Magical realism and experiences of extremity Langdon, Jo 2011, Magical realism and experiences of extremity, Current narratives, no. 3, pp. 14-24. Attached Files Name Description MIMEType Size Downloads langdon-magicalrealism-2011.pdf Published version application/pdf 376.77KB 308 Title Magical realism and experiences of extremity Author(s) Langdon, Jo Journal name Current narratives Issue number 3 Start page 14 End page 24 Total pages 11 Publisher University of Wollongong Place of publication Wollongong, N.S.W Publication date 2011 ISSN 1837-0314 Keyword(s) magical realism trauma Summary Examining magical realist texts including Tim O’Brien’s Going After Cacciato (1991), and Jonathan Safran Foer’s Everything is Illuminated (2002) and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (2006), this paper discusses how magical realism examines the extremities of trauma and fear, proposing that magical realist narratives afford a unique ability to represent trauma in a way that is not open to the stylistics of literary realism. Blending the real or believable with the fantastically outrageous, magical realist narratives typically destabilise and disorder privileged centres of ‘truth’ and ‘reality’, demonstrating the constructedness of knowledge and history. Accordingly, magical realist strategies are frequently used in interventionist or counter narratives that refuse to adhere to privileged versions of truth or history and insist upon a multiplicity of experience. The majority of magical realist scholarship explores how the genre undermines hegemonic perspectives of history to clear a space for marginal representations of the past. However, as this paper argues, magical realist narratives also provide a unique space for writing about experiences of extremity. Examining the role of fantasy in representations of violence and trauma, this paper proposes that rupturing a realist narrative with the magical or un-real accommodates representations of extremity by conveying the ‘felt’ experience of trauma. Language eng Field of Research 200524 Comparative Literature Studies Socio Economic Objective 970120 Expanding Knowledge in Language, Communication and Culture HERDC Research category C1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal Copyright notice ©2011, University of Wollongong Free to Read? Yes Persistent URL http://hdl.handle.net/10536/DRO/DU:30045297 Document type: Journal Article Collections: Faculty of Arts and Education School of Communication and Creative Arts Open Access Collection Related Links Link Description Connect to published version Go to link with your DU access privileges     Unless expressly stated otherwise, the copyright for items in DRO is owned by the author, with all rights reserved. Every reasonable effort has been made to ensure that permission has been obtained for items included in DRO. If you believe that your rights have been infringed by this repository, please contact drosupport@deakin.edu.au. Versions Version Filter Type Mon, 14 May 2012, 16:00:07 EST Tue, 15 May 2012, 10:04:55 EST Tue, 15 May 2012, 14:57:31 EST Tue, 15 May 2012, 14:58:38 EST Tue, 15 May 2012, 15:00:01 EST Mon, 02 Jun 2014, 11:48:44 EST Mon, 02 Jun 2014, 12:08:32 EST Mon, 02 Jun 2014, 12:10:08 EST Mon, 02 Jun 2014, 12:18:40 EST Tue, 06 Sep 2016, 19:01:02 EST Tue, 05 Dec 2017, 12:32:56 EST Fri, 07 Sep 2018, 15:58:36 EST Filtered Full Citation counts:   Cited 0 times in TR Web of Science Cited 0 times in Scopus Search Google Scholar Access Statistics: 378 Abstract Views, 308 File Downloads  -  Detailed Statistics Created: Mon, 14 May 2012, 15:59:24 EST by Kylie Koulkoudinas