Feminism and magical realism across cultures expressed in Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel, The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende, The Bridge to the Afterlife by Simone Schwarz -Bart and Toni Morrison's Song Solomon. Magical realism has only evolved in the last century. Franz Roh was the first to use the term to describe the paintings and new style that emerged after the expressionist era (7, p.15), but it was Alejo Carpentier who used it to describe the fanatical writing styles of Latin America (3, p.373). He believed that magical realism explained reality and "was able to evade the insufficiency of realism, in its inability to describe ex-centric experience" (3, p.373). Latin America, although perhaps the first to name the new writing phenomena, was not the only country to use it. Throughout this article I will compare and contrast several novels by female authors who evoked magical realism in their writing styles. These authors come from Latin America, Africa, and the Caribbean, showing the wide range of history and environments. Believing that the Caribbean alone might prove to be a narrow topic for a style that has taken the world by storm, I thought it was only right that other countries included the topic of women in the document. Additionally, I selected Africa and parts of Latin America to compare with Caribbean writings because these two continents play a critical role in shaping what the Caribbean has become today. The novels I will compare are Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel, Isabel Allende's House of Spirits, The Bridge of the Afterlife by Simone Schwarz-Bart, and Song of Songs by Toni Morrison. All of these novels use magical realism, which adds to the reader's enjoyment as he describes...... middle of paper ...... Works CitedAllende, Isabel. The House of Spirits. 1982. Bantam Books, New York. Allende, Isabel. http://www.harpercollins.com/catalog/0060927216.htmCohn, Deborah. “To See or Not to See: Invisibility, Clairvoyance, and Revisions of History in The Invisible Man and La Casa de los Espiritus.” Comparative Literature Studies, vol. 33, no. 4, page. 372-391, 1996.Ibsen, Krisitne. "On Recipes, Reading, and Revolution: Postboon's Parody at ComoAqua Para Chocolate." Hispanic Review, Vol. 63, n.2, page 133. 1995.Morrison, Toni-Social and Historical Context.http://www.oll.temple.edu/ih/IH52/Novels/Morrison/MorrisonContext.htmSchwarz-Bart, Simone. The bridge to the afterlife. 1972. Heinemann EducationalPublisher, Oxford.Zamora, Lois Parikinson, and Wendy B. Faris. Magical realism. 1995. Duke UniversityPress, Durham and London.