[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"doc-detail-138044-en":3,"doc-seo-138044-105":31,"detail-sidebar-cat-0-en-105":92},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":6},0,"success",{"doc_id":7,"user_id":8,"nickname":9,"user_avatar":10,"doc_module":4,"category_id":11,"category_name":12,"doc_title":13,"doc_description":14,"doc_content":15,"file_id":16,"file_url":17,"file_type":18,"file_size":19,"view_count":20,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":21,"is_downloadable":21,"audit_status":21,"page_count":22,"language":23,"language_code":24,"site_id":25,"html_lang":24,"table_of_contents":26,"faqs":27,"seo_title":28,"seo_description":14,"update_tm":29,"read_time":30},138044,8796095461610,"Oliver","https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_276721f389ce27ea32af1340a28f341c",2,"Literature","Representing Imaginary Spaces - Fantasy, Fiction, and Virtuality","This chapter examines the experience of imaginary spaces—spaces that are imagined but not believed to exist—and clarifies what spatial experience entails when the space is only represented. It compares spaces evoked in personal fantasy, spaces represented in fiction, and spaces presented through interactive digital media, with special attention to video games. Virtual representations not only require users’ imagination of the space but also their participatory involvement, enabling fictional spatial practices that can feel like lived worlds.","Representing Imaginary Spaces: Fantasy, Fiction, and Virtuality  \nVan de Mosselaer, N. & Gualeni, S. (2022), “Representing Imaginary Spaces: Fantasy, Fiction, and Virtuality”, Gottwald, D., Vahdat, V., Turner-Rahman, G. (eds.) Virtual Interiorities. Pittsburgh (PA): ETC Press, Vol. 3, pp. 21-44.  \n(This is a pre-print version)  \nAbstract. In this chapter, we investigate the experience of imaginary spaces, understood as spaces that are imagined—but not believed—to exist. More precisely, we explore what a spatial experience could entail when the experienced space is only imagined or represented to exist. For this purpose, we analyze and compare the experiences of spaces that are evoked in personal fantasy, spaces that are represented in works of fiction, and spaces that are presented through interactive, digital media. The focus of this chapter will be on the latter: imaginary spaces that can be experienced through digital media such as video games. Virtual representations of space do not only mandate their users to imagine certain spaces, but also their own involvement within these spaces. As such, they give rise to fictional, spatial practices: ones that users themselves undertake, but only imaginatively so. Other than spaces entertained in fantasy or represented in fiction, virtual space representations thus permit habitation and a personal relationship with the represented space, which becomes a lived world for its users.  \nKeywords: virtuality, spatial practice, imagination, fantasy, fiction, representation  \nIntroduction  \nIt was […] like a great barn-door; and they all felt that it was a door because of the ornate lintel, threshold, and jambs around it, though they could not decide whether it lay flat like a trap-door or slantwise like an outside cellar-door. As Wilcox would have said, the geometry of the place was all wrong. One could not be sure that the sea and the ground were horizontal, hence the relative position  \nof everything else seemed phantasmally variable.—H. P. Lovecraft 1  \nWhat kind of space was presented in the previous paragraph? Its description is clearly not an incentive to think of it as the kind of space that could be intuitively grasped or easily navigated by human beings. The readers of the passage above are not supposed to believe that such a space exists: they are merely prompted to imagine its existence, appearance, and unfamiliar qualities. The space described here is thus an example of what we call an imaginary space. In this chapter, we want to analyze and discuss how we experience such spaces.  \n--End of page 21  \nImaginary spaces can manifest in many different ways. The space described above, for example, originally only existed in the fantasy of H. P. Lovecraft, who conceptualized it, gave it a certain shape and specific colors, imaginatively decorated it with objects, and rendered it in a textual description. In the original  \n1 H. P. Lovecraft, Cthulhu Tome Revised (Ingersoll: Devoted Publishing, 2019), 233.  \nconceptualization of that space, Lovecraft was bound by the limits of his own creativity, and was able to freely conceive and transform this space within his imagination. For whoever reads Lovecraft’s work, on the other hand, this space is a represented space that is to be imagined based on the text of the above paragraph. The reader, in other words, cannot just freely imagine anything about this particular space, but is constrained by the information given within Lovecraft's work of fiction. This space is thus what we will call a “fictional space”: it is a space that readers imaginatively encounter based on the information contained in the text.  \nRegardless of this space being freely conceived in fantasy or imagined based on its description, the way we experience this imaginary space differs from how we tend to experience real, physical spaces. After all, the described space cannot be entered, touched, interacted with, or explored any further. As it is an imaginary space, it is n","cbCaihdr5jNTQEIb","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaihdr5jNTQEIb","pdf",536878,5,1,17,"English","en",105,"# Abstract\n# Introduction\n## Imaginary spaces as represented prompts\n## Imagination vs. real spatial experience\n# Imagination and Space","[{\"question\":\"What does the chapter mean by an “imaginary space”?