21st century literature – week 1 – final

World Literature has four major areas known as: Anglo-Saxon, European, Afro-Asian, and North-
American. First, let’s talk about Anglo-Saxon. There are two important epochs in Anglo-Saxon Period.
In the year 600 (7th Century), BEOWULF, the longest epic in old English was put into life. Beowulf,
heroic poem, is the highest achievement of old English literature and the earliest European vernacular
epic. It deals with events of the early 6th century and is believed to have been composed between 700
and 750. Although originally untitled, it was later named after the Scandinavian hero Beowulf, whose
exploits and character provide its connecting theme. Second is the reign of the Duke of Normandy. He
had conquered the British Isle, hence, the French has intervened in the evolution of English.

The second major area is EUROPEAN literature. In the early time of the European literature,
traditional Latin was the language manifested in literary works in most of their states especially in
Germany. As the prestige of the Papacy began to decline, national consciousness began to increase
in different states. This nationalism was manifested in literature written in National Languages or
Vernacular instead of traditional Latin. The vernacular opened up such that cultural peculiarities could
be more naturally expressed. This allowed literature to feel more realistic and human to the readers.
In the late 1600s and early 17000s, when the Enlightenment was well under the way in Britain and
France, Germany was highly fragmented both politically and culturally.

The third major area is AFRO-ASIAN. Afro-Asian literature refers to the literary output of the
various countries and cultures in Africa and Asia. This includes their oral traditions and from the first to
the contemporary written and/or published prose and poetry. There are 10 focus countries of the Afro-
Asian Literature:
1. South Africa
2. Sudan
3. Philippines
4. Japan
5. Cambodia
6. Israel
7. Saudi
8. Pakistan
9. China
10. India

The last major area is NORTH AMERICAN LITERATURE. It’s not impossible that some
people in North America knew how to write before 1500 AD. Some Cherokee people tell stories about
an early way of writing, for instance. These stories were usually about religion, or about how people
should act. The earliest North American literature was mainly sermons by men like Cotton Mather,
written in the 1600s and 1700s. African-American people who had come over from Africa as slaves met
local Cherokee people and translated traditional African and Cherokee stories into English as Br’er
Rabbit stories. By the 1800s people were beginning to write novels or fictional stories, like those of
James Fenimore Cooper.
 INTRODUCTION ABOUT WORLD LITERATURE
World literature started to be an ideal or ambition. Goethe said, “The era of world literature is at
hand, and everyone must contribute to accelerating it.” Centuries later, this statement remains to be
true. World literature is a market that must be sustained as the circulation of literature is somehow still
experiencing some challenges and debates such as the considerations to be taken note of when letting
work be included as world literature and of course, regarding the issue of translation. The challenges
on circulation, however, are not as grave as the recent years. Today in the 21 st century, because of
technology and freedom of expression, as well as our growing need for information, we continue to
accelerate world literature as more and more people contribute to it.
There are many factors for a literary piece to be qualified as World Literature, let alone to be
called “literature”, per se. World literature is used to refer to the sum of the world’s national pieces of
literature, but usually, it denotes the circulation of works into the wider world beyond their country of
origin. To be considered world literature, it has to speak to people of more than one nationality, hence
it transcends borders. Often used in the past primarily for masterpieces of Western European literature,
world literature today is increasingly seen in a global context because in the present time, countries are
experiencing similar situations and somehow, they are all linked together. Literature went through
profound changes in the 20th and 21st centuries, partly in that of technology, communication, and
warfare.
In world literature, three things are needed to be considered. Firstly is classic. Classic Literatures
are often called the “work of a transcendent” because it progresses even how old it might be to
generations. Frank Kermode developed this idea: Established Body of Classics. He attempts to
determine the criteria for classical literature through an analysis of the social and intellectual importance
of great works of the past. Secondly is a masterpiece. Masterpieces are recent pieces but need
foundational and cultural force. GOETHE proposed this idea: Evolving Canon of Masterpieces. Thirdly
is a window. This means that literature is open to all and opens its links to all. GOETHE termed this
as Weltliteratur.

12 world’s most famous masterpiece

1. Goethe. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, German poet, playwright, novelist, scientist,
statesman, theatre director, critic, and amateur artist, is considered the greatest German
literary figure of the modern era. He proposed a widely known crossword puzzle.

2. The Epic of Gilgamesh. This epic is originated in Mesopotamia. It follows the story of
Gilgamesh, the mythological hero-king of Uruk, and his half-wild friend, Enkidu, as they
undertake a series of dangerous quests and adventures, and then Gilgamesh’s search for the
secret of immortality after the death of his friend. It also includes the story of a great flood very
similar to the story of Noah in “The Bible”and elsewhere.

