Well, I’ve read through all of the posts in this thread and through quite a lot of the linked articles, and while one would think that would make things clear enough, I’m still left with some nagging questions.
To be clear this isn’t an attempt to change existing MR definitions to a more agreeable liking, nor is it some sort of devil’s advocate attempt to stir things up.
Instead, it’s an attempt to provide a bit more clarification to the less literarily minded (myself included) who see their work as (possibly) interstitial, but lacking a clear label to employ, choose MR as the closest fit.
You can’t exactly list a work as “interstitial” in a query letter.
Put another way, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, but looks like a cat, then calling it a duck could be perilous …
I’m hoping that some of the more ardent and knowledgeable of the posters thus far will give their opinions here, as I think it would be very helpful
Story Setting
While it seems that MR is almost universally set in our own, current world, I have seen a few more recent works also being given that label. (works by Gaiman, Mievillee, etc.); works that take place elsewhere (but not else-when)
So, if a story takes place in a secondary world that is not a temporal and/or technological analog to our own, is it immediately disqualified from being MR? Additionally, would the occurrence of an apocalyptic event that has never occurred on Earth likewise be a disqualifier?
As a corollary I guess, does MR require the actual existence of current political and cultural events in the setting in order to comment upon them?
Genre Soup
For the sake of illustration, I’m more or less using the genre categories from the glossary of the 2013 Novel & Short Stories Writer’s market.
Can a work be considered Fantasy if it has no actual “magic” in it? MR seems to rely instead on what I will call “psionics” (telepathy, telekinesis, et al) and the appearance of ghosts and other non-corporeal beings.
That would seem to bend the “genre” toward Paranormal, but since in the writer’s world that word is almost inextricably linked to the word Romance, that seems a poor fit. I don’t think any work of MR would be classified as Paranormal Romance, nor would most fantasy works. It is a specific sub-genre of its own.
The next available word, and one that I see used in MR definitions is “supernatural”, but that seems to conjure an association to Supernatural Horror, and while sometimes quite horrific things occur in MR, it would not be classified as such, nor would most fantasy works, despite occasionally horrific imagery and the inclusion of dead things in both types of stories.
And that brings us to Dark Fantasy. But if what might appear to be ghosts and zombies and vampires really aren’t any of these things, then what genre would be left to describe such works? Likewise, the “spirits” that tend to appear in MR aren’t exactly what we could call the undead, as their presence and means of their existence are usually not explained in those terms.
I think the above may be one of the reasons why authors are increasingly using the MR label to try and define their works. Lacking a clear genre place to land, and especially if their works include any of the other precepts of MR, and more especially if intentionally so, then the application of the MR label may be all that they have left, “valid” or not.
Agent and Reader Expectations
Clearly, both from the posts above and the discussions linked, the definition of MR is a bit in flux. You have of course the traditional and original works of MR and their adherents. But there also seems to be an increasing recognition of other works, some of which were never marketed as MR, but are being labeled as such after the fact.
Additionally, you have some (many) agents that while they ostensibly represent fantasy authors, have also begun showing (and announcing) an interest in works that are magical realism. But do they truly know what they are asking for?
That isn’t meant in a disparaging way at all. Confusion seems rife on all sides, and while what an agent (or a reader) might consider to be MR may not track exactly with what the traditionalists say it is, they are looking for something.
To paraphrase the Congressional porn hearings, I may not know exactly how to describe magical realism, but I know it when I see it.
((I think any (anonymous or not) agent insight on this would be wonderful.))
So in closing, I guess where I’ve gotten to is the idea, or more correctly the question, is there such a thing as “New Magical Realism”? And if so, can we construct a definition for it?
Or, are genre authors trying to tap into a more literary label for their works (especially if these works don’t fit neatly within established genre labels) and/or are they simply trying to write toward a new thing that agents are asking for?
But please, don’t limit your answers to simple yeses and noes for those two closing questions. I just needed a summation.