THE FANTASTIC AS A MODE

THE FANTASTIC AS A MODE
The Fantastic derives from the Latin, phantasticus, meaning that which is made visible, visionary, unreal. A fantasy is story based on and controlled by an overt violation of what is generally accepted as possibility; it is the narrative result of transforming the condition contrary to fact into “fact” itself (Irwin, p.x)
The menippea was a traditional form of fantastic art and it exhibits crucial links with carnival as well as crucial differences between its celebrations of misrule and the disorder found in less festive modern fantasies.
Modern fantasy is severed from its root in carnivalesque art: it is no longer a communal form.
Dostoevsky frequently writes of a fantastic literature as being the only appropriate medium for suggesting a sense of estrangement, of alienation from ‘natural’ origin.
Sartre claims, fantasy assumes its proper function: to transform this world. The fantastic, in becoming humanized, approaches the ideal purity of its essence, becomes what it had been. Without a context of faith in supernaturalism (whether sacred or secular), fantasy is an expression of human forces.
The ‘real’ under scrutiny
Paraxis is telling notion in relation to the place, or space, of the fantastic, for it implies an inextricable link to the man body of the ‘real’ which it shades and treathens.
The best theoretical study of fantasy as a mode defined by its ‘rationality’, i.e. by its positioning in relation to the real is Irene Bessiere le Recit fantastique: la poetique de L’incertain (1974).
Formalis theories explained that the basic trope of fantasy is the oxymoron, a figure of speech which holds together contradiction and sustains them in an impossible unity, without progressing toward synthesis. Several literary critics said that Fantasy is kind of extended narrative which establishes and develops an antifact, that is, plays the game of impossible… a fantasy story based on and controlled by an overt violation of what is generally accepted as possibility( Irwin, p.ix). Caillois also defined that fantastic is always break in the acknowledged order, an irruption of the inadmissible within the changeless everyday legality images do not examine narrative structures. Titles of many fantasies indicate this opening activity, often linking into notions of (1) invisibility, (2) impossibility, (3)transformation, (4) defiant illusion.
The fantastic requires the fulfillment of three conditions. 1. The text must oblige the reader to consider the world of the characters as a world of living persons and to hesitate between a natural and supernatural explanation of the event described. 2. The readers role is entrusted to characters…the hesitation is represented, it becomes one of themes of the work. 3. The reader must adopt a certain attitude with regard to the text: he will reject allegorical as well as poetic interpretation.
Todorov represents the different kinds of fantasy diagrammatically

Pure uncanny
Fantastic uncanny
Fantastic Marvelous
Pure marvelous

Themes of the fantastic in literature revolve around this problem of making visible the un-seen, of articulating un-said.
Themes can be clustered into several related areas: (1) invisibility, (2), transformation (3), dualism (4) good versus evil. Two groups of fantastic themes based on Todorov: those dealing with the “I” and those dealing with”not-I”.
There are two kinds of myth in fantasy: Frankenstein type of myth, source of metamorphosis or strangeness within the self and Dracula type of myth, otherness is established through a fusion of self with something out side , producing a new form, an ‘other’ reality.

References
Rosemary Jackson,1981, FANTASY: The Literature of Subversion, Metheun: London and New York

Sex and the city as chick lit Work?

A. INTRODUCTION
1. Definition of chick lit
Chick lit is a term used to denote genre fiction within women's fiction written for and marketed to young women, especially single, working women in their twenties and thirties.
Women’s Fiction: Women's fiction, also known as "Chick Lit," is sometimes considered a sub-genre of romance. It borrows some elements of romance, yet does not necessarily focus on the pursuit of one relationship or the happily ever after ending. Chick Lit tends to feature sophisticated, savvy women in their 20s and 30s, although characters can be older or younger. (Defining the Genres
By Jennifer Crispin© 2004,
Jennifer Crisp in
http://fmwriters.com/Visionback/Issue19/themedefine.htm )

The characters might bounce from man to man in search of the perfect relationship, or they might focus more on their friends and jobs. They are generally looking for a perfect something, whether it’s a perfect man, a perfect figure, a perfect job, or a perfect pair of shoes.

