Which COUNTRY has produced the greatest literature?

[JBI]

By the way, the best Canadian writer (in terms of international critical acclaim) is Robertson Davies. The best Canadian poet (in my opinion anyway) is Anne Hebert, the French-Canadian lyric poet, who ranks (in my opinion) as high as any of her contemporaries from any other country. Mistery also can be considered Canadian, for India I think Tagore would be the obvious massive choice, in addition to their epic poets, and Salman Rushdie.

P.S. Anti, half the people you said are dead are alive, and half the ones you said are alive are dead.

[JBI]

Maybe Tolkien was not a great writer, but surely his influence on cinema, popular music, cartoons, etc... is on thing to consider. The same thing we can say about Edgard Allan Poe and Mark Twain.

In the other hand, we have the wonderfull Miguel de Cervantes! Don Quixote is enough to put Spain in the top of the list.
The same thing I could say about the Divine Comedy by italian genious, Dante Alighieri.

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry is a very influent figure until now, however there are a lot of better writers in the world, but they are not so influent as Exupery.

So, what is the criterion:
the quality of the work?
the global influence of the work?

There are rich books not very known and poor book very influents in the popular culture (things not always stay together)

And what about the Brazilian poets (Castro Alves, Carlos Drummond de Andrade, Vinicius de Moraes, João Cabral de Melo Neto, Manuel Bandeira) and novelists (Machado de Assis, Paulo Coelho, Monteiro Lobato, Jorge Amado)???
I hope someone know about them.
I know all the Brazilian writers are well known by the french people, the italians, russians... but I think the anglophonics don't know very much.

Anglophones don't know much about literature from other countries. It's a shame really, but I guess in America and I know for certain in Canada, language learning is not a priority, like it is in other countries. I know in many European countries most people speak a verity of languages, here there is less emphasis unfortunately. And lets be honest, reading foreign literature in translation isn't much fun. Especially if it is poetry.

[Kafka's Crow]

When we mention other countries, and countries like Iran, India, the sub-continent etc, we realise how useless this thread actually is. These countries have bodies of 'literatures' in different regional and national languages, specially the sub-continent where cultural changes are so strong every few hundred miles that even languages transform into totally different languages, not just dialects. All these languages have their own bodies of literatures. You mentioned Tagore, his work is in Bangalese, a regional language though spoken by millions. Then there is the huge body of the category called 'Indian Literature in English.' A friend of mine has a whole library full of these works only and there are literally thousands of books in it. Starting from the great grand-sires of Indian literature in English language, RK Narayan and GV Desani the list of these writers is as long as any country could boast although the genre is hardly a hundred years old. Then there is the Indian diaspora and the Indian writers abroad, people like Mistry. Rushdie's writings show a huge influence of the sub-continent myths, tall-tales and fables. This is only one country. Most languages have great literary masterpieces but we can not appreciate them because of the linguistic constraints. Most of us can read only one language, i-e. English. Guess which literature is repeatedly labeled as the 'greatest'? Students and lovers of literature should know better than to throw around superlatives thoughtlessly.

[Brasil]

JBI,
yes, I agree with you. My knowledge about chinese literature is restrict to the philosophers. It's because I apreciate very much the oriental philosophy. Unfortunately, I still don't know the chinese poets.

Antiquarian,
I totally agree with your sugestions. I belive we still forgot someone in the list. It is hard to remember all the names.

JBI,
Here in Brazil people only speak Portuguese, there is not much focus in the study of foreign languages. However, some people apreciate to study languages. I speak english, italian, spanish and a little of french. That knowledge of languages doesn't help me in my job, but I have fun when I study languages and compare the gramatical structures.
I usually read a foreign novel in my natural language, portuguese. But when I want to read some foreign poetry, I try to find a bilingual edition. So, friendly, I say to you try the same.
How to compare two things if you still don't know second thing?


A little about Brazilian literature:

Castro Alves, the "poet of the slaves", was one of the first abolitionists in Brazil, on XIX century.

