Q. What are the different literary forms in prose?

Q. What are the different literary forms in prose?

Or

Describe Diary as a prose form. June-2010, Q.No.-7 (d)l[Dec-2011, Q.No.-7 (b)I June-2012, Q.No.-1 (d)]

Or

Describe Travelogue as a prose form. [Dec-2010, Q.No.-7 (d)]

Ans. The different literary forms in prose are:

 (1) Short Story: A short story is a work of fiction usually written in a narrative prose. A short story is not a novel in an abridged form. A short story is complete in itself. Therefore, a short story writer must have great skill to achieve an impression of completeness in a few pages. The characters and incidents are sketched in a few effective strokes. A short story thus has intensity and a singleness of purpose. There is no single acceptable definition of a short story. All that we can say is that it is short, has a plot and character(s) and has a beginning, middle and an end. According to one definition, a short story is a relatively short narrative which is designed to produce a single dominant effect and which contains the elements of drama. Although the short story is expressly defined by its length, the precise length of stories that can be considered 'short varies between critics and writers, especially when taking account of the diversity of the form across genres. The aim of a good short story is to make the reader feel, to make him/her enter into the experience of the characters. Short stories can be read in magazines as well as in anthologies. Short stories date back to oral story-telling traditions, which originally produced epics such as Homer's iliad and odyssey.

(2) Novel: A novel is a long prose narrative that usually describes fictional characters and events in the form of a sequential story. The genre has historical roots in the fields of medieval and early-modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. Like the short story, it is difficult to define a novel. A novel usually means certain length. A novel is an individual vision of the novelist. It is a picture of life as viewed by the writer. It has a story, which tells us what happened and a plot, which tells us how it happened. E.M. Forster, an English novelist, told the difference between a story and a plot by the followirng example, i.e. The King died and the Queen died' is a story. The King died and then the Queen died of grief is a plot. The difference is quite clear from this example. The plot and characters in a good novel leaves a lasting impression on the readers. A good novel gives us an insight into the world and ourselves; it is full of vitality and humanity and appeals to human sensibilities. The style varies from one novelist to another. Each novel bears the signature of the novelist. piece of fiction, written in prose and of a nitian eally.of moderate.

 (3) Essay: An essay is a piece of prose composition usually of moderate length. It is often written from an author's personai point of view. The word 'essay derives from the French word "essai" or attempt. An essay "attempts" to throw some light on the subject under discussion. The Frenchman Michel de Montaigne was the first author to describe his work as essays; he used the term to characterise these as "attempts" to put his thought into writing. There are two kinds of essays. One is informal or personal and the other is formal. Anything can be said in an informal essay as long as it is interesting and pieasing to the reader. The style of the essay is generally familiar and conversational. The subjects can often be light such as in 'Apology for Idlers,' 'On Tremendous Trifles', 'On Bores' and so on. The informal essay tries to inform, persuade or entertain the reader. A formal essay is a serious one and it weighs, evaluates and judges. It discusses the merits and the demerits of the topic in question. The style is objective and serious. A good essay however, is balanced, thoughtful and not biased. The judgement is based on facts.

(4)Letter: Another form of non-fictional prose is the letter. On a personal level, a letter is a spontaneous expression of one's self and on a social level, letters hold up a mirror to the age in which

they are written. Letter writing came to be recognised as a literary form in England during the Renaissance when critics came in touch with the works of Seneca, Cicero and Guevara. A good public letter is a literary piece of work that explores an Issue idea, impression or interpretation. It has a focussed point and has both informative value and aesthetic appeal.

(5)Travelogue: Travelogue is a piece of writing about travel. It is written in a style that is both interesting and informative. The passion for knowledge about other countries have always driven men to embark upon land travels and sea-voyages to distant lands, the accounts of which have been left by them for posterity The history of travelogues is as old as the history of man's travels Travel literature typically records the experiences of an author touring place for the pleasure of travel. Travel literature may be cross-cultural or transnational in focus, or may involve travel to different regions within the same country. The systematic study of travel literature emerged as a legitimate field of scholarly inquiry in the mid-1990s, with its own conferences, organizations, journals, monographs, anthologies and encyclopedias’. Literary travelogues generally exhibit a coherent narrative or

aesthetic beyond the logging of dates and events as found in travel journals or a ship's log. Travel literature is closely associated with outdoor literature and the genres often overlap with no definite boundaries. Another sub genre, invented in the 19th century, is the guidebook The form comprises many of the finest writings in prose during the 'Romantic Age'. Not only were the romantics more alive to picturesqueness and quaintness but also they were in love with nature. They were eager to study local colours and climates and to depict them in the settings for their imaginative stories. Also, travel gave the romantic writer the illusion of flight from his wearied self. Early examples of travel literature include Pausanias' Description o Greece in the 2nd century CE, and the travelogues of Ibn Jubayr (1145-1214) and Ibn Batutta (1304-1377), both of whom recorded their travels across the known world in detail. Burton Holmes was an American traveller, photographer filmmaker, who coined the term "travelogue". and Many "fictional" works of travel literature are based on factual journeys, i.e. Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness and presumably, Homer's Odyssey while other works, though based on imaginary and even highly fantastic journeys, i.e. Dante's Divine Comedy, Jonathan Swift's Gulliver Travels nevertheless contain factual elements.

(5) Biography and Autobiography: A biography is a detailed description on account of someone's life. A good biography usually tries to project an

objective picture of the life of a particular person. It avoids the temptation either to praise too much or to be too severe and critical. In this kind of writing, the writer selects the salient features of a particular life and gives them a shape. It tries to make the reader share the hopes, the fears, the interests and aspirations of that person. A biography presents a subject's life story highlighting various aspects of his/her life, including intimate details of experience and may include an analysis of a subject's personality In an autobiography, the writer attempts to reveal selected experiences of his/her own life in retrospect. Here the picture presented is necessarily subjective. It presents the events and impressions of the past as recollected by the writer af the time s/he is writing the autobiography. It cannot be a complete account of one's life, as the future has still to be lived. The word autobiography was first used deprecatingly by Taylor in 1797 in the 'English Periodical the Monthly Review. The autobiographies of Gandhi and Nehru are good examples of this form of writing.

(6)Diary: A type of autobiographical writing, a diary is essentially a regularly kept record of the diarist's activities and reflections ostensibly for the author's use alone, although some diaries are eventually published. Its name is derived from the Latin word dies', meaning "days," which suggests the "day-to-day" nature of the writing. As a genre, it has been practiced for over five hundred years. The diary is also a valuable historical document of an individual life and gives us written evidence of the historical, social and political circumstances of a particular period. Many diaries of notable figures have been published and ferm an important element of autobiographical literature. One of the most famous modern diaries, widely read and translated, is the posthumously published. The Diary of a young girl by Anne Frank, who wrote it while in hiding during the German occupation of Amsterdam in the 1940s. Speeches: A speech is a spoken communication or expression of thought in prose addressed to an audience. It presents the personal viewpoint of the speaker in a convincing manner, on a subject that is of universal importance. A good speech is not ed with the aim to excite or rouse the audience. Rather it is made to inspire and persuade the hearers to think along the lines the speaker wishes them to. A power-packed speech is one that is charged with the sturdy conviction the speaker has in his/her beliefs.

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