The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night Time Realism
877 Words4 Pages
Realism within literature tries to ‘represent events and social conditions as they actually are, without idealisation’ thus trying to create a truthful representation of everyday life to which the reader can relate to. With realism attempting to create a truthful image of the world it, at first glance, appears unusual to apply the conventions of realism to children’s books within the fantasy and adventure genre which by definition is ‘A product of imagination, fiction, and figment’ . However as Ursula Le Guin wrote “fantasy is true, of course. It isn’t factual, but it is true’ suggesting that although fantasy is made up it holds an element of truth which provides a gateway for realism to integrate within the genre. The use of realism allows the author to create a relatable yet removed space in which a child can question the world around him within the safe confines of the fictional world that is portrayed in the book without fear of repercussions. The element of realism within…show more content… These uses of realism can be seen in Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time and Phillip Pullman’s Northern Lights. In Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time the often lack of full detail of characters, the setting of England in the modern day, the broken plot and the everyday situations that get described bring an element of realism within the fantasy setting. In Phillip Pullman’s Northern Lights it contains more of the fantasy element however the settings remain grounded into a more realistic background. The characters contain a magical quality but hold a depth which the reader can still relate to. The plot has a liner chronology with surprises hidden throughout which is common to the fantasy