Transitions and Dissolving Boundaries in the Fantastic

The fantastic raises a number of significant questions about cultural and social developments and challenges existing boundaries. By creating hybrid zones of autonomy, the fantastic provides alternatives to conventional understandings of world, knowledge or identity.

With regard to fantastic fiction in literature and different media representations the articles explore crossings into other worlds, time travel, metamorphoses, hybrid creatures and a variety of other transitions and transgressions. They analyse hybrid genres, inter-media adaptations, transpositions into new media, as well as various forms of crossover as exemplified in the increasing trend of generation-spanning all-age literature.

Christine Lötscher, Petra Schrackmann and Aleta-Amirée von Holzen are researchers at the University of Zurich.

Ingrid Tomkowiak is Professor of Popular Literature and Media Studies at the University of Zurich and head of research at the Swiss Institute for Children's and Youth's Media, Associated Institute of the University of Zurich, Switzerland.