The Importance Of Fantasy

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Fantasy is one of the most popular literary genres. Chadbourn (2008) believes it is because fantasy fulfills people’s desire to read for fun and to escape from reality. Unlike science fiction that tends to be more technological and consists of full of big ideas, fantasy fiction is pretty easy to read (Nicole, 2015). Since it sets in a fictional universe full of mystical creatures, fantasy stories give the readers new experiences that are unfeasible in the real world. Through its fantastic elements, fantasy offers a chance to break out from the rational world we get. One of the fantastic elements that commonly appear in the fantasy genre is the presence of magic.
According to Bailey (2006), magic can be defined as the use of extraordinary power
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It then becomes a turning point for them to go on a magical adventure to complete a mission. Basically, the characters in the fantasy genre always interconnected with magical events in order to pursue their goals (Nikolajeva, 2002). They start their journey with the help of magic, fight with magic, and, in the end, accomplish their ‘happy ending’ with the aids of magic as well. The presence of magic in both novels helps to construct the story by creating some challenges for the characters. As they get along with magic throughout the story, consequently, it will affect the characters’ traits. Over the course of the story, their characters may gradually develop as the result of the magical events they confront along the journey (Sefton, …show more content…
For example, a study by Watts (2006) analyzed how magic constructed the logic of the novel Harry Potter. She applied Nikolajeva’s (1988) magic law as its framework to discuss her research question. This study found that the logic of the novel Harry Potter was constructed by making limitations on the magic; there is not only the rule for the magic, in which the way magic is possible to use but also the law for magic, the limitation on how the magic allowed to be used. Another study that employed magic laws approach was conducted by Amelis (2013). She used Riordan’s Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief as her object of the study and combined Nikolajeva’s (1988) magic laws and Tolkien’s (1966) function of fantasy as her frameworks of analysis. This study revealed the magical features in the novel portray certain magic laws and functions of fantasy which helped to construct the story to be more interesting, believable, and related to human life. There was also a study conducted by an Indonesian student, Hamzah (2008). Her study was carried out to investigate the function of fantasy world for the major characters and how it affected the development of major character. She used functions of fantasy by Tolkien (1966) to analyze her study. She disclosed that the fantasy world served as a place for the major characters to escape and found their true