The Gravity Of The World Underground-The Thematic Evolution Of The World Underground In British Fantasy Fiction

As an integral part of English literature the British fantasy literature has a long history, and gone through a long and complex process of development and evolution. Britain's fantasy literature derived mostly from ancient Greek mythology and came to fruition through the different eras and process of Anglo - Saxon, Renaissance, Romanticism, Realism, and Modernism; resulting in a variety of topics related to a large number of excellent literary works. The world underground is one of these topics. Different writers despict the world underground in their own way giving many themes of the topic. The themes of the world underground have the features of their time. In a certain, the evolution of the theme reflect the development of the British fantasy.This thesis is a thematic approach to the world underground in the British fantasy fiction. In the course of the development of the British fantasy fiction , the theme of the world underground varies with different literary periods .This thesis intends to trace the course of the evolution of the theme of the underground world from the time of mythology to J.R.R Tolkien's fantasy fiction. There are three stages during the course of fantasy development, the origin, the further development and the fantasy as genre. During the three stages, there are five themes of the underground world, that is The Realm Of Afterlife in mythological period, The Ghost and The Physical Underground World during the further development of fantasy, Journey To The World Underground and The Secondary Underland in fantasy fiction.The thesis is composed of three chapters: the first chapter investigates the underground theme in the mythological period, that is The Realm Of Afterlife and the features and significant of the concept. The concept of The Realm Of Afterlife is the origin of the underground theme in British fantasy. The second chapter discusses the underground elements contained in the classical works in the stage of further development of fantasy .There are two underground themes, The Ghost and The Physical Underground World. The classics include Beowulf, Shakespeares'plays, Paradise Lost , Gulliver's Travel and Christmas Carol . The third chapter discusses the underground themes after fantasy comes into being as genre .The two themes are Journey To The World Underground and The Secondary Underland. What's more, in this chapter the features and the kinds of the fantasy fiction are analyzed and the Secondary World theory is discussed.