<p>My intentions with this essay has been to examine the World in which the story of J. K. Rowlings Harry Potter takes place, the structure, narrative and restrictions, in order to place the suite of novels in the tradition of the Fantasy genre. Since the release of the first book Harry Potter has become a household name, possibly more than any other contemporary literature written for children. Various readings concerning gender, etymological, linguistic aspects and so forth have been done, and in most cases the books are placed in the genre of Fantasy without distinguishing what in fact makes the novels Fantasy. I wanted to see which specific sectors of the books that place them in the genre, and, assuming that it would in fact fit into the Fantasy genre, in which ways it diverges from the tradition of the genre in means of the structure of the world/s of the story. I also looked at the faults in the logic within the novels to see if the inconsistencies in the rules of the world have an impact on the agency of the story.</p><p>I found the novels to be a part of the fantasy tradition, not only by having many intertextual relations and similar features to other fantasy-novels but also in the fundament of the story, its basic conditions such as the supernatural elements and the hidden places in the world of the books. The minor inconstancies that I found where to small to disrupt the narrative, and the fact that some of the aspects of the books drift slightly away from the logic of the world within the story have reasonable explanations such as making the story easier to relate to.</p>

My intentions with this essay has been to examine the World in which the story of J. K. Rowlings Harry Potter takes place, the structure, narrative and restrictions, in order to place the suite of novels in the tradition of the Fantasy genre. Since the release of the first book Harry Potter has become a household name, possibly more than any other contemporary literature written for children. Various readings concerning gender, etymological, linguistic aspects and so forth have been done, and in most cases the books are placed in the genre of Fantasy without distinguishing what in fact makes the novels Fantasy. I wanted to see which specific sectors of the books that place them in the genre, and, assuming that it would in fact fit into the Fantasy genre, in which ways it diverges from the tradition of the genre in means of the structure of the world/s of the story. I also looked at the faults in the logic within the novels to see if the inconsistencies in the rules of the world have an impact on the agency of the story. I found the novels to be a part of the fantasy tradition, not only by having many intertextual relations and similar features to other fantasy-novels but also in the fundament of the story, its basic conditions such as the supernatural elements and the hidden places in the world of the books. The minor inconstancies that I found where to small to disrupt the narrative, and the fact that some of the aspects of the books drift slightly away from the logic of the world within the story have reasonable explanations such as making the story easier to relate to.

The main objective of this thesis is to define narrative scheme and elements of the fantastic in the novel Blank Gaze (Nenhum Olhar, 2000) by a Portuguese writer, José Luís Peixoto. His works have been considered part of the mythic narrative current, which, according to a common definition, often draws attention to deformed values of today's society. For José Luís Peixoto, the fantastic, from a modern perspective, or neofantastic, an alternative means for expressing a need for belief in today's society. This fact becomes the main and timeless legacy of the work, and the reader does not be aware of details of religious rules. After the introduction the thesis focuses on outlining the literary and historical context of contemporary Portuguese prose. The second chapter also pays attention to the biography and bibliography of José Saramago, both politically and ideologically involved author. Similarly to Peixoto, in his works he touches the human essence and presents unconventional reflections about values of present society. The third chapter tries to introduce Peixoto as an autor of Blank Gaze. It also mentions him as the laureate of the 2011 José Saramago Prize - a reward which is awarded to Portuguese writers younger than thirty five. The fourth chapter discusses the beginning and development of...