What is dark academia? What is a murder novel? How can I write a dark academia book? Here, I'll try to explain a little bit more about the literary genre CAMPUS NOVEL, and how we can write novels with diverse characters and original plots!
Dark academia is a popular way to call novels set in universities or boarding schools, with plots that contain a specific set of characteristics — one of them being a murder. Dark academia, however, is just a sub genre of another type of novel: academic novels, also known as campus novels.
The main premise of the campus novels are: they're usually set in the campus of a university or boarding school, usually away from parental figures, in a way that knowledge and the academic life is thoroughly a part of the characters lives. Quoting campus novel's Wikipedia page:
"Campus novels exploit the fictional possibilities created by a closed environment of the university, with idiosyncratic characters inhabiting unambiguous hierarchies. They may describe the reaction of a fixed socio-cultural perspective (the academic staff) to new social attitudes (the new student intake)." —— https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campus_novel
Which means they're usually coming of age books, that talk about how college students relate to their peers, teachers, mental health issues, hierarchies, and their way to relate with the world. College is the time where young people try to know themselves and build their path from teenage years to adult life, which can lead to life-changing mistakes that are used as a way to learn and mature.
THE ACADEMY IN CAMPUS NOVELS
All of these elements mentioned above are used as literary devices to develop the plot and the characters, using the academic knowledge as a running theme through the whole novel. This happens in a deep level, like using philosophy as a subject of conversation, and even as a motivation to pivotal plot points.
The academic knowledge may vary, but the most common study fields are arts, history, literature and philosophy. The characters are completely immersed in their academic life, and that dedication — bordering obsession — sets them apart from the other students.
THE CHARACTERS/GROUP OF FRIENDS IN CAMPUS NOVELS
It's noticeable the feeling of being misunderstood by people around them, as if they were more special and different than the rest, being peers, adult and authority figures. This is how they usually path their way to a very close group of friends, that form the group of primary and secondary characters of the novel. They develop relationships that may range from healthy to toxic, from friendships, romantic or sexual relationships.
Several people believe — me included, but I'll try to be as impartial as possible unless I state so — that:
"The genre has a tendency to over-romantizice a liberal arts education, and it also generally disregards people of color, women, lgbtq+ community, and more. It has in many ways been centered a lot on straight white men, with women playing the role of an innocent, and the token gay man, playing the role of comic relief, and a way for the main character to experiment." — https://blackhholesbooks.wordpress.com/2018/09/07/litcrit-dark-academia/
I believe that the campus novels have a lot of place to improve regarding the characters, and it would be a lot more realistic and inclusive if other minorities were portrayed. Sometimes we see the same character tropes written again and again, we just change the name and hair color, and this can be really tiring sometimes.
AESTHETIC IN CAMPUS NOVELS
The most important thing in the narrative of this literary genre is the aesthetic. The vocabulary is wide and descriptions detailed, trying to give the reader the most cinematographic vision possible. Old books, hidden places, gardens, uniforms and a beautiful college. I avoided using the term "dark academia" before, using campus novel instead, because dark academia is a specific aesthetic of the genre.
What we usually understand by dark academia, actually refers to the sub genrefrom campus novels: campus murder mystery. Campus novels are the main genre, and when we mix it with crime fiction, we're presented with this sub genre. Which means: no, not every dark academia book needs to have a murder.
I believe that we can have a dark academia without the presence of a murder. Actually, this is the whole reason why this book was born, I intend to write a literary thesis (I mean, it's a novel, but whatever) about dark academia without anyone being murdered.
ARE YOU CURIOUS ABOUT AESTHETIC IN CAMPUS NOVELS? YES? GOOD!! NEXT CHAPTER WE'LL DELVE DEEPLY IN THIS MATTER, SO STAY TUNED!!
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SO, HELLO GUYS??? This is my first time publishing anything in English in this account, and this is not my native language, so please be patient lmao. My name is Ananda de Souza, you can call me Nanda, and I'm 22 years old. I used to study Portuguese Language and English Language Literature in uni, but I dropped to study Journalism. I'm still obsessed with literature, as you can see.
I tried to be as impartial as possible when presenting the concepts, because I think there is a huge amount of misinformation about this genre. I used to have a writing blog, it used to be a place for me to vent a little bit about literature and give a few advices, but I don't feel that's my jam anymore.
I created this book with the purpose of helping other dark academia novels to understand a little bit more about the genre, and to know our possibilities. I speak this for myself, because before I made my research, I used to believe in a lot of misconceptions. I'll leave all the links below, so you can see for yourselves!
