The Concept of Literature in Historical and Phenomenological Perspective

Abstract

The delineation of the concept of literature is incomplete and, hitherto, is still in progress because of quantitative and qualitative criteria are continuously changing. The definition of literature is determined not only by the genealogic characteristics of literary art, aesthetic doctrine of the epoch or literary canon, but is primarily correlated by the concept of human being, varying with each period of time. Phenomenology underlies the concept of literature, and at the same time, is an outgrowth of the phenomenon of literature.

Keywords: concept of literature, the criteria of high artistic merit, cultural and historical epoch, canon, poetics.