Unfortunately, I have missed the last Wednesday’s lesson

            Unfortunately, I have missed the last Wednesday’s lesson, when you have had such an interesting debate on what is literature and what came first, history or literature (reminds one of the philosophical question “which came into being first: a hen or an egg?”). The question of what is literature has been stirring me since I went to elementary school or even longer; for my parents, being a “soviet intelligentsia”, tried to cultivate in me love to literature not without some success since I learnt how to tricycle. Anyway, I would like to share with you some disorderly observations, to which I came soon after my tricycle was replaced by a stable four-wheel vehicle.

             Firstly, I am going to speak about the narrow meaning of Literature, which according to Orit and Oxford English Dictionary is “written works that are regarded as having artistic merit”, because this is what we learn on this faculty. Of course, we also read critical articles, but this kind of literature (without capital L) is going to be the subject of my final review letter, if I won’t change my mind.