Book contents
- Magical Realism and Literature
- Cambridge Critical Concepts
- Magical Realism and Literature
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Introduction
- Part I Origins
- Part II Development
- Chapter 6 Magical Realism and the ‘Boom’ of the Latin American Novel
- Chapter 7 Magical Realism
- Chapter 8 Beautiful Lies
- Chapter 9 Myth, Orality and the African Novel
- Chapter 10 Breaking Boundaries
- Chapter 11 East Asian Magical Realism
- Chapter 12 Magic and Realism in South Asia
- Chapter 13 Fantastic Cohabitations
- Part III Application
- Bibliography
- Index
Chapter 10 - Breaking Boundaries
The Tale of North American Magical Realism
from Part II - Development
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 October 2020
- Magical Realism and Literature
- Cambridge Critical Concepts
- Magical Realism and Literature
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Introduction
- Part I Origins
- Part II Development
- Chapter 6 Magical Realism and the ‘Boom’ of the Latin American Novel
- Chapter 7 Magical Realism
- Chapter 8 Beautiful Lies
- Chapter 9 Myth, Orality and the African Novel
- Chapter 10 Breaking Boundaries
- Chapter 11 East Asian Magical Realism
- Chapter 12 Magic and Realism in South Asia
- Chapter 13 Fantastic Cohabitations
- Part III Application
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Tracing its roots back to Romanticism and invoking a counter-realism associated with postmodernism, North American magical realism invites a variety of communities to resist inequity and oppressive rhetoric and culture and to revise historical, social and religious traditions. Its canon includes North American writers as diverse as Toni Morrison; Latina authors Cristina García, Ana Castillo and Julia Alvarez; feminist magical realists Laurie Foos and Aimee Bender; Canadian writer Robert Kroetsch; and indigenous authors Louise Erdrich, Thomas King and James Welch. A new wave of writers drawing upon magical realism – including Kelly Link, David Levithan, Micah Dean Hicks, Anna-Marie McLemore and Leslye Walton, and often using young adult literature – continues to redefine 'American-ness'. Magical realism carves out space for developing better understandings of established and new (or newly acknowledged) communities, allowing mainstream and disenfranchised authors alike – bound by geography, race, gender or other collective categorizations of identity – entry into the main discourse.
Keywords
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Magical Realism and Literature , pp. 164 - 181Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2020
- 1
- Cited by