Oral Literature
The term oral literature refers not to written, but to oral traditions, which includes different types of epic, poetry and drama, folktales, ballads. However the use of this oxymoron is controversial and not generally accepted by the scientific community. Some prefer to avoid the etymological question using "oral narrative tradition", "oral sacred tradition", "oral poetry" or directly using epics or poetry (terms that do not necessarily imply writing), others prefer to create neologisms as orature.
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Famous quotes containing the words oral and/or literature:
“After I discovered the real life of mothers bore little resemblance to the plot outlined in most of the books and articles I’d read, I started relying on the expert advice of other mothers—especially those with sons a few years older than mine. This great body of knowledge is essentially an oral history, because anyone engaged in motherhood on a daily basis has no time to write an advice book about it.”
—Mary Kay Blakely (20th century)
“The newspapers, I perceive, devote some of their columns specially to politics or government without charge; and this, one would say, is all that saves it; but as I love literature and to some extent the truth also, I never read those columns at any rate. I do not wish to blunt my sense of right so much.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)