Meaning of secondary world | Babel Free

Definitions

An internally consistent, fictional, fantasy world or setting that is different from the real "primary world".

Examples

“What really happens is that the story-maker proves a successful 'sub-creator'. He makes a Secondary World which your mind⟳ can enter⟳. Inside it, what he relates is 'true': it accords with the laws of that world. You therefore believe⟳ it, while you are, as it were, inside. The moment disbelief arises, the spell⟳ is broken; the magic, or rather art, has failed. You are then out in the Primary World again, looking at the little abortive Secondary World from outside.”

“From beginning to end⟳ of the fiction we are in the secondary world.”

“The girls stress⟳ the internal logic of the Secondary World as the crucial point⟳ for fantasy pleasure. Mastering the elaborate structure⟳ of the Secondary World is part and parcel of the reader's quest to experience⟳ a text such as Harry Potter, although the central hero would identify⟳ the text as masculine.”

“The world to which the protagonist belongs is the 'primary' or 'domestic' world. The secondary world is often a binary opposite of the primary world; an inverse, or mirror-image of the consensual reality of the text.”

CEFR level