3. The ODYSSEY. Homer wrote this after the story of the Greeks destroyed Troy in a very long
war. The Odyssey is Homer's epic of Odysseus'10-year struggle to return home after the Trojan
War. While Odysseus battles mystical creatures and faces the wrath of the gods, his wife
Penelopeand his son Telemachus stave off suitors vying for Penelope's hand and Ithaca's throne
long enough for Odysseus to return. The Odyssey ends as Odysseus wins a contest to prove
his identity, slaughters the suitors, and retakes the throne of Ithaca.
4. The 1001 Arabian Nights. The Arabian Nights is a story straight out of a romance novel.
Scorned by an unfaithful wife, Shahryar is the king of a great empire but is brokenhearted.
Shahryar chose to marry a new woman every day only to kill her the next morning. Needless to
say, this did not make him a very popular ruler. More and more innocent women die until one
day Scheherazade, the daughter of the king's top advisor, offers to marry the king. The king and
advisor both protest, but Scheherazade insists, all knowing that the night could be her last. That
night, she requests the presence of her sister and tells a story that manages to be the beginning
of dozens of stories meant to keep her alive.

5. Candide. Candide is the illegitimate nephew of a German baron. He grows up in the baron’s
castle under the tutelage of the scholar Pangloss, who teaches him that this world is “the best
of all possible worlds.” Candide falls in love with the baron’s young daughter, Cunégonde. The
baron catches the two kissing and expels Candide from his home. On his own for the first time,
Candide is soon conscripted into the army of the Bulgars. He wanders away from camp for a
brief walk and is brutally flogged as a deserter. After witnessing a horrific battle, he manages to
escape and travels to Holland.

6. Death and the King’s Horseman. Death and the King’s Horseman play tells the story of Elesin,
the king’s horseman, who is expected to commit ritual suicide following the death of the king, but
who is distracted from his duty. The story is based on a historical event. In 1946, a royal
horseman named Elesin was prevented from committing ritual suicide by the British colonial
powers. Soyinka alters the historical facts, placing the responsibility for Elesin’s failure squarely
on Elesin’s shoulders so that he might focus on the theme of duty rather than colonialism.

7. Diary of a Madman. The story contains thirteen fragments from the diary of a man who has
lived in confusion for thirty years and suddenly gains spiritual insight from the moon. This lunatic
sensitivity leads him to paranoia. Barking dogs, people’s glances, children’s stares, a mother’s
cursing words to her son, a brother’s caring, and a doctor’s treatment—all converge, in his mind,
into a sinister scheme about eating him. On a sleepless night, he reads through a Chinese history
with “Virtue and Morality” written on each page but finds the words “eat people” between the lines.
Then he discovers his brother’s accomplice in the plan for eating him and realizes that his mother is also
collaborating. He even discovers his unwitting involvement in eating his sister’s flesh. The story ends
with the madman’s desperate cry: “Save the children.”

8. My Name is Red. This is a chronology of Arabic and Western art primed by Orhan Kamuk who
won a Nobel Prize because of this. My Name Is Red is essentially the story of Black, a failed
illustrator who has spent 12 years in the eastern provinces of the Ottoman Empire after falling in
love with his beautiful cousin, Shekure, and being rejected by her.

9. Eileen Chang. Eileen Chang was born into an aristocratic family in Shanghai. Her father, deeply
traditional in his ways, was an opium addict; her mother, partly educated in England, was a
sophisticated woman of cosmopolitan tastes. Their unhappy marriage ended in divorce, and
Chang eventually ran away from her father—who had beaten her for defying her stepmother,
 then locked her in her room for nearly half a year. Later, she was considered the most influential
Chinese Writer. Often, the concept of her pieces is about love, marriage, family.

10. Tale of Genji. The story takes place in ancient Japan. Genji is the son of the king. His mother
is the king's favorite concubine. Genji's future is foretold by a Korean sage in a prophecy
heralding Genji's bright future, but his mother's fate turns for the worst. She spends her last days
in frivolous court cases until finally she becomes ill and dies.

11. Ficciones. These are collection of Fictions in South American Literature by Borges. The
seventeen pieces in Ficciones demonstrate the whirlwind of Borges's genius and mirror the
precision and potency of his intellect and inventiveness, his piercing irony, his skepticism, and
his obsession with fantasy. Borges sends us on a journey into a compelling, bizarre, and
profoundly resonant realm; we enter the fearful sphere of Pascal's abyss, the surreal and literal
labyrinth of books, and the iconography of eternal return. To enter the worlds in Ficciones is to
enter the mind of Jorge Luis Borges, wherein lies Heaven, Hell, and everything else in between.

12. The Lusiads. The Lusiads is the national epic of Portugal. It specifically tells the story of Vasco
da Gama's voyage to India in the sixteenth century but also details other voyages of the
Portuguese during the time in which they were a major imperial force and a major force for world
exploration. This was the discovery of India. An epic poem that is composed of 10 cantos with
1102 stanzas.