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ziastarss · 4 years

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WORLD LITERATURE

Each literature signifies our nations even our culture, it has its own artistic and national features. It is essential to study our world as it helps us to understand more, the life and people with different perspectives. It forms our world outlook and familiarize us with the masterpieces of their literature.

a.) Southeast Asia - The entire region of Southeast Asia, with the exception of Thailand due to it’s not a country yet; fell under colonial rule. From this we could actually perceived even from the word “under colonial rule” that they were oppressed. The historical experiences of people have been deeply intertwined for centuries. Colonialism has altered Southeast Asian social structure and brought modern western ideas and concepts into society as well. Most of their literatures are actually consists of how they were repressed those dark times, the reason why their literature reflects their philosophies of life, and the struggles and success of their developing nations and its people.

Some Southeast Asian Literature:

Jose Protacio Rizal Mercado Y Alonso Realonda

- Was a Filipino nationalist and polymath during the tail end of the Spanish colonial period of the Philippines. He is tagged as the national hero (pambansang bayani) of the Filipino people. An ophthalmologist by profession, Rizal became a writer and a key member of the Filipino Propaganda Movement, which advocated political reforms for the colony under Spain. He was executed by the Spanish colonial government for the crime of rebellion after the Philippine Revolution, inspired in part by his writings, broke out.

- Noli Me Tangere Together with its sequel, El Filibusterismo are widely considered as the national epic of the Philippines. Jose Rizal conceived the idea of writing the novel that would expose the ills of Philippines society and he preferred that the prospective novel express the way Filipino culture was perceived to be backward and anti-progress.

- Burmese Days, first novel by English writer George Orwell, set in British Burma during the waning days of Empire, when Burma was ruled from Delhi as part of British India, it is "a portrait of the dark side of the British Raj."

b.) East Asia - It includes Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Mongolian, Taiwanese Literature. East Asian literature reached prominence in the Literary World. The literatures of East Asia are drawing inspirations from pluralistic sources, within as well as beyond their region. The Chinese literary norms, canons of poetry, lyrical prose and classical novels have shaped the literary taste of the gentry and the ruling class of East Asian countries, especially Japan and Korea. Modern literature in East Asia subsequently developed along a more dichotomized east/west traditional/modern path. The spread of World Literature is heavily dependent on translation. In the case of East Asia, the language of literature was largely monolingual in classical times.

Some East Asian Literature:

Tale of Genji - a classic work of Japanese literature written in the early 11th century by the noblewoman and lady-in-waiting Murasaki Shikibu. The tale concentrates on Genji's romantic life and describes the customs of the aristocratic society of the time. It may be the world's first novel, the first modern novel, the first psychological novel or the first novel still to be considered a classic

The Vegetarian - A South Korean three-part novel written by Han Kang and first published in 2007. Based on Han's 1997 short story "The Fruit of My Woman", The Vegetarian is set in modern-day Seoul and tells the story of Yeong-hye, a part-time graphic artist and home-maker, whose decision to stop eating meat after a bloody, nightmarish dream about human cruelty leads to devastating consequences in her personal and familial life.

Haruki Murakami - A Japanese writer, Murakami's most notable works include A Wild Sheep Chase (1982), Norwegian Wood (1987), The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (1994–95), Kafka on the Shore (2002), and 1Q84 (2009–10).

c.) South and West Asia - 21st Century Middle Eastern Literature encompasses a rich variety of genres and addresses human experience often through a realist approach. In the Hellenistic period literature and flourished in Western Asia. Traditional literary forms such as lists continued to be produced by the native population and were adapted by the new rulers. The works by these South and West Asian authors captures the heart of their reader, also their minds. Often dealing with controversial or emotional subject matters, these writers have a unique ability to calmly discuss or explore contentious issues.

Some South and West Asian Literature:

The Epic of Gilgamesh - The Epic of Gilgamesh is an epic poem from ancient Mesopotamia, regarded as the earliest surviving great work of literature and the second oldest religious text, after the Pyramid Texts. These independent stories were later used as source material for a combined epic in Akkadian.

My Name is Red - My Name Is Red is a 1998 Turkish novel by writer Orhan Pamuk. The novel incorporates metafiction in such ways as making frequent reference to the reader and to the narrators' awareness that they are characters in a book. Each chapter of the novel has a different narrator, and usually there are thematic and chronological connections between chapters.

Nilanjana Sudeshna - "Jhumpa" Lahiri is an American author known for her short stories, novels and essays in English, and, more recently, in Italian. Lahiri's early short stories faced rejection from publishers "for years". Lahiri's writing is characterized by her "plain" language and her characters, often Indian immigrants to America who must navigate between the cultural values of their homeland and their adopted home.

d.) Anglo-American and Europe - The united states was one a colony of Britain, as such, its early literature was closely linked to traditional English Literature. English is a main language and a British culture and the British empire have had significant historical ethnic, linguistic, and cultural impact. American literature has produced some of the significant prose and poetry the world has seen, American literature began as an extension of English literature. It encompasses literature written in Old English, epic poetry is the common style and religious literature continued to enjoy popularity and Hagiographies were written and adapted.

