Welsh Myth in Historical Novels

Abstract

In the realm of literary genres, the boundaries blur. What constitutes ‘realism’ and what ‘fantasy’? The point has been argued at length. It might be said that all fiction is fantasy; that the creation of characters outside an author’s self (or drawn from it) is by its very practice fantasy. One might go further and suggest that all rewritings of history or biography (and even autobiography) are works of fantasy, since the record depends upon perception, and perception is subject to very many variables. In any case, if one cannot bring oneself to agree that the term ‘fantasy’ might apply to biography or history, one might allow that when historical events are fictionalised, the resultant work is, if nothing else, imaginative.