Machado de Assis founded the Brazilian Academy of Letters in 1896.

Vinicius de Moraes, poet and diplomat, best remembered for his words in Bossa Nova songs. The girl from Ipanema is just one of the Vinicius (poet) and Tom Jobim (musician) works.
Vinicius has books and several poems.

Paulo Coelho, the "wizard", is a Brazilian novelist. His books have appered on bestsellers list of UK, USA, Greece, Romania, Bulgaria, Russia, Cuba, Poland, Lithuania, France, Germany, Iran, Canada, Italy, Israel, Finland, Serbia. He is the all time best-selling Portuguese language author.
Madonna (singer) and Bill Clinton (ex-president) are fans of his work.

Thanks for all

[Inderjit Sanghe]

Tolkien may be influential, but he isn't good. He simply isn't worthy of mention as a writer, since everything that he wrote is mediocre, and everything he influenced is mediocre for the most part

I fail to see how Tolkien can be classified as 'mediocre'-he was one of the greatest and most important writers of the 20th century, it is also nice to see that you have so deftly categorized Tolkien's influence under the label 'mediocre' too.

As for his not being Noble Prize worthy-I guess I would I agree, it being a cesspit of mediocrities, of platitudinous writers and pseudo-philosophers and all of that nonsense

Poe, like Melville, was more influential outside of American than in it. That is the problem of American literature, not of Poe or Meville.

Kafka's Crow-yes India has produced a host of great writers, but there is still no truly great, revolutinary Indian writer, no Indian Joyce or Tolstoi.

[Brasil]

The Brazilian poet Carlos Drummond de Andrade (1902-1987) usually wrote his poems without rhymes and fixed forms. So, everyone can understand, does not need to be a speaker of the Portuguese language.

See the beautiful structure of the poem bellow (translated by me). It talks about the mismatch between lovers:

Quadrilha
John loved Teresa that loved Raimundo
that loved Maria that loved Joaquim that loved Lili
that loved no one.
John went to the United States, Teresa to the convent,
Raimundo died of disaster, Maria remained alone,
Joaquim comited suicide and Lili married J. Pinto Fernandes
that had not entered into the history.

Now, read the poem again from the last verse to the top, making the construction of the relationships between lovers. You're going to understand the determinism mechanicist at the poem:
Lili married J. Pinto Fernandes, consequently, Joaquim (who loved Lili) was desolated and comited suicide.
Maria (who loved Joaquim) remained alone, because Joaquim comited suicide and Raimundo (who loved Maria) died of disaster.
Teresa (who loved Raimundo) went to the convent because she remained with no lover (Raimundo died) and John (who loved Teresa) went to the USA.

Observation: The title of this poem refers to a popular dance in Brazil, which
consists in a constant change of partners (remember that the poem talk about mismatch between lovers).

P. S: The change of partners (is not at the sexual sense). It is just a constant moviment in the dance, there's no body contact, basicly just hands in hands. I said that just to discard misunderstood, cause unfortunately, some foreign people thinks brazilians are a sexual people.

Another detale at the poem: Everyone at this poem shows their first names, except Lili and J. Pinto Fernandes.
J. Pinto Fernades is the only person who has family name at the poem. Futhermore, he hides his first name. Why? It give us a clue that J. Pinto Fernandes is a powerful man, a influent person, with a powerful family name. When the poet says "J. Pinto Fernandes that had not entered into the history" he keenly indicated that Lili married Mr. Fernandes just because he is rich (social climbing, interest).
Everyone at this poem has real names (John, Teresa, Raimundo, Maria, Joaquim), but Lili is a codename (or nickname). Lili is not a real name (it's like Bill for William) so she hide her identity (in other words, Lili does not have courage to face life, to face people, so she married for social interest).

[Kafka's Crow]

I fail to see how Tolkien can be classified as 'mediocre'-he was one of the greatest and most important writers of the 20th century, it is also nice to see that you have so deftly categorized Tolkien's influence under the label 'mediocre' too.

