Magical Realism

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The use of Magical Realism in Caribbean Literature
The literacy device of magical realism is often employed in Afro Caribbean literature. Magical realism is an artistic or literacy genre whereby naturalistic techniques and realistic narratives are combined with bizarre elements of fantasy or dream to create the literature core pillars of the Afro Caribbean literature. Sometimes, these narratives are backed up with particular references to the place that the magic happened. Magical realism includes enthralling elements into common stories. Magical elements have traditionally played a role in African literature and African Diaspora literature, this includes the Caribbean. A quick web-search will disclose countless books, academic papers, and articles which talk about this aspect of magical realism being applied in Caribbean literature. Brown girl in the ring, a traditional dance song in the Indies is one perfect example of this aspect of magical realism.
The history of African literature suggests that magical realism was a prevalent method in African literature. Storytelling, which was the main form of passing across literature was full of magical realism. One of the reasons as to why this method was so prevalent was because, in the African societies, magic was a common practice that many believed in and had faith in their supernatural power. Therefore, incorporating it in literature only seemed obvious. Caribbean’s were African slaves who had been imported to America during the slave trade.

When these slaves were imported, they came together, combined their different cultures and came up with one unique blended African American culture, in so doing, very many factors were influenced, including literature. The Caribbean carried so much from their African culture to their new Caribbean way of life.
As much as magical realism was in practice for a long time in many literacy cultures, the label first came out publicly as a genre in literature in the year 1925 in the works of a German named Franz Roh. In his works, Roh applied the German term magischer realism which means magical realism to post-expressionist paintings. These paintings also combined realism with some emphasis on expressing and analyzing the miracle of existence. Roh, in using the term for the first time in an essay which talked about Karl Haider’s paintings explained magical realism as an aesthetic category of art, as a way of representing the unique enigmas of reality in the form of a picture. From this ideology, it was realized that magical realism could not be presented on pictures and art alone but also in literature. In fact, it was also realized that Caribbean literature was full of this genre or art and had been practicing it for years.
According to Booker, Magical realism is a technique that acts by introducing unrealistic elements or incredible events factually, into an obviously realistic piece of narrative (70). This method depends so much on the reader’s acceptance of the idea that there is an irrational and illogical dimension to everyday life. This method of literature is of course not prevalent only in the Caribbean, but also in the rest of the world, in European fair stories, African folktales and other forms of narratives throughout the world. Since it is a literacy model, magical realism is characterized by two contradictory perspective rather than a distinguishable genre. One perspective is based on a rational view of certainty, and the other as the acknowledgment of supernatural things. Both of these two perspectives are well represented in Caribbean literature.
In Caribbean literature, magical realism differs greatly from pure fantasy. This is due to the reason that it is primarily set in the modern and normal world with authentic imagery of human beings and the society in general. It targets at seizing the absurdity of the union of opposites, for example, it acts to challenge on oppositions such as life and death, or the pre-colonial times against the post-colonial present times. In the Caribbean, magical realism, therefore, involves the infusion of the actual, fantastic and real. This can in other terms be defined as an amalgamation of fantasy and realism.
The availability of the supernatural in the way the Caribbean use the magical realism in most cases is usually in connection to the magical or primeval native mentality which is in opposition to the European rationality that exists. Some critics also claim that magical realism is in a way a combination and expression of the real world reality, which most often than not combines the rather rational aspects of the great European civilization and the slightly absurd elements of undeveloped Africa and America.
Brown girl in the ring, a novel written by a Jamaican-Canadian writer named Nalo Hopkinson, is a novel that presents all the aspects of magical realism. The story represents the afro-Caribbean culture in its full view, majoring not only in magic realism but also folklore. The novel combines the genre of magical realism with feminism. As much as it is hard to combine these two very diverse manifestations in literature, both of the two aspects are represented. Magical realism is, however, more prevalent than any other theme or genre. In the plot, the post-apocalyptic story seems very enticing to read (45). This is because the reality of the world has been combined with absurd and bizarre concepts, which have been merged so well to complete the whole picture of a messed up world. The storyline is very realistic and applicable in the real world. However, with magical realism taking a course, the storyline becomes more and more inapplicable in the real world. The genre of magical realism, however, as much as it makes the storyline lose inapplicability in the real world also acts to make the story quite interesting. It gives the reader the urge and zeal to continue reading. As the story approaches the climax, the tone slowly changes into horrific, with more application of magical realism (Sandín, 76). Brown girl in the ring draws the elements of the Afro Caribbean religion named Orisha to intertwine a suspenseful plot which like the novel is aimed at, evokes and pits three people against a devil, as represented by the three women against a man.
This book is not the only Caribbean literacy work that has the concepts of magical realism. There are many more works of literature associated to the Caribbean which can also boast of this aspect. One of the importance of magical realism is that it makes a story more interesting and more thrilling to the reader. People love to read thriller works since they keep the eyes glued to the pages, eagerly waiting for the next scene and how the events occur. When an interesting story uses this aspect, it gets a lot of publicity from the public.
After the German writer; Franz Roh introduced the aspect of magical realism in literature, very many writers in the Caribbean and the world at large started applying this concept in their literature. However, this is not to mean that this method was not in existence before Roh introduced it to the public. In fact, even before he mentioned it, there were many literacy works which had already applied it in their literature. This method has proved to be one of the most researched on methods of literature (Delaney, 43). This is because it has opened the Caribbean literature to the entire world. This is so interesting because generally, Caribbean literature is a blend of African literature and American literature, as it is a work of former Africans brought to America as slaves (30).
In conclusion, it is right to argue that literature is a representation of the true world. Through literature, we can learn about the cultures and the beliefs of the people. In this essence, magical realism is very important especially as a literature tool in the world today. This is because it exposes the cultural beliefs of the people involved. The Caribbean is an interesting place, for the reason that its culture is a blend of American and African concepts. Its literature is therefore very rich in terms of exposing its cultural aspects. This is one of the reasons why magical realism fits so well in its culture. In the book brown girl in the ring, these concepts are very well represented. The novel is arguably one of the best works of literature in the Caribbean, and more so regarding applying the theme of magical realism.
Works cited
Booker, M. Keith, ed. Literature and Politics Today: The Political Nature of Modern Fiction, Poetry, and Drama: The Political Nature of Modern Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. ABC-CLIO, 2015. 63-86
Delaney, Trynne. “Wounding Structures of Canadian Multiculturalism: Nalo Hopkinson’s Brown Girl in the Ring and CanLit.” 2018. 20-64
Sandín, L. Killing Spanish: Literary Essays on Ambivalent US Latino an Identity. Springer, 2016. 37-119