\",\"answer\":\"An imaginary space is a space that is imagined—but not believed—to exist. Readers are prompted to imagine its appearance and unfamiliar qualities based on description or representation.\"},{\"question\":\"How do fictional spaces differ from real physical spaces in the chapter?\",\"answer\":\"Unlike physical spaces, described imaginary spaces cannot be entered, touched, interacted with, or explored further. At most, people imagine themselves navigating them, while they remain interiorized in the mind.\"},{\"question\":\"Why are digital media and video games a key focus of the chapter?\",\"answer\":\"Digital media can make users imagine not only the represented space but also their own interactive involvement. This produces fictional spatial practices and a feeling of being present, turning representations into lived-world experiences.\"}]","Representing Imaginary Spaces - Fantasy, Fiction, and Virtuality | PDF",1787473584,26,{"code":4,"msg":32,"data":33},"ok",{"site_id":25,"language":24,"slug":34,"title":13,"keywords":35,"description":14,"schema_data":36,"social_meta":87,"head_meta":89,"extra_data":91,"updated_unix":29},"representing-imaginary-spaces-fantasy-fiction-and-virtuality","",{"@graph":37,"@context":86},[38,54,69],{"@type":39,"itemListElement":40},"BreadcrumbList",[41,45,48,51],{"item":42,"name":43,"@type":44,"position":21},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":46,"name":47,"@type":44,"position":11},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/","Document",{"item":49,"name":12,"@type":44,"position":50},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/literature/",3,{"item":52,"name":13,"@type":44,"position":53},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/representing-imaginary-spaces-fantasy-fiction-and-virtuality/138044/",4,{"url":52,"name":13,"@type":55,"author":56,"headline":13,"publisher":58,"fileFormat":61,"inLanguage":24,"description":14,"dateModified":62,"datePublished":63,"encodingFormat":61,"isAccessibleForFree":64,"interactionStatistic":65},"DigitalDocument",{"name":9,"@type":57},"Person",{"url":42,"name":59,"@type":60},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-09-05","2026-08-23",true,{"@type":66,"interactionType":67,"userInteractionCount":20},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":68},"ViewAction",{"@type":70,"mainEntity":71},"FAQPage",[72,78,82],{"name":73,"@type":74,"acceptedAnswer":75},"What does the chapter mean by an “imaginary space”?","Question",{"text":76,"@type":77},"An imaginary space is a space that is imagined—but not believed—to exist. Readers are prompted to imagine its appearance and unfamiliar qualities based on description or representation.","Answer",{"name":79,"@type":74,"acceptedAnswer":80},"How do fictional spaces differ from real physical spaces in the chapter?",{"text":81,"@type":77},"Unlike physical spaces, described imaginary spaces cannot be entered, touched, interacted with, or explored further. At most, people imagine themselves navigating them, while they remain interiorized in the mind.",{"name":83,"@type":74,"acceptedAnswer":84},"Why are digital media and video games a key focus of the chapter?",{"text":85,"@type":77},"Digital media can make users imagine not only the represented space but also their own interactive involvement. This produces fictional spatial practices and a feeling of being present, turning representations into lived-world experiences.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":52,"og:type":88,"og:title":13,"og:site_name":59,"og:description":14},"article",{"robots":90,"canonical":52},"index,follow",{"doc_id":7,"site_id":25},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":93},[94,98,101,105,109,114,119,124,129,132,136],{"id":21,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":47,"category_name":95,"show_sort_weight":96,"slug":97},"Story & Novel",90,"story-novel",{"id":11,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":47,"category_name":12,"show_sort_weight":99,"slug":100},80,"literature",{"id":53,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":47,"category_name":102,"show_sort_weight":103,"slug":104},"Exam",70,"exam",{"id":20,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":47,"category_name":106,"show_sort_weight":107,"slug":108},"Comic",60,"comic",{"id":110,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":47,"category_name":111,"show_sort_weight":112,"slug":113},6,"Technology",50,"technology",{"id":115,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":47,"category_name":116,"show_sort_weight":117,"slug":118},7,"Healthcare",40,"healthcare",{"id":120,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":47,"category_name":121,"show_sort_weight":122,"slug":123},8,"Research & Report",30,"research-report",{"id":125,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":47,"category_name":126,"show_sort_weight":127,"slug":128},9,"Religion & Spirituality",20,"religion-spirituality",{"id":127,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":47,"category_name":130,"show_sort_weight":127,"slug":131},"World Cup","world-cup",{"id":133,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":47,"category_name":134,"show_sort_weight":133,"slug":135},10,"Lifestyle","lifestyle",{"id":137,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":47,"category_name":138,"show_sort_weight":20,"slug":139},19,"General","general"]