On the concept of world literature

The expression "world literature" is currently being used in several ways: about various culturally and temporally inclusive bodies of literature and about various ways of studying such literature. In the article, special attention is devoted to the editorial concept of world literature in The Cambridge History of World Literature (2021), edited by Debjani Ganguly. Formulations about world literature sometimes cast it as a mind-independent entity, sometimes as a scholarly construction. It is argued that the choice between these alternatives is important, since it has significant consequences for the logic of thinking and reasoning about world literature.