Overview

In this, the first book on English fantasy, Colin Manlove shows that for all its immense diversity, English fantasy can best be understood in terms of its strong national character, rather than as an international genre. Showing its development from Beowulf to Blake, the author describes English fantasy's modern growth through secondary world, metaphysical, emotive, comic, subversive, and children's fantasy. In them all England has led the world, with authors as different as Chaucer, Lewis Carroll, J. R. R. Tolkien, and Salman Rushdie.

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9781532677557

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Reviews

"""Overall Manlove's thesis is persuasive and interesting. . . . The book is very readable and frequently illuminating, though at times it feels like the shortened version of a study which could easily have been twice as long. What is here, however, is fine, and will certainly send the reader scurrying to find some of the previously un-encountered books mentioned herein, be it by comparisons with old favourites, or by brief analysis of these books in their own right."" --Douglas A. Anderson, Mythprint ""An assured, if often summary, discussion of a wide range of heterogeneous texts. . . . The fact that Manlove has returned repeatedly to thinking about fantasy literature in various contexts and from different points of view in his scholarship suggests a recognition of the incompleteness of any one account or explanation. As a general guide to a large body of work, The Fantasy Literature of England seems likely to be an important resource for other scholars who are interested in exploring detailed and theoretically nuanced answers to the many questions raised by Manlove's study."" --Mavis Reimer, University of Winnipeg, The Lion and the Unicorn ""Manlove is best when analyzing figures he previously discussed at length, but this volume's concentrated overviews, especially of children's books, constitute an excellent introduction to both fantasy and his more detailed studies. Undergraduate and graduate collections."" --R.E. Jones, University of Alberta, Choice"

Overall Manlove's thesis is persuasive and interesting. . . . The book is very readable and frequently illuminating, though at times it feels like the shortened version of a study which could easily have been twice as long. What is here, however, is fine, and will certainly send the reader scurrying to find some of the previously un-encountered books mentioned herein, be it by comparisons with old favourites, or by brief analysis of these books in their own right. --Douglas A. Anderson, Mythprint An assured, if often summary, discussion of a wide range of heterogeneous texts. . . . The fact that Manlove has returned repeatedly to thinking about fantasy literature in various contexts and from different points of view in his scholarship suggests a recognition of the incompleteness of any one account or explanation. As a general guide to a large body of work, The Fantasy Literature of England seems likely to be an important resource for other scholars who are interested in exploring detailed and theoretically nuanced answers to the many questions raised by Manlove's study. --Mavis Reimer, University of Winnipeg, The Lion and the Unicorn Manlove is best when analyzing figures he previously discussed at length, but this volume's concentrated overviews, especially of children's books, constitute an excellent introduction to both fantasy and his more detailed studies. Undergraduate and graduate collections. --R.E. Jones, University of Alberta, Choice

Overall Manlove's thesis is persuasive and interesting. . . . The book is very readable and frequently illuminating, though at times it feels like the shortened version of a study which could easily have been twice as long. What is here, however, is fine, and will certainly send the reader scurrying to find some of the previously un-encountered books mentioned herein, be it by comparisons with old favourites, or by brief analysis of these books in their own right. --Douglas A. Anderson, Mythprint An assured, if often summary, discussion of a wide range of heterogeneous texts. . . . The fact that Manlove has returned repeatedly to thinking about fantasy literature in various contexts and from different points of view in his scholarship suggests a recognition of the incompleteness of any one account or explanation. As a general guide to a large body of work, The Fantasy Literature of England seems likely to be an important resource for other scholars who are interested in exploring detailed and theoretically nuanced answers to the many questions raised by Manlove's study. --Mavis Reimer, University of Winnipeg, The Lion and the Unicorn Manlove is best when analyzing figures he previously discussed at length, but this volume's concentrated overviews, especially of children's books, constitute an excellent introduction to both fantasy and his more detailed studies. Undergraduate and graduate collections. --R.E. Jones, University of Alberta, Choice

Author Information

A pioneer of criticism on fantasy literature, Colin Manlove (1942-2020) taught English and Scottish literature at the University of Edinburgh for more than twenty-six years, retiring as reader in 1993; he was awarded a DLitt in 1990. During his long and prolific career, he wrote numerous books including Modern Fantasy (1975), Christian Fantasy (1992), Scottish Fantasy Literature (1994), and The Fantasy Literature of England (1999). He also wrote books on Shakespeare, children's literature, science fiction, and George MacDonald, the most recent of which, George MacDonald's Children's Fantasies and the Divine Imagination, was published in 2019.

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