An Enactivist Approach on Contemporary Serial YA Speculative Fiction: J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter, Cassandra Clare’s The Mortal Instruments and Suzanne Collins’s Hunger Games as key studies

Abstract

This work argues that the cognitive theoretical approach called enactivism is the most functional to interpret contemporary YA speculative fiction. J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter saga, Cassandra Clare’s The Mortal Instruments esalogy and Suzanne Collins’s Hunger Games trilogy are the three case studies here analyzed. My original contribution to the rich debate on YA speculative fiction concerns the specific slant I propose which complements the many different perspectives already existing, from feminist, to socialist, to religious, posthumanist, to name a few; all of these perspectives take into consideration mostly one particular theme at a time, and the link between YA production and children’s literature. I argue that an enactivist perspective can provide an explanation for the increasing diffusion of these narratives among young adults but especially among adults, thanks to the focus on the interaction between text and reader, and also between readers and their contemporary environment; from this last interaction, also a multiplicity of themes usually conveyed by these narratives can be explained. I start from an explanation of Marco Caracciolo’s The Experientiality of Narrative, which provides the reader the basic tenets of enactivism in literature, then I proceed with mapping YA literature and speculative fiction considering their origins, narrative techniques and empathic bonds established with readers, to come eventually to focus on close readings and take a closer look at the themes in the three case studies I selected.