Literature used to be one of my least favourite subjects. I hated it. It was so complicated. I felt I had to read everything in an entire library and that didn't seem great to me. I loved reading but then I hated reading too. Give me short romance novels that talk about love and how people lived happily ever after, that's all I needed to hear. Then I grew up.
Literature is the most fascinating subject for me because it revolves around the world of books. Words are very important to me and it's one of the most powerful tools of life which sadly a lot of people do not understand.
In my first year, I learnt a course called African Literature. In that course I was introduced to great authors like Chinua Achebe, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Ngugi Wa Thiong'o and the likes. Reading their novels which centred on pre-colonialism, colonialism and post colonialism made me fall in love with literature. I learnt that literature was beyond fictional love stories, beyond imaginative writings, beyond fantasy writing and it was a means of preserving historical facts, enlightening the younger generation and bringing to limelight different socio-political crises.
Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart for instance, is a post-colonial novel that describes a bit of the clash of culture in Africa, how Christianity religion first came to the continent and how a young man struggled to preserve the culture of his people.
Efua Sutherland wrote another book called Marriage of Anansewa which is a novel that frowns at parents who use their daughters as a means to create wealth by marrying them off to rich men of their choice even if it's against their daughter's wishes.
Poetry, prose, fiction, non-fiction and drama which are the five main genres of literature can all be used to express thoughts, feelings, share ideas and create awareness. Literature is deep, it's fascinating and it's interesting. That's why I would love to teach this subject in school. Surprisingly it's now my best course so far.
Literature as a whole is a form of art that possesses the ability to bring out emotions in us, this is another reason why I love it. Through literature, I have travelled to places I've never physically gone to, I've learnt about different cultures and different histories. Isn't this a beautiful thing?
It's really important that literature be taught in schools because that way, more writers will be born. Literature inspires creativity of a person and of the mind. So many times I've read books and didn't like the ending, it inspired me to write mine and think of a better ending to give to it.
Through literature, our vocabulary is expanded and our brain is exercised. No one would disagree that oftentimes poems aren't easily understood. That's because their true meanings are hidden in different literary devices which are used in the poem. Trying to decipher the messages hidden in these poems is mind stimulating.
The tricky thing about literature is how writers use words to their advantage. Insults can be made to sound like compliments in poetry😂 Literature is fun. There couldn't be a much better subject for me.
About The Author
I am a witty, adventurous and nicheless writer who loves to sing, take pictures, teach and travel. I am currently an English Education student at the University of Nigeria Nsukka. I am also a young children's teacher who homeschools kids during holidays. I love to share my life experiences through writing with the hope of inspiring as many people as possible on the Hive space.