Literature refers to written works that are valued for their artistic quality, imagination, and meaningful ideas, particularly novels, poems, plays, and essays. When people talk about literature, they mean writing that explores what it means to be human: how people think, feel, struggle, dream, and connect with each other.

A science textbook tells you facts about photosynthesis, but a novel like Charlotte's Web makes you think about friendship, loss, and what it means to care about someone. Both are valuable, but literature aims to move you, make you think differently, or help you understand life in new ways.

The literature of a culture or time period reveals what people cared about. Ancient Greek literature includes epic poems about heroes and gods. American literature of the 1800s grappled with questions about freedom and what kind of nation the United States would become. When you read the literature of another place or time, you're meeting people across centuries or continents, discovering that humans everywhere share similar hopes and fears even when their lives look completely different.

Teachers distinguish between fiction (made-up stories) and nonfiction (true accounts), but both can be literature if they're written with artistry and depth. A powerful memoir about someone's real life can be just as much literature as an invented fantasy world.