Exploring Imaginary Worlds

Mark J.P. Wolf’s study of imaginary worlds theorizes world-building within and across media, including literature, comics, film, radio, television, board games, video games, the Internet, and more. Building Imaginary Worlds departs from prior approaches to imaginary worlds that focused mainly on narrative, medium, or genre, and instead considers imaginary worlds as dynamic entities in and of themselves. Wolf argues that imaginary worlds—which are often transnarrative, transmedial, and transauthorial in nature—are compelling objects of inquiry for Media Studies. Chapters touch on: a theoretical analysis of how world-building extends beyond storytelling, the engagement of the audience, and the way worlds are conceptualized and experienced a history of imaginary worlds that follows their development over three millennia from the fictional islands of Homer’s Odyssey to the present internarrative theory examining how narratives set in the same world can interact and relate to one another an examination of transmedial growth and adaptation, and what happens when worlds make the jump between media an analysis of the transauthorial nature of imaginary worlds, the resulting concentric circles of authorship, and related topics of canonicity, participatory worlds, and subcreation’s relationship with divine Creation Building Imaginary Worlds also provides the scholar of imaginary worlds with a glossary of terms and a detailed timeline that spans three millennia and more than 1,400 imaginary worlds, listing their names, creators, and the works in which they first appeared.

From The Brothers Karamazov to Star Trek to Twin Peaks, this collection explores a variety of different imaginary worlds both historic and contemporary. Featuring contributions from an interdisciplinary and international group of scholars, each essay looks at a particular imaginary world in-depth, and world-building issues associated with that world. Together, the essays explore the relationship between the worlds and the media in which they appear as they examine imaginary worlds in literature, television, film, computer games, and theatre, with many existing across multiple media simultaneously. The book argues that the media incarnation of a world affects world structure and poses unique obstacles to the act of world-building. The worlds discussed include Nazar, Barsetshire, Skotopogonievsk, the Vorkosigan Universe, Grover’s Corners, Gormenghast, Collinsport, Daventry, Dune, the Death Gate Cycle universe, Twin Peaks, and the Star Trek galaxy. A follow-up to Mark J. P. Wolf ’s field-defining book Building Imaginary Worlds, this collection will be of critical interest to students and scholars of popular culture, subcreation studies, transmedia studies, literature, and beyond.

History and literary criticism of works of fantasy, chiefly of fantasies written for adults. Includes techniques for fantasy writers.

From The Brothers Karamazov to Star Trek to Twin Peaks, this collection explores a variety of different imaginary worlds both historic and contemporary. Featuring contributions from an interdisciplinary and international group of scholars, each essay looks at a particular imaginary world in-depth, and world-building issues associated with that world. Together, the essays explore the relationship between the worlds and the media in which they appear as they examine imaginary worlds in literature, television, film, computer games, and theatre, with many existing across multiple media simultaneously. The book argues that the media incarnation of a world affects world structure and poses unique obstacles to the act of world-building. The worlds discussed include Nazar, Barsetshire, Skotopogonievsk, the Vorkosigan Universe, Grover's Corners, Gormenghast, Collinsport, Daventry, Dune, the Death Gate Cycle universe, Twin Peaks, and the Star Trek galaxy. A follow-up to Mark J. P. Wolf 's field-defining book Building Imaginary Worlds, this collection will be of critical interest to students and scholars of popular culture, subcreation studies, transmedia studies, literature, and beyond.

“THE IMAGINARY WORLD” is all about love and life. Everyone has experienced betrayal in their life but not everyone has seen true love… it’s not easy. This book brings many writers together to show how love feels, with society issues in their way. I am very grateful to have so many amazing writers by my side, and I would like to thank each and every person present in this book and also those who aren’t. My Parents for supporting me in this and my best friend Jeet Kakkar for making me strong enough and believing in me that I can do this, I love you. Lastly, A big Thank you to TOC for this opportunity and Somya Dii our project head for holding my hand the whole time, it wouldn’t have been possible without you. Make the world a better place With your smile… Live life with no regrets Love life with no debts. ~ Sanmeet K Sethi

How can parents, educators, business leaders and policy makers nurture creativity, prepare for inventiveness and stimulate innovation? One compelling answer, this book argues, lies in fostering the invention of imaginary worlds, a.k.a. worldplay. First emerging in middle childhood, this complex form of make-believe draws lifelong energy from the fruitful combustions of play, imagination and creativity. Unfortunately, trends in modern life conspire to break down the synergies of creative play with imaginary worlds. Unstructured playtime in childhood has all but disappeared. Invent-it-yourself make-believe places have all but succumbed in adolescence to ready-made computer games. Adults are discouraged from playing as a waste of time with no relevance to the workplace. Narrow notions of creativity exile the fictive imagination to fantasy arts. And yet, as Michele Root-Bernstein demonstrates by means of historical inquiry, quantitative study and contemporary interview, spontaneous worldplay in childhood develops creative potential, and strategic worldplay in adulthood inspires innovations in the sciences and social sciences as well as the arts and literature. Inventing imaginary worlds develops the skills society needs for inventing the future. For more on Inventing Imaginary Worlds, check out: www.inventingimaginaryworlds.com

This companion provides a definitive and cutting-edge guide to the study of imaginary and virtual worlds across a range of media, including literature, television, film, and games. From the Star Trek universe, Thomas More’s classic Utopia, and J. R. R. Tolkien’s Arda, to elaborate, user-created game worlds like Minecraft, contributors present interdisciplinary perspectives on authorship, world structure/design, and narrative. The Routledge Companion to Imaginary Worlds offers new approaches to imaginary worlds as an art form and cultural phenomenon, explorations of the technical and creative dimensions of world-building, and studies of specific worlds and worldbuilders.

Children are widely celebrated for their imaginations, but developmental research on this topic has often been fragmented or narrowly focused on fantasy. However, there is growing appreciation for the role that imagination plays in cognitive and emotional development, as well as its link with children's understanding of the real world. With their imaginations, children mentally transcend time, place, and/or circumstance to think about what might have been, plan and anticipate the future, create fictional relationships and worlds, and consider alternatives to the actual experiences of their lives. The Oxford Handbook of the Development of Imagination provides a comprehensive overview of this broad new perspective by bringing together leading researchers whose findings are moving the study of imagination from the margins of mainstream psychology to a central role in current efforts to understand human thought. The topics covered include fantasy-reality distinctions, pretend play, magical thinking, narrative, anthropomorphism, counterfactual reasoning, mental time travel, creativity, paracosms, imaginary companions, imagination in non-human animals, the evolution of imagination, autism, dissociation, and the capacity to derive real life resilience from imaginative experiences. Many of the chapters include discussions of the educational, clinical, and legal implications of the research findings and special attention is given to suggestions for future research.