Sonali Dhawan

Academic Writing
November 23, 2019

ARGUMENTATIVE ESSAY

Literature: Salubrious or Noxious?

Literature is not merely a word indexed by the lexicographers for citation, whereas it is beyond

the comprehensive line of thoughts of a human, less known to this term! From salubrious to

noxious, intellect to emotion, written to oral, this very term can affect and shape the mind and the

heart of a person in contiguity with it. This can be recognized in context to the English Literature

studied almost across the globe, which has, in turn, thrived from Old English Literature to Post-

Modernism that is from Cynewulf, Bede to Eliot, Shakespeare, and Rushdie to many more.

Literature can affect the thought process when studied with deep focus, engrossment, and

impulsion. Poetry, Drama, Novels, Plays, Prose, Essays are all the mainstream divisions into which

Literature is divisible. And it is a flabbergasting fact that all these channels further maneuver

emotions as well as intellect! Enhancing it, even more, it has genres like fiction, non-fiction,

supernaturalism, sci-fi, mystery, romanticism, and much more. A varied range of work can

consequently be argumentative as it will confuse the reader to choose. On his search for finding a

perfect pick, he might lose his interest in reading. While on the other hand, making choices groom

the personality and this exploration of choosing is neglected by many. Reading aides to develop

the taste buds for better decisions at numerous stages of life.

At points, Literature is responsible for proliferating the critical idiosyncrasy. The reader is certain

to possess it as he reads one text with the view of say, three different critics; one out of them

eulogizes the efforts of the writer, while the other two disparage the same. It is so instinctive that

the intellectual side of the reader develops slowly and slowly to have a multi-perspective of a

single text! George Orwell, S.T. Coleridge, Roger Ebert, Walsh, and many other owners of critical

brains have contributed to letting a reader, as well as a writer, think unusually. Likewise, the other

side of a coin having discrete viewpoints may lead to the adverse judgemental analysis of any

work. But this tendency is not prominent in all the readers. It is an exception with rarity. Just as

F.R Leavis highly criticized C.P Snow for his essay Two Cultures.

A voracious reader is subjected to think way differently from a layman. It allows him to have a

broader perspective. This is how literature is surprising in all aspects. A.J Cronin’s The Best

Investment I Ever Made reflects the morality of life, in which the narrator gives money to save

the life of a teenage boy. The boy, further in the future, turns out to be a juvenile lawyer and thanks

to the narrator for trusting him. It depicts humanity where people have faith in others to give them

a second chance and make their lives worth living. Also, the flip side will pave the way for a

broader perspective with unrealistic expectations from the real world. Arguments involve that a

reader can be so engrossed in his/ her "fairy-tale" world that he starts reading "between the lines"

and not "in the lines" of any text. S/he may associate the characters and plots of the works so

intimately to her/his own life that it results in a "virtual cocoon" of the reader where the reality of

life is cut off.

Reading is great when a person knows what he /she is reading and perceives it the way an author

wants; without limiting his/her comprehension to that of the writer. It effectively dots mind and
writing. Literature, in its complete sense, makes a universe out of it with a sense of healthy and

worldly aspects.