LITERARY • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Literary

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/lˈɪtərˌɛri/ Listen

adjective

Literary adj.

Of or pertaining to letters or literature; pertaining to learning or learned men; as, literary fame; a literary history; literary conversation. "He has long outlived his century, the term commonly fixed as the test of literary merit."

Versed in, or acquainted with, literature; occupied with literature as a profession; connected with literature or with men of letters; as, a literary man. "In the literary as well as fashionable world."

Literary property.

(a)

Property which consists in written or printed compositions.

(b)

The exclusive right of publication as recognized and limited by law.

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Etymology of 'Literary'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Literary" Quotes from Famous Books

... Allegranti; I had the quiet so necessary to literary labours, but nevertheless I made up my mind to change my lodging. Magdalena, my landlord's niece, was so clever and charming, though but a child, that she continually disturbed my studies. She came ...

— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... Abraham and long before, and on to the time of Moses there was great literary culture. Letters passed between kingdoms and cities. There were schools and colleges, great dictionaries and many books on many subjects. The Babylonian language was almost universally employed, so that the scribes could read without difficulty a letter sent anywhere in ...

— The Bible Period by Period - A Manual for the Study of the Bible by Periods • Josiah Blake Tidwell

... particularly in the splendid library of the Faculty of Advocates, and in that belonging to the Writers to the Signet, both at Edinburgh. The present article is transcribed from a volume of MSS belonging to a private gentleman, communicated to the editor by a valued literary friend. It had formerly belonged to a respectable clergyman of Edinburgh, and has the following notice of its origin written by the person to whom ...

— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr

... produce merchant by addressing your letter to "Mr. So-and-so, Grocer." There are plenty of men of the world who ought to be aware, since the knowledge of such subtle distinctions is their province, that you cannot insult a French writer more cruelly than by calling him un homme de lettres—a literary man. The word monsieur is a capital example of the life and death of words. Abbreviated from monseigneur, once so considerable a title, and even now, in the form of sire, reserved for emperors and kings, it is bestowed indifferently upon all and sundry; while the twin-word messire, ...

— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac

... Theodoric to Vitigis: for the most part royal rescripts addressed to foreign powers and to officials of the kingdom. Invaluable for their light upon men and things fourteen hundred years ago, these Variae of Cassiodorus; and for their own sake, as literary productions, most characteristic, most entertaining. Not quite easy to read, for the Latin is by no means Augustan, but after labour well spent, a delightful revelation of the man and the age. Great is the variety ...

— By the Ionian Sea - Notes of a Ramble in Southern Italy • George Gissing

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