The Belgian school of the bizarre

Kim Connell

This anthology of nineteen short stories by thirteen different authors introduces the reader to L'ecole belge de l'etrange, the Belgian School of the Bizarre. This is a brand of concrete fantasy that has been the hallmark of Belgian fiction since 1975. Though this school has links to both French surrealism and the magic realism of Marquez and other South American authors, Belgium's concrete fantasy, or fantastique reel, is closer to realism than either of its cousins. It is a subtle, quiet brand of fantasy that is tied to the ordinary daily life of the Belgian people. Belgian fiction has often been lumped together with French fiction, and Belgian writers have had to struggle for recognition because the French have long dismissed them as provincial and because Paris continues to be the artistic capital of the francophone world. In the past, many Belgian writers had to move to Paris to get any sort of recognition because they had only four and a half million potential readers at home. Though the question of whether or not Belgium has a national literature continues to be controversial, Kim Connell argues in his introduction that the Belgian School of the Bizarre distinguishes francophone Belgian fiction from French fiction.