Abstract
While many studies have focused on Salman Rushdie’s use of magic realism in his highly-acclaimed novels, the way it is employed in his children’s fiction remains understudied. This paper, hence, attempts to fill in this gap by applying Anne Hegerfeldt’s (2005)’s theoretical framework on magic realism onto its reading of Salman Rushdie’s Haroun and the Sea of Stories (1990). This framework relies on five techniques or features namely: a realist mode of writing to describe fantastic events and characters; a marginalized focaliser; subverted scientific and historical discourses; a supernatural reality; and, finally, a literal manifestation of a figurative expression. This paper also suggests that Rushdie employs magic realism to undermine the realist narrative mode as well as scientific and historical discourses in order to present an alternative worldview that places narrative knowledge, gathered from stories with magical characters and events, as a legitimate source of knowledge regarding the world.
Highlights
Magic realist children’s fiction remains to this day one of the most understudied fields of research in children’s literature
In his seminal work The Uses of Enchantment (1976), Bruno Bettelheim applies a psychoanalytic framework onto his reading of fairy tales which, he argues, provide the child reader with harmless and acceptable ways of dealing with emotions, such as anger and jealousy
Nuurzahirah Ali and Aimillia Mohd Ramli draws upon similarities between his real life problems and the predicaments faced by fantastical characters of his readings
Summary
Magic realist children’s fiction remains to this day one of the most understudied fields of research in children’s literature. In a magic realist text, such as Haroun and the Sea of Stories, non-literary discourses, in particular those on natural science, are subverted in order to emphasise the importance of narrative knowledge as a valid mode for understanding reality This aims to demonstrate that science alone cannot provide a comprehensive explanation of the world. Challenging scientific discourse’s ability to provide its readers with a comprehensive understanding of the world, Haroun and the Sea of Stories has characters who adhere to the scientific principle but resort to “mock-scientificdiscourse” to explain their scientific achievements An example of this in the novel is the marginalised focalisers, the Guppees, who are practitioners of science but use unscientific methods to protect their stories. By turning the question into a cause of misfortune, magic realism emphasises that words can have as much impact as actions
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