unliterary

adjective

un·​lit·​er·​ary ˌən-ˈli-tə-ˌrer-ē How to pronounce unliterary (audio)
: not literary
D. H. Lawrence died in March 1930, when I was just 13 years old and too unliterary to notice.Anthony Burgess
Mr. Singer was a modest man with an unassuming and unliterary style of life: he liked to wear plain business suits and he preferred dairy restaurants to writers' bars.Eric Pace

Examples of unliterary in a Sentence

poems written in a natural, unliterary voice
Recent Examples on the Web
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
The bond between Alice and the spiky, decidedly unliterary Felix might flummox. New York Times, 1 Sep. 2021 Both were born as writers in public libraries—hyper-bright American Jewish urban boys from unliterary backgrounds, encountering the classics on their own, without too much pre-sorting, responding with delight, imitation, amusement, and familiarity. Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker, 24 Aug. 2021

Word History

First Known Use

1788, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of unliterary was in 1788

Dictionary Entries Near unliterary

Cite this Entry

“Unliterary.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/unliterary. Accessed 21 Nov. 2024.

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