1. Reach Cambridge Explorer Program, 2007 Genny Zimantas
What is a ‘Literature’?
Reach Cambridge
Explorer Program, 2007
Genny Zimantas

3. Once upon a time…
Most of the literature we talked about yesterday was paper-based, but the printing press (which made the mass production and circulation of ‘books’ possible) was only invented in the 15th century.
‘Literature’ has existed for at least two and a half thousand years.

4. Two Big Questions: How do we define ‘literature’?
What has literature looked like?
What does it look like now? What might it look like in the years/decades/centuries to come?

5. A Place to Start

6. The Ancient Greeks Democracy Philosophy Math The Olymipics
Drama (Tragedy / Comedy)
Epic Poetry

7. Homer, Epic Poetry, and the Oral Tradition

8. … a few thousand years later.

9. The Medieval Bard
5th to 15th centuries
A professional, travelling story teller and performer

10. Renaissance Theatre
14th to 17th centuries

11. And only somewhere in this renaissance period do we get the printing press!

13. Magazines and Pamphlets in the 18th and 19th centuries
*fun fact: most of the nineteenth century ‘novels’ we read today were first published in installments in periodicals or journals.

14. So printed books didn’t really become affordable until the late 19th or early 20th century, helping to spur on literary Modernism…
But that’s a topic for
another class!
(Thursday’s class!)

15. But what about ‘Literature’ today?
What does literature look like?
Kindles
Audiobooks
And more??
1914 portrait by Nathan Altman

16. A Big Question: Why does the form or medium of literature matter
A Big Question: Why does the form or medium of literature matter? How might form or medium change the way we read content?

18. And what might it look like next?