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Adventure fiction is a type of fiction that usually presents danger, or gives the reader a sense of excitement. Some adventure fiction also satisfies the literary definition ofromance fiction.[1]
In the introduction to theEncyclopedia of Adventure Fiction, CriticDon D'Ammassa defines the genre as follows:
.. An adventure is an event or series of events that happens outside the course of the protagonist's ordinary life, usually accompanied by danger, often by physical action. Adventure stories almost always move quickly, and the pace of the plot is at least as important as characterization, setting, and other elements of creative work.[2]
D'Ammassa argues that adventure stories make the element of danger the focus; hence he argues thatCharles Dickens's novelA Tale of Two Cities is an adventure novel because the protagonists are in constant danger of being imprisoned or killed, whereas Dickens'sGreat Expectations is not because "Pip's encounter with the convict is an adventure, but that scene is only a device to advance the main plot, which is not truly an adventure."[2]
Adventure has been a commontheme since the earliest days of written fiction. Indeed, the standard plot of Heliodorus, and so durable as to be still alive inHollywood movies, ahero would undergo a first set of adventures before he met his lady. A separation would follow, with the second set of adventures leading to a final reunion.[citation needed]
Variations kept the genre alive. From the mid-19th century onwards, when mass literacy grew, adventure became a popular subgenre of fiction. Although not exploited to its fullest, adventure has seen many changes over the years – from being constrained to stories of knights in armor to stories of high-tech espionage.
Examples of that period includeSir Walter Scott,Alexandre Dumas, père,[3]Jules Verne, theBrontë Sisters,Rudyard Kipling,Sir H. Rider Haggard,Sir Arthur Conan Doyle,Edgar Rice Burroughs,Victor Hugo,[4]Emilio Salgari,Karl May,Louis Henri Boussenard,Thomas Mayne Reid,Sax Rohmer,A. Merritt,Talbot Mundy,Edgar Wallace, andRobert Louis Stevenson.
Adventurenovels andshort stories were popular subjects for Americanpulp magazines, which dominatedAmerican popular fiction between theProgressive Era and the 1950s.[5] Several pulp magazines suchasAdventure,Argosy,Blue Book,Top-Notch, andShort Stories specialized in this genre. Notable pulp adventure writers includedEdgar Rice Burroughs,Talbot Mundy,Theodore Roscoe,Johnston McCulley,Arthur O. Friel,Harold Lamb,Carl Jacobi,George F. Worts,[5]Georges Surdez,H. Bedford-Jones, andJ. Allan Dunn.[6]
Adventure fiction often overlaps with other genres, notablywar novels,crime novels,detective novels,sea stories,Robinsonades,spy stories (as in the works ofJohn Buchan,Eric Ambler andIan Fleming),science fiction,fantasy,(Robert E. Howard andJ. R. R. Tolkien both combined thesecondary world story with the adventure novel)[7] andWesterns. Not all books within these genres are adventures. Adventure fiction takes the setting and premise of these other genres, but the fast-paced plot of an adventure focuses on the actions of the hero within the setting.[according to whom?] With a few notable exceptions (such asBaroness Orczy,Leigh Brackett andMarion Zimmer Bradley)[8] adventure fiction as a genre has been largely dominated by male writers, though female writers are now becoming common.
Adventure stories written specifically for children began in the 19th century. Early examples includeJohann David Wyss'sThe Swiss Family Robinson (1812),Frederick Marryat'sThe Children of the New Forest (1847),andHarriet Martineau'sThe Peasant and the Prince (1856).[9]The Victorian era saw the development of the genre, withW. H. G. Kingston,R. M. Ballantyne, andG. A. Henty specializing in the production of adventure fiction for boys.[10] This inspired writers who normally catered to adult audiences to essay such works, such asRobert Louis Stevenson writingTreasure Island for a child readership.[10] In the years after the First World War, writers such asArthur Ransome developed the adventure genre by setting the adventure in Britain rather than distant countries, whileGeoffrey Trease,Rosemary Sutcliff[11] andEsther Forbes brought a new sophistication to the historical adventure novel.[10]Modern writers such asMildred D. Taylor (Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry) andPhilip Pullman (theSally Lockhart novels) have continued the tradition of the historical adventure.[10] The modern children's adventure novel sometimes deals with controversial issues liketerrorism (Robert Cormier,After the First Death (1979))[10] and warfare in theThird World (Peter Dickinson,AK (1990)).[10]
Works related toAdventure at Wikisource
