/lit/ - Literature

What is the difference between science fiction and fantasy?
I am not looking for a definitive answer so much as a list of different definitions.

What's the best book by him?

What is Arthur C. Clarke's best Short story collection?

what does /lit/ think of scifi short stories, such as those written by this man?

/lit/ is one of the slowest boards on 4chan.

What does this tell you about the declining reading rates?

Go into a bookstore, and you'll find novels shelved alphabetically by author's last name but divided into a number of categories: mystery, science fiction, romance. Each genre gets its own section, which is understandable, but then there are novels classified as Fiction and others as Literature. Whats the difference between the two?
My first guess was that to be Literature, the novel's author had to be dead.
That hypothesis was disproved the next time I checked the shelves. I looked up in the dictionary when I got home. Fiction was defined as "any literary work portraying imaginary characters and events, asa novel, story, or play," while literature included "all writings in prose or verse, especially those of an imaginative character, but especially those having excellence of form or permenant value."
So basically, Literature is classier then Fiction.
Still curious, I started asking people in the book business how they decided what was classy enough to be Literature. The semiseries consensus among the pros was, "If an editor has to look up three words while reading the manuscript, it's literature." The best answer I got was from my stepbrother Jack Provenzale, who doesn't sell books but is a passionate reader. He said, "Literature changes you. When you're done reading, you're a different person.
-Maria Doria Russel (Introduction to "A Canticle for Leibowtz.")

Okay /lit/ what do you define as Literature? Why don't you think Science Fiction or Fantasy can't be considered Literature?

pic semi related

Some of the finest literature that has ever been written has been Science Fiction or Fantasy.