Magical Realism as a Fusion of Fantasy and Reality
One month ago, I had never heard of Magical Realism. Since reading the four essays by Franz Roh, Angel Flores, Luis Leal and Amaryll Chanaday and various internet articles, I have a much better understanding of Magical Realism - what it is, how it applies to literature, how it applies to art, and its theory, history, and style.
Magical Realism is a fusion of fantasy and reality. According to Flores, it is a "transformation of common and everyday into the awesome and unreal" (114). This is not even and equal mix. Magical Realism is reality-based with just one fantastic overstatement. This overstatement is described by Pietri as "a kind of extreme state," and that it "favors the unexpected richness of reality" (qtd. in Leal 121). This one fantastic element is always accepted as reality by the characters in the story. It also has hidden meanings in a deeper realm. "The mystery does not descend to the present world but rather hides and palpitates behind it" (Roh 16). Magical Realism is subject to a certain control and is mainly used to show a different way of
viewing the world. In this form of expression, the plots are always logically conceived. Magical Realism also expresses emotions without evoking them. In Magical Realism, "key events have no logical or psychological explanation" and "the author does not need to justify the mystery of events" (Leal 123). as a science fiction or fantastic author would. Also, unlike in sci-fi and fantasy stories, the author clings to reality. Flores describes this characteristic by saying the authors "cling to reality as if to prevent 'literature' from getting in their way, as if to prevent their myth from flying off, as i...
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...t be literature that is reality based but contains at least one fantastic element that is unexplained but accepted. Now that I understand what it is, I am beginning to find more examples of it all around me. I am looking forward to reading examples of this unusual and interesting genre.
Works Cited
Flores, Angel. "Magical Realism in Spanish American Fiction." Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community. Ed. Lois Parkison Zamora and Wendy B. Faris. Durham; N.C.: Duke UP,1995:109-118.
Leal, Luis. "Magical Realism in Spanish American Literature." Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community. Ed. Lois Parkison Zamora and Wendy B. Faris. Durham; N.C.: Duke UP,1995:119-124.
Roh, Franz. "Magic Realism: Post-Expressionism." Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community. Ed. Lois Parkison Zamora and Wendy B. Faris. Durham; N.C.: Duke UP,1995:15-31.
One of the most important aspects of Hmong culture is the group and family dynamic. The Hmong considered farming their most important duty because it was a major source of income when they were in Laos. The story regarding the Hmong family who attempted to grow vegetables inside their second story apartment was an example of this (Fadiman, 1997, p. 226). The Hmong found the transition difficult since the thing they knew best, farming, was taken away from them. Thus, they were forced to fit into roles that were foreign to them.
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As a boy Johannes worked and studied with his father and learnt lessons from books with his mother, with whom he would play ?four-hands? at the piano, ?just for fun.? There were never any doubts as to his becoming a musician. From early childhood he learn everything his father could teach him, read everything he could lay hands on, practiced with undeviating enthusiasm, and filled reams of paper with exercises and variations. The soul of the child went out in music. He played scales long before he knew the notes, and great was his joy when at the age of six he discovered the possibility of making a melody visible by placing black dots on lines at different intervals, inventing a system of notation of his own before he had been made acquainted with the method which the musical world had been using for some centuries.
Faris, Wendy B. Ordinary Enchantments: Magical Realism and the Remystification of Narrative. Nashville: Vanderbilt UP, 2004. 24 Sept. 2012. Web. 15 Mar. 2014. 21
Delbaere-Garant, Jeannie. "Variations on Magical Realism". Magical Realism Theory, History, Community. Ed. Lois Parkison Zamora and Wendy B. Faris. Durham" Duke U.P., 1995. 249-263.
An essential difference, then, between realism and magical realism involves the intentionality implicit in the conventions of the two modes…realism intends its version of the world as a singular version, as an objective (hence ...
... Southeast Asia due to the wars taking place, it was hard for the Hmong to find jobs in America. With little work skills and hardly and language understanding, Americans were getting frustrated with trying to teach a Hmong how to do their job. The Hmong were also taking up all the jobs because they would work for less than an American worker. This angered some Americans because they could not find jobs. The Hmong were also gobbling up Welfare and resources provided by a government that they didn’t even belong to. The Hmong were just trying to make a living for themselves but this was making many lower class Americans frustrated when trying to find a job to feed their families.
Flores, Angel. "Magical Realism in Spanish American Fiction." Magical Realism. Theory, History, Community. Ed. Lois Parkinson Zamora and Wendy B. Faris. Durham, N.C.: Duke UP, 1995: 109-116.
Before the pianoforte was brought into existence, the keyboard instrument of the orchestra was the harpsichord. The timbre of the harpsichord was much different than that of the pianoforte, this being primarily because of the harpsichord’s strings being plucked, whereas the piano’s strings
Both Petipa and Tchaikovsky still did not like the story and refused to work on the project. Petipa did not think the story was right for ballet dancing. He did not feel that Marie, the main character, was a strong enough character to dance. He did try to write a scenario for the ballet, but he could not think of anything past the scene of what we know of as the kingdom of snow. After Petipa gave up, Vsevolojsky begged and persisted with Petipa to try again. He convinced Petipa and this time he created a new character called the Sugarplum fairy. This character was not in either of the original stories. She was to be the main character, rather than Marie, and she would be the ruler of the Kingdom of Sweets. Petipa felt that this character could dance the big scenes better than the character Marie.
Angel Flores wrote about magical realism in a way that was hard for me to understand.
DHH-Office of Public Health. Facts about HIV and AIDS. South Deerfield: Channing Bete Company, 2002. Print
Magical realism, by definition, is a literary style that addresses social concerns, but masks the...
Flores, Angel. "Magical Realism in Spanish American Fiction." Magical Realism. Theory, History, Community. Ed. Lois Parkinson Zamora and Wendy B. Faris. Durham, N.C.: Duke UP, 1995. 109-116.
Magical realism is clearly present throughout Gabriel-Garcia Marquez's novel Chronicle of a Death Foretold. Magical realism is the juxtaposition of realism with fantastic, mythic, and magical elements. A secondary trait was the characteristic attitude of narrators toward the subject matter: they frequently appeared to accept events contrary to the usual operating laws of the universe as natural, even unremarkable. Though the tellers of astonishing tales, they themselves expressed little or no surprise.