Defining Fantasy

Fantasy is “a fiction evoking wonder and containing a substantial and irreducible element of the supernatural with which the mortal characters in the story or the readers become on at least partly familiar terms” (Manlove 1).  [By “irreducible,” Manlove means that the supernatural elements cannot be completely explained away by rational terms.]

“Fantasy is a powerful aspect of the imagination” – not one that is less significant than other parts, but itself an important way of imagining the world (Smith 11).

Fantasy was widespread in western literature until the Renaissance.  Then, an emphasis on science and reason led to a rejection of fantasy forms (Mathews 2).  In the Middle Ages, writers and their audiences shared a belief in the real possibility of supernatural occurrences (Manlove 258).  Over time, this prior belief in the supernatural became less and less available to writers.  The historical concept of fantasy being connected to the imagination developed through the writing of 19th-century poets, including Coleridge, Blake, Keats, and Christina Rossetti (Mathews xi).  Thus, the re-creation of the fantasy genre in modern times reflects Romantic ideas about the creative imagination rather than genuine belief in the supernatural (Manlove 259).

Theories of Fantasy

•     In Gothic or dream fictions, the supernatural elements are a “symbolic extension of the purely human mind.”(Manlove) “…as soon as it clearly emerges, the science of psychology also begins to color fantasy” (Mathews 26).
•     Mathews identifies two complementary strains in modern fantasy, one essentially religious in nature (exemplified by Tolkien and, presumably, by Lewis) and one with a more secular orientation (ex., William Morris) (86).
•     Carl Jung provides the basis for archetypal analysis, with his concept of the collective unconscious (outline).  In psychoanalysis, identification of archetypes is important for comprehending the meaning of dreams, and thus to work through the individual's particular psychic trauma. In interpretation, it matters less whether the images and symbols are part of the brain's essential wiring, or the result of social conditioning.  But the images of fantasy are very prominent in Jungian analysis - the witch, the numerology, beast marriages, etc. - and can be interpreted in psychological terms.
•     “[T]he very heart of the fantastic” consists of the occurrence of an event in the “real world” which is impossible under the laws of nature governing that world, thus leaving the reader or the character with two choices: either view the event as a hallucination or illusion, or accept that there are unknown laws in operation.  (Todorov 25). “Either total faith or total incredulity would lead us beyond the fantastic; it is hesitation [i.e., between belief and unbelief] which sustains its life” (Todorov 31).  The fantastic develops from an “uncanny event.”
•     Tolkien's theory of  fairy tales:
• Fantasy - imagining unreal things but endowing them with "the inner consistency of reality"
• Recovery - the ability to see things more clearly after experiencing the fantasy
• Escape - i.e., does not treat what is "real" as inevitable
• Consolation - the happy ending, or eucatastrophe
    In Christian fantasies in particular, “the real world” that we know is every bit as fantastic as the fictional creation, since for Christian writers “true Reality” is the source of all creation (Manlove 2). [Note that Manlove describes this as “Christian” but it is at least in part Platonist as well.]

A. Waller Hastings
Professor of English
Northern State University
Aberdeen, SD  57401

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