Some Anglo-American Literature:

Beowulf - An Old English epic poem consisting of 3,182 alliterative lines. It is one of the most important works of Old English literature. The story is set in Scandinavia in the 6th century. Beowulf, a hero of the Geats, comes to the aid of Hrothgar, the king of the Danes, whose mead hall in Heorot has been under attack by a monster known as Grendel. After Beowulf slays him, Grendel's mother attacks the hall and is then also defeated. Victorious, Beowulf goes home to Geatland and becomes king of the Geats. Fifty years later, Beowulf defeats a dragon, but is mortally wounded in the battle. After his death, his attendants cremate his body and erect a tower on a headland in his memory.

The Canterbury Tales - A collection of 24 stories that runs to over 17,000 lines written in Middle English by Geoffrey Chaucer between 1387 and 1400. The tales (mostly written in verse, although some are in prose) are presented as part of a story-telling contest by a group of pilgrims as they travel together from London to Canterbury to visit the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral. The prize for this contest is a free meal at the Tabard Inn at Southwark on their return.

Walt Whitman - was an American poet, essayist, and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among the most influential poets in the American canon, often called the father of free verse. Whitman's work breaks the boundaries of poetic form and is generally prose-like. He also used unusual images and symbols in his poetry, including rotting leaves, tufts of straw, and debris.

e.) Africa - African Literature oftentimes refers back to its colonial past, and it is in this reference that its literature becomes unique, subersive and expressive. Africa’s literature includes slave narratives, protests colonization, calls for independence, African pride and their hope for their future. This literature is essential because it offers opportunity to hear the voices of African people, and to spread awareness to the one’s who’s lacking.

Some African Literature:

Things Fall Apart - The debut novel by Nigerian author Chinua Achebe, first published in 1958. Its story chronicles pre-colonial life in the southeastern part of Nigeria and the arrival of Europeans during the late 19th century. It is seen as the archetypal modern African novel in English, and one of the first to receive global critical acclaim.

Half of a Yellow Sun - A novel by Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. The story in Half of a Yellow Sun centres on the war. Adichie grew up in the aftermath of the war: "The need to write about it came from growing up in its shadow. This thing that I didn't quite understand was my legacy. It hovered over everything". She has stated she believes that many of the issues that caused the war remain today. Because none of the major political events were changed in the book, Adichie said that the book contained "emotional truth", and that the book showed the war had a significant impact upon the people of Nigeria.

Chimamanda Adichie - A Nigerian writer whose works range from novels to short stories to nonfiction. She was described in The Times Literary Supplement as "the most prominent" of a "procession of critically acclaimed young anglophone authors [which] is succeeding in attracting a new generation of readers to African literature", particularly in her second home, the United States. Adichie, a feminist, has written the novels Purple Hibiscus (2003), Half of a Yellow Sun (2006), and Americanah (2013), the short story collection The Thing Around Your Neck (2009), and the book-length essay We Should All Be Feminists (2014). Her most recent book, Dear Ijeawele, or A Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions, was published in March 2017.In 2008, she was awarded a MacArthur Genius Grant.

f.) Latin America - Latin American literature is characterized by mysticism, magic, uniqueness, raw creativity and wonder. Over the years, they developed a rich and complex diversity of theme, forms, creative idiom and styles. The colonial period was important because it was the beginning of the written tradition in Latin American Literature, they began to take shapes, they wrote documents that recorded the way life change after the Spanish infiltrated their lands.

Some Latin American Literature:

One Hundred Years of Solitude - a landmark 1967 novel by Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez that tells the multi-generational story of the Buendía family, whose patriarch, José Arcadio Buendía, founded the (fictitious) town of Macondo. The novel is often cited as one of the supreme achievements in literature. The magical realist style and thematic substance of One Hundred Years of Solitude established it as an important representative novel of the literary Latin American Boom of the 1960s and 1970s, which was stylistically influenced by Modernism (European and North American) and the Cuban Vanguardia (Avant-Garde) literary movement.

The Alchemist - A novel by Brazilian author Paulo Coelho that was first published in 1988. An allegorical novel, The Alchemist follows a young Andalusian shepherd in his journey to the pyramids of Egypt, after having a recurring dream of finding a treasure there. The book's main theme is about finding one's destiny, although according to The New York Times, The Alchemist is "more self-help than literature.

Gabriel García Márquez - Was a Colombian novelist, short-story writer, screenwriter, and journalist, known affectionately as Gabo throughout Latin America. Considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th century, particularly in the Spanish language, he was awarded the 1972 Neustadt International Prize for Literature and the 1982 Nobel Prize in Literature. García Márquez started as a journalist and wrote many acclaimed non-fiction works and short stories, but is best known for his novels, such as One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967), Chronicle of a Death Foretold (1981), and Love in the Time of Cholera (1985). His works have achieved significant critical acclaim and widespread commercial success, most notably for popularizing a literary style known as magic realism, which uses magical elements and events in otherwise ordinary and realistic situations.

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