How Was The Term Magical Realism First Used?

The term magical realism was first used by art critic Franz Roh in 1925 to describe a style of painting that incorporated elements of both fantasy and reality. He used the term to describe paintings by artists like Paul Klee and Wassily Kandinsky, who incorporated non-representational elements into their work. Magical realism became popular in the 1970s as a literary genre, characterized by the use of magical or supernatural elements in realistic settings. Many magical realism novels are set in Latin America and often deal with the themes of poverty, violence, and political oppression. One of the most famous magical realism novels is Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude, which tells the story of the fictional town of Macondo and its residents. Other well-known magical realism novels include Isabel Allende’s The House of the Spirits and Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children. Magical realism has also been used in film, such as in Guillermo del Toro’s 2006 film Pan’s Labyrinth, which tells the story of a young girl who discovers a magical world in the midst of the Spanish Civil War. Some scholars argue that magical realism is a postcolonial genre that allows Latin American writers to subvert Eurocentric narratives and offer alternative visions of history.