2. Sex and the City
a. Novel
Sex and the City by Candace Bushnell (Grand Central Publishing, 1997)
Have there ever been four more memorable female friends? Sometimes people forget that Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, and Charlotte started as characters in a book. The novel sex and the city picture the brand minded glamour and also sexual relationship. It tells about the Bachelor and Spinsters and their life style.

b. Movie
Sex and the City took place in Manhattan in 2008. It is a spin off from the television show that ran for six seasons. At the very beginning of the movie, Carrie, the main character, starts out expressing that the only reason young women move to New York City is to shop for the labels and to fall in love. This foreshadows the entire film because it is about the designer clothing the characters wear and the different relationship problems each character has. After the series end, four years past, and the characters lives have all changed. Carrie Bradshaw, the main character, is dating her on and off again boyfriend Jonathan Big. They buy an apartment together and get engaged. The story consists of their up-and-down relationship. He gets cold feet the day of the wedding and her three best friends, Charlotte York, Miranda Hobbes, and Samantha Jones, all go with her to Mexico, on the trip that was intended to be her and “Mr. Big’s” honeymoon. The rest of the movie shows how she deals with the pain of heartbreak and how her friends are there to help her

c. TV Series
The TV series differ from the movie and the novel. The novel gives imagination through the strong word. The movie is designed to be watch in the shorter time than the TV series. And TV series is picturing slower than the movie. The plot is designed to be enjoyed in different style. Sex and the City is an American cable television series. The original run of the show was broadcast on HBO from 1998 until 2004, for a total of six seasons. ( www.answer.com )


B. DISCUSSION
Chick lit at actually derived from Chick American slang term for young woman and lit is short for literature. The phrase chick lit is analogous to the term chick flick. The definition of chick lit varies widely and tinged with shades of backlash. Carole Desanti, the United States editor for Helen Fielding (Bridget Jones Diary) and Melissa Banks (The girls’ Guide to Hunting and fishing) notes:

Initially women writers were trying to find a way to write about their lived experience that was vibrant and authentic and creative and artful. Now there is a range definitions for chick lit, but the one we seem to be settling in with is the one that trivialize and dismisses it (Danford, N. 2003, “is chick lit still chick?”, publisher weekly, vol.250, no.42. pp.5-20)

Ferris and Young state that to list potentially compelling themes in chick lit: identity, sexuality, friendship as family, and balancing work and relationship.
The term chick lit has versus namely lad lit or Dick lit means literature written by men, with the main character being male. It is classified under the chick lit because the tone is very similar to chick lit’s tone. The men in these books are often going through dating, work scenarios, love, family issues and more. Another term is "Mommy Lit" namely a spin off from Chick Lit the new genre of chick lit. As the name suggests, Mommy Lit focuses on women dealing with new motherhood. Chick Lit and Mommy Lit tend to be humorous and irreverent. They often focus on ordinary details of women’s lives in a way that other woman-focused genres might not. These are not yet official genres, but there are certain publishing houses that have imprints specifically for publishing Chick Lit and Mommy Lit.

The Kinds of Chick lit
There are two kinds of chick lit:
There's the straight-up kind, offered with no pretense or apology, identifiable by the high-heeled shoe, martini glass or gown on its cover, and then there's lit chick lit, which attempts to straddle the conventions of chick lit and the ambitions of literary fiction.
To put it another way, lit chick lit dresses the bones of chick lit in a less conventional dress than the polka-dotted gown pictured on the cover of Katie Crouch's first novel, "Girls in Trucks."

