Date of Award:

5-2015

Document Type:

Thesis

Degree Name:

Master of Arts (MA)

Department:

English

Committee Chair(s)

Jennifer Sinor

Committee

Jennifer Sinor

Committee

Brock Dethier

Committee

Michael Sowder

Abstract

This creative thesis contains four original short stories and a literature review written by Utah State University student Kevin Larsen. The four short stories were written and revised in 2013 under the mentorship and guidance of Professor Jennifer Sinor. Works for the literature review were selected by Kevin Larsen after reading extensively within the horror and magical realism genres.

Horror and magical realism both are well established genres with their own rules and tendencies. By pulling from both genres, these stories explore ideas and themes of horror fiction using the structure and setting that magical realism allows. This isn’t to say that these stories are simply horror themed magical realism. Instead, they are a kind of merger between the two genres, pulling what is needed from each without relying on the tropes and gimmicks that are often present in works of horror or magical realism.

The literature review portion of this thesis reviews stories from both contemporary and historic horror magical realism authors. The review specifically focuses on more contemporary works of fiction in an effort to place Kevin Larsen’s own stories within relevant discourse.

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