literary

From French littéraire.

• (UK, General Australian) IPA^(key): /ˈlɪtəɹəɹi/, /ˈlɪt(ə)ɹi/
• (US, Canada) IPA^(key): /ˈlɪtəɹɛ(ə)ɹi/, [ˈɫɪɾəɹɛ(ə)ɹi]

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literary (comparative more literary, superlative most literary)

1. Relating to literature.

   literary fame

   a literary history

   literary conversation

   • c. 1768, Samuel Johnson, Preface to the Plays of William Shakespeare:

     He has long outlived his century, the term commonly fixed as the test of literary merit.

2. Relating to writers, or the profession of literature.

   a literary man

   • 1775, William Mason, The Poems of Mr. Gray. To which are prefixed Memoirs of his Life and Writings by W. Mason. York:

     in the literary as well as fashionable world

3. Knowledgeable of literature or writing.
4. Appropriate to literature rather than everyday writing.
5. Bookish.

• bookly

• “literary”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “literary”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.

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