literarywhere

Literarywhere is a term used in literary studies to denote the imagined, mapped, or conceptually constructed space that a narrative invokes as its primary geographic frame. It encompasses real-world locations treated as narrative anchors, as well as wholly invented landscapes, and often merges memory, history, and myth with place.

The term is a modern coinage in scholarly discourse and is not tied to a single tradition or author. It is used to analyze how authors configure space to shape character, plot, and meaning. Literarywhere can function across genres, including realism, fantasy, science fiction, and travel writing, and may refer to a single locale or to cross-textual geographies across a body of work.

Key features include spatial permeability (places that characters move through in ways that reveal social relations), symbolic geography (places that encode themes such as memory, identity, or power), and intertextual mapping (linking places across works).

Examples are often discussed as case studies rather than canonical definitions: in contemporary fiction, the cityscapes of a real city refracted through dream sequences; in fantasy, a mapped continent functioning as a palimpsest of history; in postcolonial writing, spaces bearing traces of colonial encounter.

Critics note that the term can be vague and culturally loaded; some scholars advocate precise analysis of spatial practices rather than broad categorizations. Used carefully, literarywhere helps readers understand how place shapes perception, narrative structure, and cultural memory.