Literary works?

Until this week I hadn't really given much thought to whether any given book or text was considered a "literary work." Call it what you will. Perhaps it's just me being naive. Aren't all books literary works? Does a literary work have to be a book? A magazine? A blog post? Maybe high school left something out. Perhaps it is a subject slightly beyond my common thinking where books are concerned. At first I didn't even understand the topic.

Why might The Great Gatsby be considered a literary work?

My initial reaction was that an adjective had been left out. I found myself trying to insert one that sounded appropriate. Why might The Great Gatsby be considered a "great" literary work? Important, classic, and timeless are a few other typical descriptors that came to mind. Despite these attempts it seems to be more a matter of misunderstanding than anything else. I wasn't thinking in terms of simply classifying Gatsby as a Literary work or something else. Initially I thought it was.

Now, having gained more insight and understanding in this matter, I feel like I can still say yes to all of the above. I've always approached reading with an open mind. I can't think of a single time in the past when I have ever set out to read a book (and this goes for movies, music, etc... as well) with the intent or even the slightest inclination to analyze and classify it as a work of art, or in this case, literature. Now, as I sit here, I find myself saying, "this is why you're in college, David. To expand your mind and broaden your horizons." A cliche' yes but nevertheless a fact that I now acknowledge and address with this blog post.

So what can I say about Gatsby? I enjoyed it. It did what it set out to do. It was read and it entertained it's reader. I found the passages and dialog flowing enough and satisfying to read. Poetic at times, which I like. This brings me to another point, which is that I enjoyed it as much as I did watching the film. Not the recent version, but the older one starring Robert Redford. I found it equally sincere in it's attempt to entertain me. It was just a different way to experience the same story. I'm certainly no authority on literary works. I've already established that. To me, anything can be a literary work.

In this case, I suppose one could instigate quite a lengthy discussion about the story being iconic and full of meaning and symbolism or how it may transcend generations with it's human drama. Take The Last Days of Disco, for example. Frequenting nightly festivities in one form or another to uphold your stature in the ranks of society, mixed up relationships, deception, etc... these are things that don't change. They haven't changed since Gatsby's days. Many things do change, but not those things. They will always be prevalent. It's our nature and we generally just can't help ourselves.

Anyway, a lot of things in life are about perception and point of view. Opinions and subjectivity. While a literary work as such may indeed meet a predefined list of points or other criteria, it certainly doesn't change what the words on the pages of novels say to us as they are presented in their raw form. They are stories, meant to entertain and enrich our lives in whatever ways they do. Maybe that is what being a literary work is all about after all. Identifying a human condition and relating it to those of us who don't know any better but are entertained and enriched by it all the same, each in our own way. It's a classification, as all things tend to be classified in one form or another. Like I said before, we can't help ourselves. It's some kind of strange need we have to classify things. Do we need to? We certainly want to. I hereby classify this post as a literary work. There, now this has been entertaining.