Variety of Literary Genres

Literature, as suggested by various research paper writings, is the mirror of society. And so are its various genres. Literature students, who require assignment help with the concept may refer to the following:

1. Drama:  The most prominent form of literary genre, drama, traces its development since the Middle Ages in Europe. Earlier plays were written to spread a religious word to the masses. 

Church was the most important thing in these eras therefore emphasis was on the spread of words of the church. Therefore mystery, morality and miracle plays were written.

Mystery plays were based on Bible, morality plays were dramatized allegorical representations used to convey a moral and miracle plays conveyed the stories of martyrdom of a saint or any such figure.

 Later, during the Renaissance, Shakespeare and other University Wits made the Elizabethan era the golden era of literature. Restoration period saw a further rise in dramas representing the society in this piece of literature.

 Drama comprises plot representation through the dialogues of various characters that leads to plot development. 

2. Poetry:  Poetry is another prominent literary genre that traces its existence to the earlier literary eras. There are several types of poems that have developed through ages in the language, type, content, style and subject matter.

 They were always used to add beauty and flavor to the world of literary genres. The different eras in England saw different styles of writing. Shakespeare’s works led to the development of Shakespearean sonnets, Spenser’s to Spensarian sonnets and later on the Romantic era saw the works written for the common man. Wordsworth and Coleridge stated that poetry is a spontaneous overflow of emotions recollected in tranquility.

 The former wrote on the minor things of our everyday life while Coleridge wrote on supernatural elements. Thereafter poetry developed at fast speed and found prominence in all parts of the world.

 Poetry has various types that are segregated based on the style of writing.

3. Fiction:  Fiction is a literary genre where everything written is actually a result of imagination rather than being based on real-life events. Fiction gave an escape to people from their routine life, offering them some food for thought. This may include novels, drama as well as dramatic poetry. This literary genre sky-rocketed in the Victorian era and thereafter, where writers and novelists such as Jane Austen, Bronte Sisters, Charles Dickens, George Eliot and other such writers used this genre to highlight the then society, thereby offering a subtle irony on the people living then. Fiction can be detective, romantic, mystery, historical and the like.

4. Non-Fiction: This literary genre includes the writing of practical things. This may include a personalized account of things, first-hand experience or any such real-life event. The writer of a non-fiction makes it a point to stay accurate to the facts provided in the work. This genre may include biography, autobiography, research paper writing and the like. The first two themselves constitute a separate literary genre being the narration of the life events of a person. 

5. Fable:  This literary genre is a short narrative that aims to convey a moral to the readers. This moral is usually conveyed at the end of the story as an epigram, by a character. The most common in this category is the beast fable wherein in place of humans, their follies are represented through the various animals. The beast fables have been present since ancient times in Egypt, India and Greece. In the Western culture these fables are based on the Greek character Aesop, who was a slave in the 16th century.

 Later, Jean de la Fontaine, a French writer, came up with certain witty fables. In fact, the famous poem by Geoffrey Chaucer, Canterbury Tales, has the ‘Nun’s tale’ in the form of a fable.

 The main origins of these fables can be traced to the oral culture and tales in various parts of the world. 

6. Parable:  The most stressed upon and used literary genre by Jesus Christ himself, parables are used to represent parallels to real-life experiences. They are short narratives used to convey a lesson to the audience. One of the most famous parables is the story of The Prodigal Son and of the good Samaritan. That is how Jesus preached his teachings to his apostles. 

7. Exemplum:  Usually associated with religion and religious sermons. Exemplum was among the most popular devices in the Middle Ages. 

This was used to educate the masses about the religious theories and were extensively used by preachers. Geoffrey Chaucer, in his Canterbury Tales used this genre while narrating the Pardoner’s Tale, where the pardoner is preaching the message that greed is the reason behind all evil. Sometimes it can also be used to describe non-religious concepts. 

8. Proverbs: This literary genre contains short statements that define the whole meaning of life. These proverbs are majorly allegorical hinting at the moral behind these lines. 

9. Short story :  As the name suggests, this literary genre contains stories that are small in length but big enough to convey their essence. They too have themes just like any big novel, but they describe them without any exaggeration. 

10. Novel:  Novels developed as a literary genre in the Victorian Era though traces of their origin can be found before that. Samuel Richardson, Tobias Smollett, Henry Fielding and Lawrence Sterne were the four pillars of the novel before the Victorian Era. Later the genre saw its development in the hands of Austen, The Bronte Sisters, Charles Dickens, George Elliot and the like. And thereafter, novels did not look back and continued to develop. They were majorly used to acquaint the readers with the social situation in that era.

Thus, this is how the various literary genres developed with time and provided the world of literature with immense varieties. With the help of the above list, students can easily get assignment help in literature and go on to augment the content using various examples.