Literary genre

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A literary genre is one of the divisions of literature into genres according to particular criteria such as literary technique, tone, or subject matter (content). Literary genres are also categories of marketing, literary criticism and consumption ^{[citation needed]}. One of the areas in the study of literature is the difference between literary fiction on the one hand and genre fiction or escapist fiction on the other ^{[citation needed]}.

[edit] Subgenres

Genres are often divided into sub-genres. Literature can be organized according to the "poetic genres" and the "prose genres". Poetry might be subdivided into epic, lyric, and dramatic, while prose might be subdivided into fiction and non-fiction. Further subdivisions of dramatic poetry, for instance, might include comedy, tragedy, melodrama, and so forth. This parsing into subgenres can continue: "comedy" has its own genres, for example, including farce, comedy of manners, burlesque, and satire. ^{[citation needed]},

Many times, the criteria used to divide up works into genres are not consistent, leading to works that belong to more than one genre. Romance and mystery are marked out by their plots, and Western by its setting, which means that a work can easily be a Western romance or Western mystery.