What can literature do that visual arts can't?

What can literature do that visual arts can't?

literature has the power to create its own visual art in your head

literature accesses knowledge by primarily intellectual means whereas the visual arts access knowledge by primarily aesthetic means

Communicate ideas via language rather than images.

Surely you would agree that literature conjures images through language?

I would reject this idea, the history of literature is all about that aesthetic, strictly intellectual works are often boring or really specialized.

true that literature makes its impact partially by aesthetic means, but this is subordinate to its intellectual content. can you imagine a novel without any substance beyond the beauty of its prose?

Lolita.

Not rely on someone else's imagination.

It has the potential, not power.