What Is Literary?

By Lisa Gregg, Poetry Editor

It is almost certain that if you are reading this, you have given creative writing a try at least once. I’m pretty sure most literate people who reach adulthood attempt it at some point. Whether as an assignment in third grade, to release heart-pangs in the midst of teen angst, after reading a comic book or seeing something really meaningful, we as human beings, having experienced the beauty and release of the written word, feel the need to reproduce it.

Of all of us who have written the stray bit of creative work, only a comparative few seize the nerve to share their writing with others or attempt to get it published for complete strangers to read. The human compulsion to share and to be understood drives us to put our work out there for others to see, but the human fear of being seen and judged, or worse, rejected, prevents many of us from acting on our desires to share our thoughts and our souls via the written word. For those brave enough to share their writing in the hopes of it being published, we at JuxtaProse have nothing but respect and applause.

However, JuxtaProse, like any publisher of creative writing, has a limited number of poems and stories, fiction or non-fiction, that we can publish per issue. Therefore, for editors here at JuxtaProse and elsewhere, there must be a standard to which the written word is held. Our standard is right in the name of our magazine: JuxtaProse Literary Magazine. So, the question for those seeking to share their written works through our magazine or others like it is “What does it mean for writing to be literary?”

While in the most general sense “literary” applies to anything written, when used to define genres within writing it has a more specific meaning.

Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary defines the word literary as something “of, relating to, or having the characteristics of humane learning or literature.” Not super helpful. If literary means having the characteristic of literature, what’s the definition of literature?

Literature is defined by Merriam-Webster’s a few different ways, but the most helpful definition it gives—and the most accurate for our purposes—is that literature is “writings in prose or verse, especially writings having excellence of form or expression and expressing ideas of permanent or universal interest.”

Below, I’d like to expand on Merriam-Webster’s characteristics of literary writing and add a few characteristics I’ve come across in studying literary writing.

Artistic merit over Entertainment Value

Or as Merriam-Webster’s puts it, “excellence of form or expression.” Literary writing, or literature, is an art form. The writer of literary writing puts thought not only into what the work is about but about how they are going to deliver it. Word choice and its various kinds of magic—assonance, dissonance, syntax, repetition—and the ways the author expresses thoughts through metaphor and simile, symbolism, motifs, etc., come together to create not just an object of entertainment but a work of beauty and sophistication.

In the visual world, paintings in galleries and museums are meant to inspire awe and provoke thoughts and feelings while animated films keep attention and entertain an audience for a predetermined amount of time. Both were created by artists, but each has a different purpose and intended audience. In the same way that Monet differs from Miyazaki, the authors of literary writing approach their craft differently than the authors of non-literary writing.

Joyce Saricks, who worked as a librarian for nearly thirty years and wrote three books about different genres of writing, describes literary writing as “elegantly written, lyrical, and … layered.” But something could be written beautifully, with close attention paid to every word, every syllable, every sound, and still lack in other important literary qualities.

Universal Relatability

Merriam-Webster’s expressed this characteristic as “expressing ideas of permanent or universal interest.” This is perhaps why works found in the literature section of the bookstore are almost always fiction set in the time of the author and dwelling on fairly normal human life: it’s relatable. Most people can relate to liking someone and not knowing what to do about it or feeling inadequate to deal with the challenges that arise in life.

Literature finds value and beauty in the everyday struggle of the individual, and will often spend more time on small events that show the feelings and character of a person in the piece of writing than on the over-arching plot happening to the person, because while we do not all become massively rich and throw extravagant parties to entice our long-lost love across the bay, as does Jay Gatsby, we have certainly all experienced longing, and we might see ourselves in Gatsby’s desperate attempts to get attention.

William Coles, a writer of literary short stories, nine of which have earned literary awards or recognition, has said that literary writing focuses on “interesting, complex and developed” characters, whose “inner stories” drive the plot as opposed to outer events. Literary authors often dwell on these ordinary human feelings their characters experience and on the characters themselves. Literature attempts to understand the characters and their feelings and to relate them in a way that hasn’t been used before. Which leads us to the next characteristic of literary writing…

Unique Specificity

It is not enough to just address a universally relatable topic and expect that your work is now considered literary. You would think that the more general a topic, the more relatable. Sadness is a universal feeling; we have all felt sad. And yet, a poem just about being generally sad, no matter how beautiful the word choices, might not meet literary standards. The poem must express this universally relatable feeling in a way that is new, unusual, and specific. “My soul is crying” has been said too many times to express sadness, so a poem using this metaphor is unlikely to be seen as literary.  You might compare your feelings about your mother slowly losing her cognitive abilities as she ages to a walnut in frozen ground that will not weather the winter. Now there’s a metaphor that is new and interesting and specific, and conveys a sense of that universal feeling of sadness.

On the other end of the spectrum, if writing is very specific but focused on experiences, feelings or characters to whom the reader cannot relate—the attempt to escape made by an alien with five arms from the planet Zorg who feels no emotion and has been sentenced to death by being released into deep space, for example—it will likely not make it into the literary realm either.

In genre writing, the plot drives the story, while in literary writing the author is allowed to go slowly, to catch every emotion and every nuance of their character’s choices, and to relate them to the audience in a beautiful, new way. Terrence Rafferty, a film critic of the 90s, notes, “literary fiction, by its nature, allows itself to dawdle, to linger on stray beauties even at the risk of losing its way.” So, while genre fiction might focus on the stealing of cars and escaping from police, a literary take on the same plot might focus on the way the light filters through the windshield after the chase is over, or how the character is surprisingly disappointed that he wasn’t caught.

A Final Note

Remember that the question with which we started was “What does it mean for writing to be literary?” not “What makes the poems in JuxtaProse better than the poem you submitted that never saw daylight?” or “Why is the story from your childhood that your daughter cried over not good enough to be published?” The meaningfulness and quality of writing is often subject to the reader and what they want from what they are reading. “Roses are red, / violets are blue, / I think that I / am in love with you” would likely be way more meaningful to your girlfriend of a year to whom you’ve yet to proclaim your feelings than a whole collection of literary poems. Your girlfriend doesn’t look to a poem from you for a literary experience but for something sweet and romantic. Your daughter is expecting to read something that means a lot to you, or your family, not something that will define a generation of non-fiction.

I compared literary writing earlier in this post to orchestral music or art in a gallery for a purpose: I enjoy both like I enjoy literary writing, but that doesn’t mean I dislike non-literary writing. To continue with the art and music metaphor, I listened to the Jonas Brothers’ new song with just as much excitement as the next person and I’m an avid Disney movie fan. Just because literary writing is what we publish here at JuxtaProse does not somehow make it the only writing worth reading. It is, however, a written art form that is not as common as the alternative, and as lovers of the arts, we are anxious to encourage and share the beautiful literary writing this world has to offer.