Alright friends, grab a coffee because today’s practice was a head-scratcher at first. I kept staring at this title “What Is the Literary? Key Concepts Explained Simply” and thought, how do I even make this make sense for regular folks?
Where I Started
Honestly, I opened like five different tabs looking up definitions. Academic sites, thick books online… ugh. Big words everywhere like “aesthetic function” and “discourse.” My eyes glazed over after two minutes. I thought, nobody talks like this. How can I explain it without sounding like a dusty textbook?
My Messy Process
So I just started writing stuff down, talking to myself out loud like a weirdo. I said things like:
- “Okay, it’s stuff people make with words that tries to be more than just facts.”
- “Think poems… stories… things that make you feel stuff, ya know?”
- “Why does this poem hit different than my grocery list? That’s the literary part!”
I filled a whole page with these messy scribbles. Most of it was terrible. Crossed out so much stuff. I realized the trick wasn’t defining it perfectly, but connecting it to what people already get. Like asking: “Why does that song lyric stick in your head? Boom, that’s the power of literary stuff!“
Putting It Together
I kept rewriting. Focused on simple words. Avoided jargon like the plague. Instead of “figurative language,” I wrote “using pictures made of words.” Instead of “exploring the human condition,” I said “talking about what it feels like to be us.” Tore out the academic throat-clearing. Made it short sentences. Asked myself constantly: “Would my neighbor understand this?“
The Win
Finally landed on explaining it like having a chat over the fence: The “literary” is just words doing extra work. It’s not telling you the weather; it’s making you feel the rain. It’s using language to poke at big feelings, make you see things new, or tell a yarn that sticks. It’s special attention paid to how the words sound and what they do to you. Simple as that. Felt way better seeing it laid out like normal people talk. Threw away about ten drafts to get here. Worth it.