The Formula of Chick lit
Is there a Chick Lit formula, or certain “must haves”?
I think some of the earlier books in the Chick Lit genre could have been called formulaic, but now the genre has evolved and broadened to encompass a wide range of complex issues. I think the problem with Chick Lit - if it has one - is that because all the books tend to be packaged and marketed in the same sort of way, it’s very hard to tell the quality of the contents from the covers. It all tends to look the same, but in the genre there is everything from young women struggling with career and boyfriend problems to more mature women coping with complex relationship and lifestyle issues. ‘Must haves’ for me include a strong, feisty heroine who solves her own problems while keeping a dozen balls in the air - normal, everyday stuff! It helps if there’s a drop-dead gorgeous hero somewhere in there too… : )

There's some variation in the chick lit world, of course, but the formula is as follows: Girl is guy-less; girl is miserable because she's guy-less; girl meets a seemingly unattainable guy (let's call him Prince Charming) whom the reader realizes is wonderful, but whom our heroine thinks is a prideful jerk; girl meets a second guy (let's call him Cad) whom she thinks is wonderful, but whom the reader realizes is a prideful jerk; girl gets romantically involved with Cad; Cad kicks girl to the curb; girl is rescued by Prince Charming. They live happily ever after.

Chick Lit Characters
Every stereotypical chick lit protagonist needs a supportive best friend. After all, "female friendship" is supposed to one of the themes in chick lit-- and in good chick lit, the author introduces interesting female friends. However, in stereotypical chick lit, there's no need to create a BFF who's any different from anyone else's. To be truly stereotypical, the supportive best friend must do all of the following:
Love shoe shopping with the protagonist.
Love eating ice cream with the protagonist. (Cosmos are optional.)
Console the protagonist about breakups.
Console the protagonist about her overbearing mother
Offer the protagonist wise advice about dating, including the fact that she really ought to be dating that nice guy in the office she keeps ignoring
The Overbearing Mother
The Guy She Ought to Fall in Love With

Why Sex and the city regarded as chick lit?
Chick Lit is huge right now — one of the fastest -growing genres in publishing today. Why are women crying out for these stories now, more than ever before? What are some of the current market trends?
Actually, Chick Lit is melding back into women’s fiction right now. Women are the largest portion of readers in the market, and they’re constant consumers. Right now, women are looking for more serious subjects, veering away from the traditional Chick Lit motifs like Sex In The City

How popular is sex and the city
Sex and the city is the third top ten chick lit in Penny Zang
Apr 19, 2008
Sex and the City by Candace Bushnell
(Grand Central Publishing, 1997)
Have there ever been four more memorable female friends? Sometimes people forget that Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, and Charlotte started as characters in a book. You can thank Bushnell for all the future books about shopaholics with witty friends who also live in the city.
ISBN-13: 978-0446673549
(Http: \chik lit\Top Ten Chick Lit Novels A Beginner’s Guide to the Sub-genre of Women’s Fiction and Romance.mht)

Sex and the City is a collection of essays by Candace Bushnell based on her and her friends' lifestyles.[citation needed] It was first published in 1997, and re-published in 2001, 2006, and in 2008 as 10th anniversary movie tie-in edition.
( www. Wikipedia.org )

Sex and the city sold out

SUNDAY 9:00 a.m. (Pacific): Warner Bros. has told me this morning that Sex and the City scored an estimated $17.7 million on Saturday, and they are calling for $55.7 million for opening weekend
Kristin Davis' 'Sex and the City' Date Sold for 52,100 U.S. Dollar
March 26, 2008 03:47:38 GMT

A date with Kristin Davis to the "Sex and the City" movie premiere in New York City in May 2008 has been sold for a staggering $US52,100.

Sex and the City: The Movie was released nationwide May 30, 2008 and, as of December 24, 2008, has made $413,129,126 worldwide.
The Sex and the City: The Movie DVD was released on September 23, 2008.
(www.answer.com)

Box office performance
The film has experienced commercial success. Opening in 3,285 theaters, the film made $26.93 million in the US and Canada on its first day. The three-day opening weekend total was $57,038,404, aggregating $17,363 per theater. The film recorded the biggest opening ever for an R-rated comedy and for a romantic comedy,[19] and also for a film starring a woman.[20] As of October, 2008, the film has grossed $152,619,616 at the US and Canadian box office, and $256,274,667 in other markets, bringing the worldwide total gross revenue to $408,921,925. (www.answer.com)

