by Nadja Marek, Renee Czyganowski, Danny Tran, and Ann-Sophie Ludwig
Speculative fiction is an umbrella term that contains many different genres. Generally speaking, it deals with topics such as nature (or the supernatural) and alternate realities, either in the past or future. It tries to make sense of the world by combining history with the supernatural and imaginary. Genres that count as speculative fiction are fantasy, horror and science fiction. These can also be divided into more specific categories, for example stories that entail ghost stories, magic realism, utopian and dystopian or apocalyptic and post apocalyptic elements. In this blog post, we want to give you an overview of the different genres and their key aspects that distinguish one from another.
Fantasy and Magic Realism
The Fantasy genre commonly features supernatural elements and magic, things that obviously do not exist in our world. Creative freedom is intrinsically tied to this particular genre unlike any other. Unrestricted by physical laws, fantasy offers a glimpse of what life could be like, if there was a sense of underlying magic in our world. Coinciding with the name, the genre of magic realism combines notions of a real world with fantasy and magic. The literary aspect of magic realism gained traction in the 1930, when Venezuelan author Arturo Uslar-Pietri wrote a number of influential short stories, focusing on both mystery and the reality of life. The overall setting is commonly grounded in a realistic but supernatural manner, blurring the lines between reality and fantasy. Arguably the most defining characteristic of this particular genre is the aspect of relatability; the story must take place in a real world that the reader is familiar with or can easily identify themselves with. In the world of magic realism, magic is an element that most characters are accustomed to, showcasing how modern life could be like with a supernatural twist. The genre of magic realism is distinguishable from regular fantasy by taking into account realistic elements and especially the style of realism, as it would otherwise fall under the aforementioned genre. This amalgamation of both relatability and the fantastical offers a uniquely inclusive approach to storytelling, as it is easier to grasp onto things the reader is already familiar with.
Horror and Ghost Stories
“The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.” (Lovecraft 1927) Horror is a genre that contains elements of the supernatural and unnatural which serve the purpose to scare and repulse the reader. Often, it uses themes such as death, decay, monsters and blood to create an uncanny atmosphere that is noticeable and distinguishes it from any other genre. Moreover, it combines eerie descriptions of nature and the unnatural to make the reader feel frightened. Themes, such as the uncanny valley or monster theory help to understand that fear comes from something unfamiliar and something unknown that cannot be trusted. Horror plays with these themes to intentionally confront the reader with dreadful and shocking images and situations. In modern media it established the sub category of art horror which entails the interplay between threat and disgust.
When looking at the different types of horror it is important to look at the difference between psychological horror and supernatural horror. The former uses emotional and mental circumstances to unsettle the reader and picks up themes such as insanity, whereas the latter deals with monsters and the unknown, such as ghosts, to make the reader feel frightened.
Ghost stories are a subcategory of the horror genre and deal with, like the name already states, the appearances of ghosts. “A Splinter of Darkness” by Isobelle Carmody is an example of a horror short story. It deals with the uncanny because the child Paul is visited by a girl that only comes out when his parents aren’t home and she is persuading him to do unspeakable things to free others of her kind. The story uses the element of the unknown and secrecy as a tool to create a scary environment.
Science Fiction, Utopian/Dystopian and (Post-)Apocalyptic Literature
The words science and fiction at first glance represent a paradox, two terms that have nothing in common. However, put together they represent the great world of science fiction. The science fiction genre depicts the imagination of what science and its methods could have been, could be able to do, or become. It concerns itself with the question: what if? What if there would be a world where no one has to die? What if our world would be destroyed due to a scientific error? What if nature would turn on the human race? Science fiction often shows an opposite view to the life that we are used to and when it does relate to the world as we know it, there is always a big change to it, the so-called novum. According to the Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms (3rd edition) the transformation to the world can occur due to technological inventions but it can also “involve some mutation of known biological or physical reality, e.g. time travel, extraterrestrial invasion, ecological catastrophe.” Due to the immense amount of possibilities for transformation, the genre of science fiction includes a range of subgenres such as for example utopian, dystopian and (post-)apocalyptic writing. Utopia and Dystopia present two opposing worldviews. Where utopian fiction presents a kind of perfect world, dystopian fiction presents a flawed one. Often dystopian and (post-)apocalyptic fiction are knit together tightly as an imperfect world is often presented as the result of an apocalyptic event. An example for this would be Jeremy Szal’s short story “The Weight of Silence”, which is set in Australia and deals with the aftermath of an attack through spiders that overtook the country. It presents a time of war and crisis through a before unknown force and shows how the survivors try to cope in their changed world.
Conclusion
In this blog post, we talked about different genres, such as “Fantasy and Magic Realism”, “Horror and Ghost stories”, and “Science Fiction and Utopian/Dystopian and (Post-)Apocalyptic literature”. But most of the time, stories are not written for a specific genre and categorizing them can be a bit tricky. A fantasy book can contain elements of horror stories or a dystopian short story can be considered a fantasy story as well. Stories are still divided into different genres to make it easier for the reader to find specific topics, but their content is still overlapping in genre. Therefore, we have the term speculative fiction which describes fiction that deals with elements that do not exist in reality.
Bibliography
- Carmody, Isobelle. 1995. A Splinter of Darkness. In Gary Crew, Dark House, 219-236.
- Lovecraft, H.P. 1973. Supernatural Horror in literature. Dover Publications Inc.
- Szal, Jeremy. “The Weight of Silence.” Pacific Monsters, edited by Margrét Helgadóttir, Fox Spirit Books, 2017, pp. 83-89.