As for his not being Noble Prize worthy-I guess I would I agree, it being a cesspit of mediocrities, of platitudinous writers and pseudo-philosophers and all of that nonsense

Poe, like Melville, was more influential outside of American than in it. That is the problem of American literature, not of Poe or Meville.

Kafka's Crow-yes India has produced a host of great writers, but there is still no truly great, revolutinary Indian writer, no Indian Joyce or Tolstoi.

The problem with Indian or Persian achievement lies in the main literary genre. Both nations have a huge number of great poets. Literature failing to take the commercial turn, which produced great novelists in Russia and the West, comprises mainly of great poetry. In last four centuries the greatest Indian poetry was written in Urdu, a language derived from Persian, Arabic, Hindi and Turkish. Like its mother-languages, Urdu is not easy to translate into any other language, specially English. Then there is the question of the various schools of Urdu poetry, Delhia and Lucknow being the two major schools. Then there is the post-partition flowering of this tradition in Pakistan and the continuous development of Urdu literature on the Indian side, specially in and around Delhi. You see, there are circles within circles. Cultures are not easy to label and nor are cultural manifestations in art and literature. Literature still being a very, very non-commercial, artisan activity in most of the world, we never come across best-seller writers as there is no marketing-machinery involved. People throw Tagore's name around, but he is just a drop in an ocean of creativity. India has a huge domestic market for books (bigger than China and the UK, second only to the US in terms of the number of books printed), a national best-seller is as good as an international bestseller elsewhere. Thus an absence of marketing and 'professional' writers, pure literary creativity mostly circling round verse and difficulty, complications involved in transferring poetic elements in a work from one language to another and a lack of a dynamic aspiration towards international stardom are few of the many, many factors that contribute towards having no Tolstoi or Joyce in India or other countries. Will Joyce still be Joyce if he is translated in, say, Tamil or Bengalese?

Poetry is notoriously difficult to translate. Firdausi's Shahnama or Epic of the Kings (in English you need three words to translate the single Persian word!) has many virtues that can not be transferred to any other language. It is about Persian history, about things purely Iranian. It is amazing that it has not a single Arabic word and the language is as purely Persian as one could imagine. Anybody who understands Persian would tell that many Arabic words made home in Persian language since the advent of Arab conquerors over 1300 years ago, so much so that 'pure' Persian stopped existing over a thousand years ago. How do you convey this main artistic aspect of a great work in English?

[mortalterror]

I think that Brasil mentioned something about how the country with the most people would logically have the best literature. On it's face, this looks like a safe assumption, but there are so many other factors that determine whether an artist will create a work of greatness.

You have to consider the number of people inside of each country with basic literacy, the capacity to either read or create such a work. Throughout most of history, literacy has been confined to the upper classes and certain countries had larger populations of upper classes than others. Also, we have to consider the prevalence of wealth in the world, specifically how it translates into education and leisure. If Dante were working 80 hours a week at a steel mill, he wouldn't have had the time to pen his Comedy. Lastly, I think you have to consider the publishing infrastructure of a country, the ability it has to make a profit for it's authors, and sustain them like any other natural resource. If Shakespeare couldn't sell his plays, then he would have gone into his father's glove making business. Society needs to support it's writers, either financially, or culturally in educational emphasis.

Even though America has a very high literacy rate, it is handicapped in two major ways. 1) It's educational and economic emphasis is on business, math, and science. 2) It does not have a long history from which to build on.

Likewise, any analysis of major literary trends would have to emphasize older more stable countries with longer more homogeneous languages. The average person might put 2 and 2 together and conclude that China has been a large semi-homogeneous state for longer than anywhere else, therefore it would be a reasonable assumption that they would have the greatest well of literature. However, three major concerns must be addressed before we award the prize to China. 1)China actually has three or more major languages. 2)China breaks up and reassembles itself every couple of hundred years. It gets invaded, say by the Mongols or the Japanese, and it's individual racial/cultural make-up changes. This happens all over the world. For instance , the people we now know as the Germans did not inhabit that patch of land they now hold until sometime after the Roman Empire fell. One must consider Diaspora and exodus, the scattering of the tribes and migration of people. 3) Thirdly, China does not begin writing longer works of literature until about 1300 for some reason. Their forms emphasized short works, and often restricted serious writers to poetry. When we compare world literature the tendency is to compare longer works, as more difficult and worthy of admiration. Taken this way, China's history of longer compositions is only about as long as any of the Romantic languages.

