literary
Pertaining to authorship
Literary describes writing with artistic ambition beyond mere communication—novels, poetry, essays crafted for aesthetic effect.
A literary style is polished and deliberate.
Literary also means connected to literature as a field: literary criticism, literary journals.
Someone literary reads widely and values books.
The word can suggest old-fashioned formality: a literary way of putting it.
Imagined narrative work
- novelNew and unusual
- proseUnversified language
- storytellingRecounting events aloud
- characterizationDescribing distinctive qualities
plot · theme · narrator · dialogue · protagonist · antagonist · arc · climax
Metered poetic passage
- rhymeMatching terminal sounds
- meterDevice that measures usage
- sonnetFourteen-line metered poem
- stanzaPoem's line grouping
couplet · imagery · assonance · ode · elegy · ballad · haiku · limerick
Disastrous or sorrowful event
- comedyWork meant to amuse
- romanceLove and its excitement
- gothicDark, mysterious aesthetic
- realismAccepting things as they are
naturalism · modernism · postmodernism · magical realism · absurdism · pastoral · picaresque · bildungsroman
Judgment of faults
- canonAccepted authoritative works
- bibliographyList of cited works
- exegesisCritical textual interpretation
- hermeneuticsStudy of interpretation methods
philology · critique · discourse · treatise · monograph · annotation · textual analysis · close reading
Implied identity comparison
- symbolismRepresenting concepts through images
- ironyMeaning opposite to words
- motifRecurring thematic element
- allegorySymbolic tale with deeper meaning
allusion · personification · hyperbole · synecdoche · metonymy · paradox · oxymoron · juxtaposition
fiction
Imagined narrative work
- novelNew and unusual
- proseUnversified language
- storytellingRecounting events aloud
characterization · plot · theme · narrator · dialogue · protagonist · antagonist · arc · climax · denouement
verse
Metered poetic passage
stanza · couplet · imagery · assonance · ode · elegy · ballad · haiku · limerick · quatrain
tragedy
Disastrous or sorrowful event
realism · naturalism · modernism · postmodernism · magical realism · absurdism · pastoral · picaresque · bildungsroman · epistolary
criticism
Judgment of faults
- canonAccepted authoritative works
- bibliographyList of cited works
- exegesisCritical textual interpretation
hermeneutics · philology · critique · discourse · treatise · monograph · annotation · textual analysis · close reading · structuralism
metaphor
Implied identity comparison
- symbolismRepresenting concepts through images
- ironyMeaning opposite to words
- motifRecurring thematic element
allegory · allusion · personification · hyperbole · synecdoche · metonymy · paradox · oxymoron · juxtaposition · satire
- media descriptorsdramatic, thrilling, suspenseful, emotional, atmospheric
- writing stylesformal, informal, minimalism, maximalism, concise
- criticism typesconstructive, destructive, art criticism, film criticism, music criticism
- speech registersformal, informal, casual, colloquial, vernacular
- usage labelsformal, informal, archaic, obsolete, colloquial
- writing stylediction, tone, style, prose, prose style
literarycolloquial
Casual, everyday language
vernacular · conversational · informal · everyday · slangy
literaryilliterate
Cannot read or write
unlettered · unread · uneducated · unbookish · unscholarly
literarytechnical
Of specific methods
scientific · prosaic · commercial · journalistic · functional
- literary festivalEvent celebrating authors and books
- literary reviewEvaluation of written works
- children's literatureBooks aimed at youth
- classic literatureEnduring fictional works
- European literatureWritten works from Europe
- German literatureBooks from Deutschland
literature, literal, literate, illiterate, illiteracy, alliteration, nonliteral, alliterative, literates