What is Literature?

I haven't mentioned it before, but my new semester started this past Wednesday, butI didn't have all my classes until yesterday. The class I had yesterday was contemorary literature with the new english professor. Though I've been a student at UMFK for three years now I have never had a class like this one before.
I was also going to take American Lit. with this same teacher but the class was canceled so I'm once again stuck in a class revolving around poetry (I'm sorry I'm a story teller not a poet, three years of this stuff is a bit much, and I have had a class that has something to do with poetry every single semester.)

Now it seems that I've been asked this question "What is Literature?" at the begining of every single english class I have taken it's getting old and boring. I know what literature is to me and I know what it is to most other people.

So now for your reading pleasure here is what I think literature is (and hopfully I'll never have to answer this question again)

{as I answered it for my class}

What is Literature?

It seems I’ve been asked this question in many of the English classes I have taken over the years. Everyone always has a different opinion. Does the authour's work have to be of novel length and hold great importance? Should it also be considered a classic from a year when most people hadn't even been born yet? I don’t think like that.
Though many different answers come up during discussions I’ve been a part of on this topic and I respect everyone’s thoughts to me literature will always be a work of art in the written word. I believe anything that is written can be considered literature whether it be a novel, an epic poem, or even a haiku. And really what does classic mean? A book from a year ago can be considered a classic. I know I've read my share of books in recent years that I would right now consider a clssic and a wonderful peice of literature.
As long as what is written holds some significance, something that makes them think and stays with them for a while, to another person think it should be considered a work of literature.