Forms of Literature

Back to: LITERATURE IN ENGLISH SS1

 

Welcome to class! 

In today’s class, we will be talking about the forms of literature. Enjoy the class!

Forms of Literature

There are various forms of literature. Below are some of the forms of literature that we have:

• Comedy:

This is a type of drama which is characterized by its humorous or satirical tone and depicts amusing people or incidents, in which the characters ultimately triumph over adversity. There are various types of comedy such as parody, satire, comedy of manners, romantic comedy, farce, burlesque, among others. An example of a comedy is Oliver Goldsmith’s She Stoops to Conquer.

• Tragedy:

This is a type of drama that treats a serious subject about human suffering or a terrible event in a dignified style in the life of a hero, whose “tragic flaw or hamartia” leads to his/her downfall and has an unhappy ending. It also invokes “pleasure or catharsis” in its audience. An example of this is William Shakespeare’s tragedies such as Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth, Julius Caesar, King Lear and so on.

• Tragi-comedy:

This type of drama combines the elements of or is a mixture of both the type of drama known as the comedy and tragedy. It is also seen to be described as either a tragic play which contains enough comic elements to lighten the overall mood or a serious play with a happy ending. An example of this is William Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice.

• Farce:

A farce is a light-hearted comedy that centres around a ridiculous plot that usually involves exaggerated and improbable events. Farces usually do not have much character development, but instead rely on absurdity, physical humour, and skilful exploitation of a situation. Farce examples also often occur in just one place where all the events occur. This can add to the sense of a pressure cooker where all of the elements are combined to create something truly ridiculous.

The genre of farce developed in 15th-century Europe as a way to make serious things, such as religious texts, foolish. These early farce examples included features such as acrobatics and clowning, that are still present in the physical humour of contemporary farces, as well as reversal and perversion of social rules and norms. Farce, however, does not have the biting social commentary of satire or necessarily have a greater meaning. Instead, entertainment is its primary goal.

• Burlesque:

Burlesque literature is a form of satire. It is often and perhaps best described as “an incongruous imitation.”  The purpose of burlesque literature is to imitate the manner or the subject matter of a “serious” literary genre, author, or work through a comic inversion.  Imitations of manner might include the form or the style, whereas imitation of the matter is meant to satirize the subject being explored in a particular work or genre.

While a burlesque piece may aim to poke fun at a particular work, genre, or subject, it is most often the case that burlesque will be a satire of all of these elements. What is important to consider this mode of literature is that the point of the burlesque is to create an incongruity, a ridiculous disparity, between the manner of the work and the matter of it.

While “travesty,” “parody,” and “burlesque” are terms that are often used interchangeably, it is perhaps better to consider travesty and parody as types of burlesque, with burlesque being the generic term for the larger model. That being said, it is also important to note that a burlesque piece may employ several techniques which fall into the larger category; it is not necessarily the case that all burlesque literature will share all of the same features.

There are two primary types of burlesque, the “High Burlesque” and the “Low Burlesque.” High Burlesque occurs when the form and style of the piece are dignified and “high,” or “serious” while the subject matter is trivial or “low.”  The types of high burlesque include the “mock-epic” or “mock-heroic” poem, as well as the parody. Low Burlesque occurs when the style and manner of work are low or undignified but, in contrast, the subject matter is distinguished or high in status. The types of low burlesque include the Travesty and the Hudibrastic poem.

• Comedy of Manners:

A Comedy of Manners is a play concerned with satirising society’s manners. A manner is a method in which everyday duties are performed, conditions of society, or a way of speaking. It implies a polite and well-bred behaviour.

A Comedy of Manners usually employs an equal amount of both satire and farce resulting in a hilarious send-up of a particular social group. Most plays of the genre were carefully constructed to satirise the very people watching them. This was usually the middle to upper classes in society, who were normally the only people wealthy enough to afford to go to the theatre to see a comedy of manners in the first place. The playwrights knew this in advance and fully intended to create characters that were sending up the daily customs of those in the audience watching the play. The satire tended to focus on their materialistic nature, never-ending desire to gossip and hypocritical existence.

• Romantic Comedy:

A romantic comedy is a type of play which consists of a love affair between the characters mainly protagonist, difficulties that arise due to the affairs, the struggle of the protagonist or other major characters to overcome these difficulties and the ending that is generally happy to everyone.  Romantic comedies are literary works that treat love, courtship, and marriage comically. Comic in this context refers more to the mood of the literary work that deals with a romantic relationship, almost always between a young woman and a young man. The comedy derives from their clumsy efforts to get together – usually they like each other, but each is unsure that the other likes them back, and their behaviour is nervous and awkward, resulting in situational comedy.

• Satire:

This is a genre of writing that criticizes something, such as a person, behaviour, belief, government, or society. Satire often employs irony, humour, and hyperbole to make its point. Satire is a technique employed by writers to expose and criticize foolishness and corruption of an individual or a society, by using humour, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule. It intends to improve humanity by criticizing its follies and foibles. A writer in a satire uses fictional characters, which stand for real people, to expose and condemn their corruption.

A writer may point a satire toward a person, a country, or even the entire world. Usually, a satire is a comical piece of writing which makes fun of an individual or a society, to expose its stupidity and shortcomings. Also, he hopes that those he criticizes will improve their characters by overcoming their weaknesses.

• Existential Literature:

This is a movement in philosophy and literature that emphasizes individual existence, freedom and choice. … It is based on the view that humans define their meaning in life, and try to make rational decisions despite existing in an irrational universe. Existentialism became popular in the years following World War II, thanks to Jean-Paul Sartre, who read Martin Heidegger while in a POW camp, and strongly influenced many disciplines besides philosophy, including theology, drama, art, literature, and psychology. A typical example of this type of literature is Samuel Beckett’s Waiting For Godot.

 

In our next class, we will be talking about Literary Terms.  We hope you enjoyed the class.

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