The Cambridge Companion to Fantasy Literature (Cambridge Companions to Literature)

I highly recommend this book as a resource for anyone studying and writing about Fantasy. Each of the scholars writing chapters here debate, tie in, and feed from each others research in interesting ways. Each chapter is on a different subject, but the collection as a whole begins to give a broader perspective on the academic studies around fantasy and its history and development that can be read into and researched more deeply.I also recommend this book for any passionate writer of fantasy. It gives a great perspective on what the academic and critical discourse of the field has been, what it is becoming, and what it could be. Most importantly however, it populates and positions the writers of Fantasy in a unique way that makes it so familiar and yet easier to see new connections amongst them.

High-quality essays exploring the diachronic and synchronic elements of fantasy as a critical genre. Looks backward toward fantasy's origins and forward into the subgenres that have emerged from the larger umbrella of Fantasy Fiction. Only flaw, could go deeper into differences between national and ethnic appearances of fantasy fiction, including the shared commonalities as well as the divergences. Would love to see a more equitable treatment of international (non-Western) fantasy characteristics and development.

A thorough examination of fantasy literature.Outline:Part I Histories1. Fantasy from Dryden to Dunstan2. Gothic and horror fiction3. American fantasy 1820-19504. The development of children's fantasy5. Tolkien, Lewis and the explosion of genre fantasyPart II Ways of reading6. Structuralism7. Psychoanalysis8. Political readings9. Modernism and postmodernism10. Thematic criticism11. The language of the fantastic12. Reading the fantasy series13. Reading the slipstreamPart III Clusters14. Magical realism15. Writers of color16. Quest fantasies17. Urban fantasies18. Dark fantasy and paranormal romance19. Modern children's fantasy20. Historical fantasy21. Fantasies of history and religion

Bought this book for a course on speculative fiction. Having very little prior knowledge on the genre, I found this book an excellent study resource for the fantasy aspect. The critical articles are all manageable (averaging about 10 pages each) so they are easy to digest and understand. I definitely recommend the book for students new to the critical study of fantasy.

As a professor of Literature, I always assign Cambridge or Oxford Companions for my classes. Informative and an excellent survey of Fantasy Lit.

Good articles an fantasy genre and history. Very thorough! Excellent resource for student research, and good source for reading within the genre beyond LoTR and Song of Ice and Fire. Recommended.

So great to have some scholarly articles on fantasy! Yes, yes, yes!! I took a fantasy Lit class last semester, and this was a required text. So helpful

Looks like a decent book, However for $113 I expected much more. Do not. buy unless you are a major fantasy aficionado - better yet get the paperback if you can.