(UFRGS -2004) The past quarter-century of American popular culture was ruled by the great mega-franchises of science fiction - Star Wars, Star Trek, Independence Day, The Matrix. But lately, since the turn of the millennium or so, weve been dreaming very different dreams. The stuff of those dreams is fantasy - swords and sorcerers, knights and ladies, magic and unicorns. With The Two Towers, the new 4installment of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, we have seen what might be called 1the enchanting of America. The evidence is a new preoccupation with a nostalgic, magical vision of a medieval age. It all started with a little-known Oxford professor whose specialty was the West Midland dialect of Middle English. Beginning with The Hobbit, a story he invented in the early 1930s to amuse his children, John Ronald Reuel Tolkiens novels first became 2merely popular and then turned into a phenomenon. The recent Tolkien revival began when Americas long summer romance with technology was dwindling. 3The magic would have to come from somewhere else, and we found it in fantasy. Swords, not lasers. Magic, not electricity. The past, not the future. (Time, Dec. 2, 2002). Consider the following sentences: I - The magic should come from another place. II - It would be necessary for the magic to come from elsewhere. III - The magic had to come from any other place. Which of them means the same as the sentence THE MAGIC WOULD HAVE TO COME FROM SOMEWHERE ELSE (ref. 3)?
