This thesis explores two literary genres both dealing with the relationship between the supernatural and the realistic: “The fantastic” and “magical realism”. Through an in-depth analysis of the twen-ty-one tales featured in the two works Mørkets egne and Mørke cyklister written by critically ac-claimed Danish author Charlotte Weitze, the purpose of this thesis is to uncover whether the analysis of the two works by Charlotte Weitze unfolds a conflation between the two literary genres “the fantastic” and “magical realism”, and if so, how this conflation manifests itself. Furthermore, the thesis will explore if the possible conflation of genres will give rise to considerations of new theoretical questions or literary expressions, and finally if the analysis of the thesis will express certain tendencies in the authorship of Charlotte Weitze as though what genres her works represent.
The theoretical baseline of the thesis is as follows: As the primary theory about fantastic literature the work by Tzvetan Todorov Introduction á la Littérature fantastique originally written in 1970 will be applied. The book was translated to English in 1973 and was given the title The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to Literary Genre. Complementary theory about the subject will be provided by Rosemary Jackson with the use of her work Fantasy: The Literature of Subversion from 1981. As the primary theory about magical realism a newer work, Ordinary Enchantments: Magical Realism and the Remystification of the Narrative from 2004 by Wendy B. Faris will be applied.
After the analysis of the thesis was completed the following conclusions were reached: The works by Charlotte Weitze did indeed unfold a conflation between the fantastic and magical real-ism. This conflation manifested itself through a theoretical overlap between the theories of Todorov and Faris, which some of the tales written by Weitze expressed. This overlap deals with the readers hesitation, in the sense that the reader must hesitate as to whether the happenings of a giv-en tale can be explained by the laws of the natural or the laws of the supernatural. If this hesitation is present a given tale in some cases can be applicable to both Todorovs theory of the fantastic and Faris’ theory about magical realism.
The analysis also unfolded several theoretical considerations of which the most potent one, is a conclusion that contradicts one of Todorovs points about allegorical readings. According to the writer of this thesis, if a tale contains sufficiently explicit allegorical content, the question of whether the tale fits into the theories of the fantastic, magical realism or a completely different genre, becomes of no interest. However, whether the allegorical content of the tale is sufficiently explicit is for the reader to decide. The last statement is a direct contradiction of Todorovs theory about the allegorical nature.
Finally, the analysis revealed the authorship of Charlotte Weitze to be of complex nature with a wide and divergent scale of genre manifestations.