[ofalkaed]

They are referring to the genesis of the Latin American literary movement commonly referred to as Magical Realism not the general idea of essentially realist stories with magical and fantastic elements which is ancient. Sure we can call most any religious text or mythology Magical Realism but only on the level of plot, literature is more than plot and the way the authors of the movement deal with things like theme and subtext place them firmly into literary fiction, these distinctions are important.

Edit: Thinking on this more, mythology and religion can't really be called Magical Realism from what I have read of the movement, in mythology and religion we know how the trick was done we have a god or some creature who did it even if we can not understand how they did it; in Magical Realism we don't get to know how the trick is done, it is just magic and left unexplained. Even fairy tales and folklore don't work as Magical Realism because they are so tied up in the religion and mythology of the culture that produced them, they can seem magical and unexplained when removed from that culture but that is different. I would not call myself well read in the movement yet so I could be completely wrong here.

[williamcotton]

I hear Magical Realism and I immediately think of One Hundred Years of Solitude by Marquez! The creators of Lost definitely read that book… the wrecks of ancient ships deep in the jungle, the ghosts of ancestors haunting the present, the way their community narrative evolves out of the mists of story and time. Amazing stuff.

[photochemsyn]

Also, the village of Macondo where the story is set is something quite like the Garden of Eden out of the Book of Genesis, which might qualify as the oldest work of magical realism in existence.

https://www.bartleby.com/essay/Biblical-Allusions-In-Gabriel...

[1letterunixname]

That's my instinct as well. The local university had a GGM month that was more like 2 years during the pandemic.

Rushdie also comes to mind. And I can't help but connect a number of similarities between The Satanic Verses and the TV series Lost.

[ivorbuk]

I think there's something in the names of the families and characters that, at least to my younger mind, helped blend some of the magic into a dream-like state of never ending wandering.