  Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (UK: /ˈwʊlstənkrɑːft/; née Godwin; 30 August 1797 – 1 February 1851) was an English novelist who is best known for writing the Gothic novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818), which is considered an early example of science fiction. She also edited and promoted the works of her husband, the Romantic poet and philosopher Percy Bysshe Shelley. Her father was the political philosopher William Godwin and her mother was the philosopher and women's rights advocate Mary Wollstonecraft.
  
  Mary's mother died 11 days after giving birth to her. She was raised by her father, who provided her with a rich if informal education, encouraging her to adhere to his own anarchist political theories. When she was four, her father married a neighbour, Mary Jane Clairmont, with whom Mary came to have a troubled relationship. (Full article...)
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  Andrade in 1928

  
  Mário Raul de Morais Andrade (October 9, 1893 – February 25, 1945) was a Brazilian poet, novelist, musicologist, art historian and critic, and photographer. He wrote one of the first and most influential collections of modern Brazilian poetry, Paulicéia Desvairada (Hallucinated City), published in 1922. He has had considerable influence on modern Brazilian literature, and as a scholar and essayist—he was a pioneer of the field of ethnomusicology—his influence has reached far beyond Brazil.
  
  Andrade was a central figure in the avant-garde movement of São Paulo for twenty years. Trained as a musician and best known as a poet and novelist, Andrade was personally involved in virtually every discipline that was connected with São Paulo modernism. His photography and essays on a wide variety of subjects, from history to literature and music, were widely published. He was the driving force behind the Modern Art Week, the 1922 event that reshaped both literature and the visual arts in Brazil, and a member of the avant-garde "Group of Five". The ideas behind the Week were further explored in the preface to his poetry collection Pauliceia Desvairada, and in the poems themselves. (Full article...)
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  Portrait of Rădulescu, by Mișu Popp

  
  Ion Heliade Rădulescu or Ion Heliade (also known as Eliade or Eliade Rădulescu; Romanian pronunciation: [ˈi.on heliˈade rəduˈlesku]; January 6, 1802 – April 27, 1872) was a Wallachian, later Romanian academic, Romantic and Classicist poet, essayist, memoirist, short story writer, newspaper editor and politician. A prolific translator of foreign literature into Romanian, he was also the author of books on linguistics and history. For much of his life, Heliade Rădulescu was a teacher at Saint Sava College in Bucharest, which he helped reopen. He was a founding member and first president of the Romanian Academy.
  
  Heliade Rădulescu is considered one of the foremost champions of Romanian culture from the first half of the 19th century, having first risen to prominence through his association with Gheorghe Lazăr and his support of Lazăr's drive for discontinuing education in Greek. Over the following decades, he had a major role in shaping the modern Romanian language, but caused controversy when he advocated the massive introduction of Italian neologisms into the Romanian lexis. A Romantic nationalist landowner siding with moderate liberals, Heliade was among the leaders of the 1848 Wallachian revolution, after which he was forced to spend several years in exile. Adopting an original form of conservatism, which emphasized the role of the aristocratic boyars in Romanian history, he was rewarded for supporting the Ottoman Empire and clashed with the radical wing of the 1848 revolutionaries. (Full article...)
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  Angelou in 1993

  
  Maya Angelou (/ˈændʒəloʊ/ ^ⓘ AN-jə-loh; born Marguerite Annie Johnson; April 4, 1928 – May 28, 2014) was an American memoirist, poet, and civil rights activist. She published seven autobiographies, three books of essays, several books of poetry, and is credited with a list of plays, movies, and television shows spanning over 50 years. She received dozens of awards and more than 50 honorary degrees. Angelou's series of seven autobiographies focus on her childhood and early adult experiences. The first, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969), tells of her life up to the age of 17 and brought her international recognition and acclaim.
  
