Fantasy vs. Magical Realism
HOW...@sonoma.edu
= Well, I think it depends on what one means by "fantastic." There are
=fantasy elements in EXCALIBUR - and by a stretch of logic I suppose you
=could say the same of THE EMERALD FOREST.
Here's where I get confused, y'all. What, exactly, is the difference between
"fantasy" and "magical realism?" I always thought of The Emerald Forest as MR;
which I understand to mean something like: fantastic events occur, but they are
not considered "fantastic" by the characters in the film or novel. This seems a
wee bit too broad. I'm sorry, it's late and I'm tired, so I'm probably not
making much sense. I guess I am hoping someone has a handy definition lurking
around. :-)
Bonnie
how...@sonoma.edu
Chris Smith
> Here's where I get confused, y'all. What, exactly, is the difference between
> "fantasy" and "magical realism?" I always thought of The Emerald Forest as MR;
> which I understand to mean something like: fantastic events occur, but they
> are not considered "fantastic" by the characters in the film or novel.
> This seems a wee bit too broad. I'm sorry, it's late and I'm tired, so I'm
> probably not making much sense. I guess I am hoping someone has a handy
> definition lurking around. :-)
Hmmm. I'll take a crack at it, even though some smart Lit major may
post later and prove that I'm full of it.
"Magical realism" was first used, I believe, to describe a certain
trend or school of Latin American fiction writing. The seminal work here
was "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. The
thematic concerns of these fictions are similar to those of the classic
realist and naturalist schools - they deal with social issues, politics,
history; the various classes and walks of life of a society are portrayed
through the characters. The focus, also, is on individual character and
the tone is usually that of the reasonably sober narrator of actual events
that one finds in, say, Balzac or Thomas Mann. The difference is that, at
times, events which are not usually accepted as possible in the real world
(and thus "magical") happen from time to time in these fictions, narrated
in this same objective way. And in this way these authors create quite a
unique effect, and portray certain psychological and spiritual aspects of
the human condition. The rains that last for years in "One Hundred Years
of Solitude," for instance, parallel on a spiritual realm the oppressions
the country has suffered in the political realm. There's usually an
allegorical flavor to these magical events - they're never there as a plot
device, they're always saying something about the ordinary world we know,
in a way which ordinary language cannot articulate. (Actually Franz Kafka
used a form of this technique sometimes, but nobody has ever called him a
"magical realist," maybe because his work is so dark.)
Fantasy, it seems to me, is a much broader term that gets thrown
about a lot and means a lot of different things to different people. It
gets applied to SF, to sword-and-sorcery stuff, to a wide range of
children's literature, to some types of horror stories. The common
thread here, as I see it, is that the fictional universe has different
rules than the one we're used to - and the focus is on this difference.
In a sword-and-sorcery story, for instance, the whole interest of
the story lies in the magical elements. The characters in the story are
very aware of these elements and use them consciously for whatever ends
they are driven to in the plot. In magical realism, on the other hand,
the magical elements are only significant insofar as they illuminate
some aspect of the characters or the culture depicted, and the characters
do not typically use these elements consciously, they just happen.
Well, I have gone on. But in a nutshell, I would say: In fantasy, the
world is determined by different rules, fantastic ones. In magical
realism, the world is basically the same as the ordinary one we know,
but fantastic elements intrude at times to show us things about the world
we might not know otherwise.
I'm not sure I can come up with any examples of films that can truly be
categorized as "magical realism." The beginning of THE EMERALD FOREST
seems like it's going that way, but it doesn't deliver. Perhaps LIKE WATER
FOR CHOCOLATE - it certainly shows the Garcia Marquez influence.
Dashiell
Jeffrey Dubin
characters think of them as such--it's fantasy. To my knowledge, MR would
thus be a subset of fantasy.