The thesis begins at word # 183

The author of this blog (that’s me) would like to assume that the title has struck the reader (that’s you) in one of two ways.

The first is that the reader responds with anger, a sense of detachment and a not-so-subtle feeling that the author is nothing more than a pretentious half-witted hipster using a flash of poetry (and only two lines at that) to appear more intelligent than he is.  We will not dissect this further as the readers who do have this gut-wrenching reaction have already left.

On the other side of the coin the author sincerely hopes that the reader is left with a feeling of intrigue and perhaps have questions bubbling to the surface of their conscious. After all a blog about dreams could hardly be rewarding (many readers may even nod at this thought recalling the peace of the morning being broken by a lover describing their nocturnal visions in boring detail).

For those still with me I will discuss the title soon enough, but I’m already 173 words into this post and haven’t delivered the thesis.

The purpose of this blog is to discuss literature, in forms familiar and in forms that may shock you.

Literature as per The New Oxford American Dictionary is “written works, esp. those considered of superior or lasting artistic merit.” Now I have no personal vendetta against the fine folks over at the Oxford, but this definition seems to be lacking in many ways, enough so that I choose to reject it out right.

But what good does rejecting this definition do?  For this blog it allows us to look at things that are unwritten as literature. Examples of this would be music, film, digital worlds and even various games.

Now all of these things can be transcribed.  A game has rules that an be read, music can be written, and films have scripts, however we must be mindful that these genres are not intended to be enjoyed in this method. You read sheet music to play it and the script of the film is just a starting point.

My goal is to prove that all these are indeed literature by opening up the definition into something more akin to “a creative endeavor that strives to tell stories.” I do this out of a love of literature and the desire to plant that same love in others by pointing out that literature surrounds us, no matter where we go or what we do.

To go back to the question of title, the short poem provided was written to make the reader question their standard for reality. It stands to reason that we are then questioning the reality of literature.

I apologize for the length of this initial post, if the girth intimidates take solace knowing that the entries will decrease in size.

Cheers to all!