  She became a poet and writer after a string of odd jobs during her young adulthood. These included fry cook, sex worker, nightclub performer, Porgy and Bess cast member, Southern Christian Leadership Conference coordinator, and correspondent in Egypt and Ghana during the decolonization of Africa. Angelou was also an actress, writer, director, and producer of plays, movies, and public television programs. In 1982, she was named the first Reynolds Professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Angelou was active in the Civil Rights Movement and worked with Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. Beginning in the 1990s, she made approximately 80 appearances a year on the lecture circuit, something she continued into her eighties. In 1993, Angelou recited her poem "On the Pulse of Morning" (1993) at the first inauguration of Bill Clinton, making her the first poet to make an inaugural recitation since Robert Frost at the inauguration of John F. Kennedy in 1961. (Full article...)
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  Amir Hamzah, c. 1928–1937

  
  Tengku Amir Hamzah (February 1911 – 20 March 1946) was an Indonesian poet and National Hero of Indonesia. Born into a Malay aristocratic family in the Sultanate of Langkat in North Sumatra, he was educated in both Sumatra and Java. While attending senior high school in Surakarta around 1930, Amir became involved with the nationalist movement and fell in love with a Javanese schoolmate, Ilik Sundari. Even after Amir continued his studies in legal school in Batavia (now Jakarta) the two remained close, only separating in 1937 when Amir was recalled to Sumatra to marry the sultan's daughter and take on responsibilities of the court. Though unhappy with his marriage, he fulfilled his courtly duties. After Indonesia proclaimed its independence in 1945, he served as the government's representative in Langkat. The following year he was killed in a social revolution led by the PESINDO (Pemuda Sosialis Indonesia), and buried in a mass grave.
  
  Amir began writing poetry while still a teenager: though his works are undated, the earliest are thought to have been written when he first travelled to Java. Drawing influences from his own Malay culture and Islam, as well as from Christianity and Eastern literature, Amir wrote 50 poems, 18 pieces of lyrical prose, and numerous other works, including several translations. In 1932 he co-founded the literary magazine Poedjangga Baroe. After his return to Sumatra, he stopped writing. Most of his poems were published in two collections, Nyanyi Sunyi (1937) and Buah Rindu (1941), first in Poedjangga Baroe then as stand-alone books. (Full article...)

Selected excerpt

“ Reader, I think proper, before we proceed any farther together, to acquaint thee that I intend to digress, through this whole history, as often as I see occasion, of which I am myself a better judge than any pitiful critic whatever; and here I must desire all those critics to mind their own business, and not to intermeddle with affairs or works which no ways concern them; for till they produce the authority by which they are constituted judges, I shall not plead to their jurisdiction. ” — Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling

More Did you know

• ... that although J. R. R. Tolkien translated the Old English poem Beowulf in the 1920s, he did not like the result so it was published only posthumously in 2014 as Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary?
• ... that the 1928 Hindi novel Nirmala uses fiction to promote social reform of the dowry system in India?
• ... that although Crown Duel's fictional setting of Sartorias-deles is most like New Zealand, its customs and fashions were inspired by the court of Louis XIV?
• ... that Crown Princess Yaza Datu Kalaya is the subject of some of the "most beautiful poems in Burmese literature" by her nephew and husband Natshinnaung?
• ... that as a young girl, Margaret George became interested in Cleopatra because they both had dark hair, and later wrote a best-selling novel about her?

Selected illustration

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  "The Canterville Ghost"

  Artist: Wallace Goldsmith; Restoration: Adam Cuerden

  A scene from "The Canterville Ghost", Oscar Wilde's first published story, which is about an American family that moves into a haunted house in England. However, instead of being frightened of the eponymous ghost, they turn the tables and prank him, such as in this scene, where the twin boys have set up a butter-slide, causing the ghost to slip down the staircase. The story satirises both the unrefined tastes of Americans and the determination of the British to guard their traditions.
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  Three Little Pigs

  Artist: Leonard Leslie Brooke; Restoration: Jujutacular

  The wolf blows down the straw house in a 1904 adaptation of Three Little Pigs, a fairy tale featuring anthropomorphic animals. Printed versions date back to the 1840s, but the story itself is thought to be much older. The story in its arguably best-known form appeared in English Fairy Tales by Joseph Jacobs, first published in 1890. The phrases used in the story, and the various morals which can be drawn from it, have become embedded in western culture. The story uses the literary rule of three, expressed in this case as a "contrasting three", as the third pig's brick house turns out to be the only one which is adequate to withstand the wolf.
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  Wicked Witch of the West