The List of sex and the city episodes
Main article: List of Sex and the City episodes
Season Ep # First Airdate Last Airdate
Season 1
12 June 6, 1998 August 23, 1998
Season 2
18 June 6, 1999 October 3, 1999
Season 3
18 June 4, 2000 October 15, 2000
Season 4
18 June 3, 2001 February 10, 2002
Season 5
8 July 21, 2002 September 8, 2002
Season 6
20 June 22, 2003 February 22, 2004

What makes sex and the city interesting?
There are some comment from the readers about sex and the city. These comment show that sex and the city is popular chick lit.

" Fascinating... hilarious... Welcome to the cruel planet that is Manhattan. " — Los Angeles Times

" Sly... Sharp... Sex and the City succeeds. " — People

A woman has many things to worry about, being too successful, too beautiful, too smart, too rich, too accomplished...some guys may find the stupid, 20th C girls charming, but in the book, we can find four smart, beautiful, interesting, successful and confident women showing their life to us--a life about men, sex, and the city. --- lolita260 from Canton,China

“It has the ring of truth….. Sump up the fascinate Manhattan mind-set with considerable fair” – Jonathan Yardley, Washington post book world
“ A breath of fresh air… a forceful display of the merits of the journalistic approach to sexual relations … a realism that rivals Tom Wolfe’s Bonfire of the Vanities” __ Wall street Journal
“ Fun Bushnell is a skilled eaves dropper and a bright stylist revealing to us the soft underbelly of high society” ___ Newsday

“ Fascinating and hunting… an oddly touching collection.”___ Kirkus

Addictive….. a collection of witty, socially relevant vignetess” __ Elle

“ irrestible, hilarious, and horrific, stylishly written.”__ Bret Easton Ellis

“ Hilarious…. Entertaining…. Bushnell is a deft writer, possessing a sly sense of humor and sharp insight into human behavior” ____ People

C. CONCLUSION
Sex and the city is one of the popular chick lit. It sold out not only in America but also in Indonesia as well.
Its popularity makes the producer made into movie and also TV series as well.
In short chick lit can be a starting point for discussion of why women’s writing matters, the evolution of women writing, and the importance of women perspective in fiction.

