SOURCE: "Fantasy as Adventure: Nineteenth Century Children's Fiction," in Children's Literature Association Quarterly, Vol. 8, No. 3, Fall, 1983, pp. 18-22.

In the essay below, McGillis examines the attitude displayed toward adventure in nineteenth-century fantasies, pointing in particular to the "deeply felt suspicion of fantasy adventure" common to many Victorian children's books.

I wish to extend Paul Zweig's comparison between the shaman and the storyteller to nineteenth century romance, especially in works for children.

In The Adventurer, Zweig suggests that in the nineteenth century, adventure, like the quest romance, became internalized; he also suggests that a "resemblance exists between the adventurer exploring the countries of the marvelous and the "absent" one: each finds his way to the "other" world and returns to tell the story."¹ The "absent one" is the shaman who, through illness or some other means, transports to a mysterious world of hidden realities. As Zweig argues:

The shaman's...