  Illustrator: W. W. Denslow; Restoration: Lise Broer

  Dorothy (left) douses the Wicked Witch of the West with water, melting her, in this illustration from the first edition of L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. The appearance of the witch in the 1939 film adaptation of the novel has become an archetype for human wickedness. This film is the source of the oft-quoted phrase, "I'll get you, my pretty ... and your little dog too!" The unique Broadway musical, Wicked, The Untold Story Of the Witches of Oz, tells of The Wicked Witch of the West, the Tin Man, The Cowardly Lion, The Scarecrow, and Glinda's shared history.
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  The Hunting of the Snark

  Illustration credit: Henry Holiday; restored by Adam Cuerden

  The Hunting of the Snark is a nonsense poem written by English writer Lewis Carroll between 1874 and 1876. The plot follows a crew of ten trying to hunt the Snark, which may turn out to be a highly dangerous Boojum. This original illustration by Henry Holiday accompanies the verse:
  

  
  '"`UNIQ--poem-0000001B-QINU`"'
  

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  Jeeves

  Illustration: Unknown; restoration: Adam Cuerden

  Jeeves is a fictional character in a series of comedic short stories and novels by English author P. G. Wodehouse, in which he is depicted as the highly competent valet of a wealthy and idle young Londoner named Bertie Wooster. First appearing in the short story "Extricating Young Gussie" in 1915, Jeeves continued to feature in Wodehouse's work until his last completed novel, Aunts Aren't Gentlemen (1974). He also appeared in numerous films and television series, portrayed by such actors as Arthur Treacher, Michael Aldridge, and Dennis Price. The name and character of Jeeves have come to be identified with the quintessential valet or butler.
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  The Quarrel of Oberon and Titania

  Painting: Joseph Noel Paton

  The Quarrel of Oberon and Titania is an oil painting on canvas by the Scottish artist Joseph Noel Paton. Painted in 1849, it depicts the scene from William Shakespeare's comedy play A Midsummer Night's Dream, in which the fairy queen Titania and fairy king Oberon quarrel. When exhibited in Edinburgh in 1850, it was declared the "painting of the season". The painting was acquired by the National Galleries of Scotland in 1897, having initially been bought by the Royal Association for Promoting the Fine Arts.
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  Ivanhoe

  Engraver: J. Cooper; Restoration: Adam Cuerden

  "Le Noir Faineant in the Hermit's Cell", an illustration from an 1886 edition of Sir Walter Scott's 1819 novel Ivanhoe. Here, we see Le Noir Faineant, or the Black Knight (Richard the Lionheart in disguise) with Friar Tuck. Scott was an early pioneer in the development of the modern novel, and largely created the genre of historical fiction by weaving together legends and characters into his own creations. Ivanhoe, the story of one of the remaining Saxon noble families at a time when the English nobility was overwhelmingly Norman, was greatly influential on the modern view of the English folk hero Robin Hood, and has inspired many adaptations around the world in theatre, opera, film, and television.
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  Auld Lang Syne

  Engraving: John Masey Wright (artist) and John Rogers (engraver); restoration: Adam Cuerden

  A mid-19th century illustration for "Auld Lang Syne", a Scots poem written by Robert Burns in 1788 and set to a traditional melody. It is traditionally used in the English-speaking world to bid farewell to the old year at the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve; this has led to the song being used to close other activities as well.
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  Divine Comedy

  Restoration: Adam Cuerden

  An engraving of Charon, in Greek mythology the ferryman of Hades who carried souls of the newly deceased across the River Styx that divided the world of the living from the world of the dead. This illustration is from French engraver Gustave Doré's 1857 set of illustrations for Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy, an Italian epic poem depicting an allegorical vision of the Christian afterlife. Here, Charon is shown coming to ferry souls across the river Acheron to Hell. The caption is from Henry Francis Cary's translation, from which this particular copy is taken:
  
  And, lo! toward us in a bark
  Comes on an old man, hoary white with eld,
  Crying "Woe to you, wicked spirits!"
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  Childe Harold's Pilgrimage

  Engraving: I. H. Jones; Restoration: Adam Cuerden

  The frontispiece to a c. 1825 edition of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, a lengthy narrative poem by Lord Byron. The poem describes the travels and reflections of a world-weary young man who, disillusioned with a life of pleasure and revelry, looks for distraction in foreign lands. In a wider sense, it is an expression of the melancholy and disillusionment felt by a generation weary of the wars of the post-Revolutionary and Napoleonic eras. This poem proved to be quite popular upon its publication in 1812. Byron himself said of this, "I awoke one morning and found myself famous."
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  The Song of Los

  Illustration: William Blake

  The Song of Los is an epic poem by William Blake first published in 1795 and considered part of his prophetic books. The poem consists of two sections, "Africa" and "Asia": in the first section Blake catalogues the decline of morality in Europe, which he blames on both the African slave trade and enlightenment philosophers, whereas in the second section he describes a worldwide revolution, urged by the eponymous Los.
  
