A Symbolic Study of Magical Realism and the Fantastic in “The Tree House”, “The Stone Wings”, “The Black Box”, and “The Great Mirage of Alta”

Document Type : Original Article

Author
Kosar Taherifard
Razi University, English Department, Kemanshah, Iran
10.22034/quipls.2025.2064093.1010
Abstract
The research on magical realism and its symbolic representation in literary works has been a subject of critical investigation for decades since its popular emergence in Latin American literature, and its principles have been explored by theoreticians such as Amaryll Chanady. This research aims to examine how the author has adopted the elements of magical realism and the fantastic in four of her short stories, applying Chanady’s theory of the “Unresolved versus Resolved Antinomy” between the natural world and the supernatural, plus "Authorial Reticence". Using Chanady's concepts, this paper performs a textual analysis of key symbols in these works, concluding that the author has integrated fantastic and realism as a narrative technique to express deeper concepts and depict how the line between the real and the unreal is blurred. This reading not only confirms how magical realism and the fantastic in postmodern stories have uncovered a solution to perceive reality as we know it, but also provides a framework for future researchers who aim to navigate this issue in other works.

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