Georgian Literature as Part of World Literary Heritage

Abstract

Literature in Georgia has always performed the function of an intellectual leader: due to its high-quality writing, the country has always represented a significant landscape of the world literary and cultural process.

Despite the fact, that Georgian history and cultural consciousness begin already within the pagan period, at the ancient pre-historical stage, the history of Georgian writing starts from the era of Christianity, from 4^th century. The first literary piece – ‘The Life of St. Nino’ - is dated back almost to the same period.

Georgian literature is a Christian in its essence and belongs to the European wing of writing, however, due its geopolitical location, keeping dialogue with Eastern mode of writing as well. 

The history of Georgian literature spans more than fifteen centuries.

Georgian literature is a literature of a small country, but not a minority literature; it cannot dictate rules or cannot control the world literary space, but throughout its fifteen-centuries-old history it was eager to be at the center of the global, important, influential literary processes and reflected these processes with the constant awareness of its inner dignity.