  The illustration here is from the book's frontispiece and shows Urizen presiding over the decline of morality.
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  Layla and Majnun

  Artist: Unknown; Restoration: Lise Broer

  A scene from a late-16th century publication of Nezami Ganjavi's adaptation of the classical Persian story Layla and Majnun, which is based on the real story of Qays ibn al-Mulawwah, a young man from the northern Arabian Peninsula and his love Layla. There are two versions of the story, but in both, Majnun goes mad when her father prevents him from marrying her. In the depicted scene, the eponymous star-crossed lovers meet for the last time before their deaths. Both have fainted and Majnun's elderly messenger attempts to revive Layla while wild animals protect the pair from unwelcome intruders.
• 
  The Water-Babies, A Fairy Tale for a Land Baby

  Artist: Jessie Willcox Smith; Restoration: ErikTheBikeMan

  Mrs. Bedonebyasyoudid, a character named after the Golden Rule, from The Water-Babies, A Fairy Tale for a Land Baby, a children's novel by Charles Kingsley. Published in 1863, the book was extremely popular in England, and was a mainstay of British children's literature for many decades. The book had been intended in part as a satire, a tract against child labour, as well as a serious critique of the closed-minded approaches of many scientists of the day in their response to Charles Darwin's ideas on evolution.
• 
  An Ideal Husband

  Artist: Unknown; Restoration: Adam Cuerden

  A scene from Oscar Wilde's 1895 play An Ideal Husband, originally published in a 1901 collected edition of Wilde's works. The comedy, which opened January 3, 1896, at the Haymarket Theatre in London, revolves around blackmail and political corruption, and touches on the themes of public and private honour. It has been adapted into television, radio/audio, and three films. The published version differs slightly from the performed play, for Wilde added many passages and cut others. Prominent additions included written stage directions and character descriptions. Wilde was a leader in the effort to make plays accessible to the reading public.
• 
  "Jabberwocky"

  Illustration: John Tenniel

  The Jabberwock, the titular creature of Lewis Carroll's nonsense poem "Jabberwocky". First included in Carroll's novel Through the Looking-Glass (1871), the poem was illustrated by John Tenniel, who gave the creature "the leathery wings of a pterodactyl and the long scaly neck and tail of a sauropod". "Jabberwocky" is considered one of the greatest nonsense poems written in English, and has contributed such nonsense words and neologisms as galumphing and chortle to the English lexicon.

Did you know (auto-generated) -

• ... that Rudaki is acknowledged as the founder of New Persian poetry in Iran and the father of Tajik literature in Tajikistan?
• ... that Māori fiction written in English, now a key part of New Zealand literature, only emerged in the 1950s?
• ... that the pastor John Littlejohn went from selling pornographic literature to sailors as a youth to protecting the Declaration of Independence?
• ... that Polish Renaissance poet Jan Kochanowski – considered "the founding father of Polish literature" – wrote threnodies, the first Polish-language tragedy, and epigrams?
• ... that there is a Gambian literature even though it has been argued that there is "minimal basis" for its existence?
• ... that The Man Without Talent is an I-novel, a genre of semi-autobiographical confessional literature that has been popular in Japan since the early twentieth century?

Today in literature

24 April

• 1815 - Anthony Trollope, English novelist born
• 1852 - Vasily Zhukovsky, Russian poet died
• 1905 - Robert Penn Warren, American poet born
• 1940 - Sue Grafton, American author born
• 1942 - Karin Boye, Swedish author died
• 1942 - Lucy Maud Montgomery, Canadian author died
• 1947 - Willa Cather, American writer died
• 1980 - Alejo Carpentier, Cuban writer died

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