ˈlid.ərəˌchu̇(ə)r, ˈlitərə-, ˈli.trə-, ˈlid.ə(r)ˌch-, -ˌchu̇ə, -_chə(r), -rə.ˌtyu̇-, -rəˌtu̇- noun
( -s )
Usage: often attributive
Etymology: Middle English litterature, from Latin litteratura, literatura writing, grammar, learning, from litteratus, literatus literate + -ura -ure
1. archaic : knowledge of books : literary culture
in many things he was grotesquely ignorant; he was a man of very small literature — W.D.Howells
2. : the production of literary work especially as an occupation
continually dissociated himself from literature … as a profession — Philip Rahv
3.
a. : writings in prose or verse ; especially : writings having excellence of form or expression and expressing ideas of permanent or universal interest
literature stands related to man as science stands to nature — J.H.Newman
our conceptions of types of character and the manifold variations of these types is due mainly to literature — John Dewey
b. : the body of written works produced in a particular language, country, or age
they speak a … sonorous and flexible language, and their literature is not unworthy of their language — H.T.Buckle
that superb mess of thought and observation, lust, rhetoric, and pedantry, that we call Renaissance literature — Clive Bell
c. : the body of writings on a particular subject
the literature on field sports is a mass of technicalities held together with a sticky kind of nature loving — J.M.Barzun
any scientist … will answer that at the beginning of an attack on any problem his first task is to look up the existing literature — T.H.Savory
d. : leaflets, handbills, circulars, or other printed matter of any kind
asked for volunteers to distribute campaign literature
induced to migrate by glowing real-estate development literature — American Guide Series: Tennessee
4. : the aggregate of musical compositions
programs … representing within any one year the greatest possible breadth of musical literature — William Schuman
specifically : compositions of regional or historical significance or for any particular instrument or group of instruments
a cross section of the Brahms piano literature — Saturday Review