Fastitocalon 2.1&2: The European Tradition of the Fantastic

Thomas Honegger, Fanfan Chen (Eds.)

Fastitocalon - Studies in Fantasticism Ancient to Modern. Vol. 2, Iss. 1 & 2: The European Tradition of the Fantastic

ISBN 978-3-86821-360-7, 136 S., kt., € 20,00 (2011)

The Fantastic is a human universal and no single culture can lay a monopolistic claim to its variegated forms and contents. The cultural representations of the Fantastic, however, tend to differ and even the central question of what constitutes ‘the Fantastic’ varies from culture to culture. Europe, with the Gothic novel and epic fantasy in England, the fairy- and folk-tales of Germany, and the tales of the realistic fantastic in France, is often considered the cradle of modern fantastic literature. Authors and artists in the European tradition of the Fantastic frequently explore the myths, history, and landscape next to the religious, cultural and literary traditions of their native lands for their works, or they exploit the cultural stereotypes for artistic effect. The European traditions have, of course, spread, inspired and mixed with other versions of the fantastic and thus contributed to the rise of an intercultural dialogue. The contributions to the second volume of Fastitocalon explore some of these issues in depth.

Contributors are: Roger Bozzetto (Perspectives on the Standard French Theory of the Fantastic ), Denis Mellier (From the Double to the Third: Poetics and Politics of the Fantastic. Towards the Commonness of the Fantastic), Michael Hemsley (Some Sort of Plank, Some Sort of Tapestry: The Arthurian Poetry and Painting of David Jones), Marie-Noëlle Biemer (William Morris: Primus Inter Fantastes?), Marcin Rusnak (Playing with Death. Humorous Treatment of Death-related Issues in Terry Pratchett’s and Neil Gaiman’s Young Adult Fiction), Dimitra Fimi (Between Greece and Northwestern Europe: The Fairy Tales of Penelope Delta), Antje vom Lehn (Harry Potter, Spiderwick and the Tradition of the Bestiary), and Kuniko Uemura (The Robot Fantasy – The Case of Osamu Tezuka).