Then there's the question of India. How do you compare it's drama to that of Greece when their concept of tragedy does not exist until the modern period? One country is working in poetry at the time another's highest achievements are in the novel. It's only a recent phenomenon in our current globalized era that we have so much overlap. It might be more fruitful to compare modern literatures than ancient ones, especially when faced with societies that no longer exist.

[Brasil]

I'd like to ask anyone, which is the best translation:

translation 1 -
John loved Teresa that loved Raimundo
that loved Maria that loved Joaquim that loved Lili
that loved no one.

transtation 2 -
John loved Teresa who loved Raimundo
who loved Maria who loved Joaquim who loved Lili
who loved no one.

I intented to make it means:
John loved Teresa,
Teresa loved Raimundo,
Raimundo loved Maria,
Maria loved Joaquim,
Joaquim loved Lili,
Lili loved no one.

[Brasil]

Sorry, I have had problems in my posts. I could not delete.
I'll try to make no confusion next time.

Thanks

[Brasil]

The poem says "Lilli loved no one".

So, there is no doubt that she married for social climbing and money interest (see my post before to understand).

[Brasil]

Maybe "Lili" can be "Lilith", the rebel, the first woman, the symbol of fatal woman.
(see the Legend of Lilith on Kabbalah)

[JBI]

The second one. Refresh the page after you post to make sure you don't double post.

As for India not having a Tolstoi or Joyce, what do Tolstoi and Joyce represent? In both countries, the more central figure of national development in literature would be Pushkin for Russia, and Yeats for Ireland. India has far more writers, who influence Indian literature, than any other country (they have one of the oldest traditions, and one of the oldest cultures (albeit existing in various forms and languages).

As for longest, single, unchanging culture, Japan I would think is up there. They had the most solid government structure (despite outside aspects and ages) in the world. Their line of emperors is the longest, and their people are practically all from the same ethnic group. Should we count them?

Hell, we aren't even factoring in Indigenous north/central/south American letters into the equation. Inuit oral tradition and weaving pre-dates all these literatures. Do we count that? What about Cave scratchings?

Somehow the continent of Africa has alluded almost all mention. How much of their oral tradition can we count? If we can count Homer, can we count other oral poets' work?

[JBI]

I fail to see how Tolkien can be classified as 'mediocre'-he was one of the greatest and most important writers of the 20th century, it is also nice to see that you have so deftly categorized Tolkien's influence under the label 'mediocre' too.

As for his not being Noble Prize worthy-I guess I would I agree, it being a cesspit of mediocrities, of platitudinous writers and pseudo-philosophers and all of that nonsense

Poe, like Melville, was more influential outside of American than in it. That is the problem of American literature, not of Poe or Meville.

Kafka's Crow-yes India has produced a host of great writers, but there is still no truly great, revolutinary Indian writer, no Indian Joyce or Tolstoi.

How is Tolkien one of the most important writers of 20th century literature. His influence extends only to epic fantasy literature in the English speaking world primarily. He himself is hardly original, and only started to become the Tolkien we think we see now in the 60s and 70s because of his counter-culture themes. His career actually ebbed for a while throughout the 80s and 90s before the movies got launched. Compared with the influence of someone like Beckett, or Nabokov. I won't even get started with Faulkner, or Borges, both of which were 100x more influential. The problem with Tolkien is this whole Emperors New Clothes situation where people mistake it for a classic, and therefore don't tear into it. Lets be honest, the only thing it really influenced was Tolkienian knock-off fantasy, Tolkienian detracting fantasy, and the large dumping of mediocre movies into major cinema.

