A Short History of Fantasy By:"Farah Mendlesohn","Edward James" Published on 2009-01-01 by Libri Publishing Category:"Literary Criticism" Length: 285 ISBN: 9781904750680, 1904750680 User Review Some of the earliest books written 'The Epic of Gilgamesh, and the Odyssey' are fantasy, dealing with monsters, marvels, extraordinary voyages and magic. Fantasy remained an essential part of European literature until the rise of the modern realist novel. But even then fantasy remained popular, in the guise of Gothic horror, the ghost story, the fairytale and stories of imaginary worlds: it was in part a reaction to the Enlightenment, to realism and to industrialisation. This book traces the history of fantasy from the earliest years through to the origins of modern fantasy in the twentieth century. From the 1950s (when Tolkien published The Lord of the Rings and Lewis published the Narnia books) the story is dealt with decade by decade. In the 1980s, fantas