All 5 Uses of

literally

in

Heaven Is for Real

The elevator doors had begun sliding shut when Dr. O'Holleran appeared in the hallway and literally yelled for us to stop.
Chpt 10

literally = an intensifier (to intensify what is said)

After more than two grueling weeks at Colton's bedside, we had nearly hit the road back to normal—with the elevator doors literally closing, our family inside with balloons—when the whole thing crashed around us again.
Chpt 10

The Bible says that with the Lord, "a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day." Some interpret that as a literal exchange, as in, two days equals two thousand years.
Chpt 14 *

literal = actual (not figurative)

Still, of the literally dozens of portraits of Jesus we'd seen since 2003, Colton had still never seen one he thought was right.
Chpt 27 *

literally = an intensifier (to intensify what is said)

Definitions:

(1) (literally as in: literally--not figuratively)
actually true using the basic meaning of the words (not an exaggeration, metaphor, or other type of figurative speech)
(2) (literally as in: literally at death's door)
an intensifier (to intensify what is said -- especially a metaphor)

Since literally can mean actually true, but can also be used to intensify a metaphor, the reader has to use context to know what the word means.

For example, if you read "She stabbed him in the back," you would probably assume she betrayed him. But if you read it in a murder mystery where the victim was stabbed, you might assume you were being told that she actually stabbed him.

Because confusion can arise from this kind of usage, many authorities discourage using literally to intensify a metaphor--especially in formal usage.
(3) (literal as in: a literal translation)
word for word
(4) (meaning too rare to warrant focus)
Less common and more specific meanings of literal include:
- an earlier or original meaning of a word -- as in "In Japanese the literal meaning of ronin was a 'samurai without a master,' but it is now used to describe a student who did not pass the entrance exam and is without a school."
- lacking imagination -- as in "She has a literal mind."
- a fixed or hard-coded value in a computer program -- as in "Find every instance of the literal in the source code."
- related to letters -- as in "In algebra we use literal notation as when 'x' represents a value."