THE FORMULA OF CLASSICAL DETECTIVE STORY

THE MYTHOLOGY OF CRIME AND ITS FORMULAIC EMBODIMENT
In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries crime was still primarily a religious and moral matter. An offense against the law was or God and given harsh and terrible punishment. Crime represented the considerable sympathy and complex attention to motive and social context. During the nineteenth century moral feeling about crime might be called an aesthetic approach to subject.
Two Major formulaic pattern in the literature of crime of 1920s and 1930s – gangster tragedy and had boiled detective tale-embodied significant shifts in both archetype and cultural mythology. These new formulas made protagonist out of lower-class figures characterized by crudeness, aggressive violence, and alienation from the respectable morality of society.
THE FORMULA OF CLASSICAL DETECTIVE STORY
The first archetypal form of detective story is pure mystery. Since world war II other formulas that include some element of mystery archetype, but are also stories of adventure or melodrama- the hard boiled detective story, the spy story, the police procedural tale, the gangster saga, and the Enforces caper- have become increasingly popular.
Pattern of The formula
The formula of classical detective story can be described as conventional way of defining and developing particular kinds of situations, actions, characters and relation between them, and type of setting.
Detective story writers largely based their work on Poe’s inventions.
1. Situation. The classical detective story begins with an unsolved crime and move towards the elucidation of its mystery. Two major type of crime on which much of detective literature bases itself: Murder, frequently with sexual or grotesque over tones and Crime associated with political intrigue.
2. Pattern of action. The detective story formula centers upon the detective’s investigation and solution of the crime. Exemplify six main phases of this pattern (a) introduction of the detective; (b) crime and clues; (c) investigation; (d) announcement and the solution; (e) explanation of the solution; (g) denouement.
3. Characters and relationship. The classical detective story required four main roles: (a) the victim; (b) the criminal; (c) the detective; (d) those threatened by the crime but incapable of solving it.
4. Setting. In devising the setting Poe set the pattern for the classical detective story take place in isolated settings clearly marked off from the rest of the world. The combination of the isolated place and the bustling world outside is repeated in classical detective story. The setting performs many functions: it furnishes a limited and controlled backdrop against which the clues and suspects so central to the story can be silhouetted. It also fosters that special kind of suspends. It symbolic representation relation between surface rationality and hidden depth of guilt.
Cultural background of the formula
Haycraft’s theory as detective story as an affirmation of democratic ideal of legal process does offer a relation to a specific historical period. The mythology crime that is embodied is general characteristic is the transformation of crime into a game or puzzle, the aestheticizing of crime. The special emphasizes in the classical detective formula on domestic crimes as opposed to political or social crimes.
THE ART OF THE CLASSICAL DETECTIVE STORY
Christy and Sayers exemplify two possibilities for art within the formula of the classical detective story: (1) combines a pure ingenuity of ratiocination and mystification with other narrative interests completely subordinated to their rule in structure. (2) Uses classical formula pattern to body forth a variety of other narrative interest, in this case a vision of justice and society embedded in an allegory of the mystery of divine providence.
The golden age of detection is the past. The most important influence of the classical detective story since World War II has been on the new “post modern novel”
THE HARD BOILED DETECTIVE STORY
One of the most important aspects of hard –boiled formula is the special role of the modern city as background. The pattern formula: solution to the detective quest for the discovery and accomplishment of justice, and intimidation and temptation hero passing across a series of potential suspects. It set out to investigate crime but he must go the solution to personal choice or action. Usually the end of the story is a confrontation between detective and criminal.
References;
Cawelti: Adventure, Mystery, and romance: Formula stories as art and popular culture

Setting and characters the three Musketeers

Setting the three Musketeers

 17th century France, the long journey to England, and some heavy-duty Gothic backdrops

 For the most part, the micro-settings of The Three Musketeers are in various apartments around Paris or inns in the countryside of France.

 In the Harbor, ship. The Tuesday midnight to sent the letter.

 In the kingdom of France.

.
Characters and characterization the three Musketeers
 D'Artagnan
• The main character of the novel, d’Artagnan was raised in the French province of Gascony, an area known for its courageous and brave men.
• He is brave, noble, ambitious, crafty, intelligent, honesty and integrity and also friendly to the three Musketeer.
• His loyalty to both the king and the cardinal, and his expert swordsmanship. By the end of the novel, d’Artagnan’s dream of becoming a member of the King’s Musketeers is fulfilled, and he is given a commission in the company.
 Planchet
• PLanchet is d’Artagnan’s servant.
• He is ultimately the sharpest of the servants.
• Planchet is prudent, but still exhibits moments of great courage and ingenuity.
 Athos
• The most important in the three Musketeers.
• Athos is wise man and become a father figure to d'Artagnan.
• He is --intellect, appearance, bravery, swordsmanship--yet he is tortured by a deep melancholy, the source of which no one knows.

 Grimaud
• Grimaud is Athos’s servant. His master is mannerly and rather reticent.
• He is A dignified silence passes between them, and thus Grimaud upholds the quiet nobility of his master.

 Aramis
• He passes his time as a musketeer.
• Aramis will enter the priesthood. Being brought up in a monastery it was expect of him to become a Priest.
• A young Musketeer, one of the great Three.
• Aramis is a handsome young man, quiet and somewhat foppish. He constantly protests.
• Aramis has a mysterious mistress, Madame de Chevreuse, a high noblewoman, whose existence and identity he tries to keep from his friends.

 Bazin
• Bazin is Aramis’s servant. He has religious life and faithfull.
• His utmost desire is to be the servant of a high church official.

 Porthos
• The most secular of the three musketeers.
• Porthos is extremely proud of his worldly good looks and his fine physique.
• He enjoys good food and comfortable surroundings.
• Porthos, the third of the Three Musketeers, is loud, brash, and self-important.

