The Lord of the Rings

Fantasy literature?

Science fiction? Or fairytale?

The classic definitions of fantasy1) Louis Vax

• Confrontation of regular characters with unexplainable events

• Creation of imaginary horrors within the real world

• Fear caused by supernatural events

The classic definitions of fantasy2) Roger Caillois

• A break in the universal context caused by supernatural events

• The impossible appears in a world in which it can‘t appear

• No simple explanations (illusion, dreams)

The classic definitions of fantasy3) Tzvetan Todorov

• Uncertainty if impossible events have a natural or supernatural explanation

• This uncertainty may also be experienced by a character in the text

• No allegorical or "poetic" interpretations

Modern definitions (Solms)

• Setting: not the real world, but an imaginary world

• Roots: fairytales + Gothic fiction + mythologies

• Contrast: science fiction, horror

Modern definitions (Manlove)

• A fiction evoking wonder ...

• ... and containing a substantial and irreducible element of supernatural or impossible worlds, beings or objects...

• ... with which the mortal characters in the story or the readers become on at least partly familiar terms.

Modern definitions (Purtill)

• How can supernatural events be explained?

• 1) technological progress, e.g. science fiction (insulated view of mind and matter)

• 2) acts of (a) god (animistic view)• 3) magic (primitive view)• Fantasy = animistic or primitive view

Tolkien‘s own theory(“On fairy-stories“)

• Not a question of ‘plot‘, but of ‘setting‘• “Most good 'fairy-stories' are about the

aventures of men in the Perilous Realm.“• fantasy = imagination• fantastic = non-existing, unreal• Fantasy literature = imagination of the unreal

Tolkien‘s own theory(“On fairy-stories“)

• Secondary belief• The author creates “a Secondary World which

your mind can enter. Inside it, what he relates is 'true': it accords with the laws of that world. You therefore believe it, while you are, as it were, inside.“

• Inner consistence of reality

Summary (Bauer)Fantasy = ...

• The unexplainable / impossible is an essential part of the story.

• Setting = secondary world• ...which is complex enough, consistent, and

exists independent from the plot.• Inside this setting, the supernatural events

are accepted by the reader as real• ... and they are explained by the animistic or

primitive view.