Poe's short stories seem to be his greatest achievement, which are alright, and lack originality, but his poetry can only be called meh. A meh achievement of American literature, which is so rich in poetic history that it disservices itself by constantly teaching Poe in classrooms. His best poems seem like a Shellean Byron. I knockoff of Shelly in the style of Byron. The result: a bunch of so-so simplistically rhyming, predictable, dull, horror pieces designed to scare children.

Melville was all but gone from literature until the 20th century resurgence. That still doesn't make him less important. He seems to still be one of the most important American writers, pushing at novelists like McCarthy, and Thomas Pynchon. Even so, his influence is small relative to other authors, but he still seems to be more enduring.


I would also like to toss into the mix a question: what if the poet is only valued within his country. I know many Italian poets even are read by the whole country, but hardly get read, except by scholars, outside of their borders. A good Example is Leopardi who seems to be unknown in the English speaking world, but is considered the best Lyric Poet before Montale in Italian, as is taught to all school-kids at the age of 17 as part of standard literary coverage.

[mortalterror]

I've tried to work this out mathematically. I figured that someone ought to try to model and quantify this debate somehow and lift it out of the realm of abstract speculation. I'm not totally happy with my results, because I lack hard data, and I feel I'm probably leaving something out; but I believe I'm on the right track here, trying to quantify certain variables and their relationships. Any criticism which could lead to a more accurate model would be appreciated.

Factors
1.Total population (# of people who have ever lived in the country) - rate of infant mortality
2.Percent Literate
3.Percent of literate that become writers
4.Percent of writers capable of creating masterpieces
5. # of Productive Years
5a)average lifespan
5b)-years to maturity
5c)-years of apprenticeship (learning the craft)
5d)rate of debilitating illnesses
6.Frequency of output, time per masterpiece
7.Chance of continued or universal relevance

P x L x W x M x Y x F x R = N or number of masterpieces

Let's say that a sample country has a population of 100 million, with 96% literacy, 1/1,000 people become writers, 1/10,000 writers produce masterpieces, each working at the top of their ability for a 20 year career, producing a single top level work every ten or so years, and then 1 out of every 5 masterpieces has an enduring significance for all of humanity. Then the probability that that country has created a masterpiece would be 3.84. That's 3 or 4 works of genius on the highest level of achievement.

However, for these numbers to work, we'd have to know just how many people have lived in a given country since it's foundation. This could be quantified through census data, as could the number of writers in that country, the life expectancy, and infant mortality rates. We'd have to take the average of life expectancy over time, the same as we would have to average the literacy rate which has taken a marked climb in recent years, but I do believe that such work is feasible, especially for estimating more recent trends as the data would be more accurate. Most of the hard data we'd require didn't start to get taken down until the late middle ages, but if we redefine our definition of a country that shouldn't cause too many problems. For instance one might say that after the Revolution France became a new nation under a new charter, constitution, and brand new form of government. We do the same thing when we consider the USA separately from it's founder Great Britain.

My estimated literacy rate of 96 percent is a little high for places outside of the first world. You can see a map of basic literacy around the world here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:L...rate_world.svg . In some parts of the world, literacy is still below 50 percent. I don't believe we should count oral history, or at least not in the same category as we do literary accomplishment. Partly because I don't know how such a thing could be quantified and tested.

Some other ways we might test world masterpieces is to see what people are actually reading. The U.S. and many other nations compile data about how many copies are printed of every book that gets published in their domain. We might consult all of the nations on record and see how many versions of Homer have been sold within each territory relative to Virgil. Popularity is one value, which is not to imply that it is the only criterion we should use for analysis. I'm open to any other ideas people might have as to how to go about this, but I think that the more useful ideas would be the verifiable, observable, demonstrable, and measurable ones. For instance, I've long thought that a lot of this debate could be satisfied by taking large groups of people into a lab and letting them read various books while hooked up to an EEG scanner.