nonrealism

One would think, however, that the work of writers like Beckett, Heller, Pynchon, and Sorrentino (among writers not classified as "genre" writers) would have demonstrated that "nonrealism" (I suppose that at this late date "romance" would sound too antique) is just as serious, just as "literary," as realism, psychological and otherwise.

Realism in Fiction 2008

In his Encyclopedia of Fantasy, John Clute suggests that one way to distinguish fantasy from Modernist varieties of nonrealism is the attitude toward story embodied in the text:One of the most useful distinctions between the fantastic as a whole and fantasy, considered as one of the literatures of the fantastic, is that fantasy texts are most easily understood as the telling of Story in this sense; other categories of the fantastic--some, like surrealism, of Modernist lineage--may well treat the telling of narrative as an act that warrants corrosive disparagement, deconstruction or dismantlement.

Archive 2010-01-10 2010

In his Encyclopedia of Fantasy, John Clute suggests that one way to distinguish fantasy from Modernist varieties of nonrealism is the attitude toward story embodied in the text:One of the most useful distinctions between the fantastic as a whole and fantasy, considered as one of the literatures of the fantastic, is that fantasy texts are most easily understood as the telling of Story in this sense; other categories of the fantastic--some, like surrealism, of Modernist lineage--may well treat the telling of narrative as an act that warrants corrosive disparagement, deconstruction or dismantlement.

FINAL CRISIS, Pt. 1: The Modernist Background 2010