I corrected the punctuation somewhat, but not rigorously, because that is less important in belles-lettres.
Source: tatoeba (1852688)
Belles-lettres
//ˌbɛlˈlɛtɹ(ə)//
Synonyms for "belles-lettres" (31 found)
Ranked by relevance and common usage.
Closest matches (7)
Strong matches (9)
Related words (15)
Related word relations
OpenGloss and ConceptNet supply richer edges like generalizations, collocations, and derivations.
More general
2 entriesRelated terms
2 entriesderived
1 entriesTranslations
34 translations across 22 languages.
Arabic
1 entries- أَدَب noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Chinese Mandarin
3 entries- 純文學 /纯文学 noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- 美文 noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- 詩禮 /诗礼 noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Czech
1 entries- beletrie noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Dutch
1 entries- bellettrie noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Esperanto
2 entries- beletristiko noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- beletro noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Estonian
2 entries- belletristika noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- ilukirjandus noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Finnish
1 entries- kaunokirjallisuus noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
French
1 entries- belles-lettres noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Georgian
1 entries- ბელეტრისტიკა noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
German
3 entries- Belles Lettres noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- Belletristik noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- schöne Literatur noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Hungarian
1 entries- szépirodalom noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Irish
1 entries- léann liteartha noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Japanese
1 entries- 純文学 noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Korean
1 entries- 순문학 noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Polish
2 entries- beletrystyka noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- literatura piękna noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Portuguese
1 entries- belas-letras noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Romanian
1 entries- beletristică noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Russian
2 entries- беллетри́стика noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- худо́жественная литерату́ра noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Spanish
2 entries- bellas letras noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- buenas letras noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Swedish
2 entries- belletristik noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- skönlitteratur noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Ukrainian
3 entries- белетри́стика noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- кра́сне письме́нство noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
- худо́жня літерату́ра noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Vietnamese
1 entries- văn chương noun (light literary compositions valued for their aesthetic properties)
Sample sentences
2 total sentences available.
That vapid, half naturalized term ‘belles-lettres,’ which has had some currency as a substitute for the term ‘literature.’
Source: wiktionary
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.