 Mousqueton
• Mousqueton is Porthos’s servant.
• Like his master, Mousqueton is knowledgeable about secular things.
• Enjoy his finer things

 Monsieur de Treville
• de Treville is the captain of the King’s Musketeers and an old friend of d’Artagnan’s fa.
• He also acts as d’Artagnan’s special advisor.
• Monsieur de Treville is an honorable and distinguished gentleman, and close friend to the King.
• Fatherish. He treats all his Musketeers as his sons

 Monsieur Bonacieux
• He is d’Artagnan’s immoral landlord.
• Irresponsible man and devil
• He assists in the kidnapping of his own wife.

 Constance Bonacieux
• She is Bonacieux's wife who is more than thirty years younger than her husband.
• She loves d’Artagnan and he loves her too
• she has become the queen’s linen maid,
• She is very loyal to the queen.
 Lady de Winter.
• "Milady"She represents the essence of evil in the novel.
• She is d’Artagnan’s main adversary and is bent on revenge.
• At first, d’Artagnan is deeply attracted to her physical beauty and charm even after discovering her plot to kill him.
• She acts as the cardinal’s personal spy and is responsible for the deaths of
(1) a young priest;
(2) the duke of Buckingham;
(3) de Winter’s assistant, John Felton;
(4) Constance Bonacieux; and
(5) she is probably responsible for her husband, de Winter’s, death.
• In all truth, she is responsible for the deaths of countless insignificant people who got in the way of her conspiracies.
• Milady is finally tracked down by d’Artagnan. the three musketeers, and her brother-in-law, where she is tried and beheaded for her terrible crimes.

 Lord de WinterLady de Winter’s brother-in-law.
• He suspects that Milady killed his brother in order to inherit vast family properties.

 King Louis XIII The king of France.
• He is not a very strong or effective king. Dependent and weak character in taking decision.
• Dominated by his advisor
• He despises Cardinal Richelieu but is nevertheless dependant on this powerful man.

 Queen Anne, or Anne of AustriaThe
• Queen is romantically involved with the duke of Buckingham
• She is a powerful politician in England.
• Anne is faithful and loyal to her husband, the weak and incapable king of France.

 Cardinal Richelieu.
• He is the antagonist of the novel.
• The Cardinal was one of the most powerful diplomats of his time.
• He is controlling both individual people and nations with his clever schemes.
• Cardinal is presented as the adversary to the queen. Richelieu has spies throughout the country, constantly monitoring the activities of the musketeers even though he clearly respects their bravery and courage.
• The Cardinal espessially respects d’Artagnan, to whom he makes a lieutenant.
• He is furiously self-absorbed, but also an extremely effective leader of the state
• Richelieu works hard to maintain the reputation and power of the king, since this is the stock on which his own status is based.
 George Villiers, duke of Buckingham
• Buckingham is the perfect English gentleman, handsome, witty, brave, wealthy, and powerful.
• Next to the King of England The Duke is much like the cardinal, he controls England like the Cardinal controls France.
• These two men once strived for the love of Queen Anne, but ever since the duke won, the two have been enemies—in terms of politics and love.
• Buckingham is reputed to be the most handsome, powerful, wealthy, and influencial man in Europe.
• He is a Favorite and Minister of War for King Charles I of England.

 John Felton.
• Felton is a protestant and crazed puritan whom Milady is able to manipulate for her own good.
• Felton is Milady’s instrument whereby she can bring about the duke’s death.
• A British naval officer

 Count de Rochefort, “The Man from Meung”
• Count de Rochefort is a personal representative of the cardinal
• He is also d’Artagnan’s nemesis.
• He is the man who steals d’Artagnan’s introduction to Treville while d’Artagnan is on his way to Paris, also Rochefort appears many times in unnexpected settings.
• Rochefort is the man who was twice ordered to capture Constance Bonacieux, also he is the man who tries to arrest d’Artagnan for the cardinal, who later orders the two men to become friend