What genre is 2020?
Let's be real- everyone thought 2020 was going to be their year. Then January happened- then February and March- and here we are in April- waiting for the inevitable boss battle of sorts. If you have not seen the memes regarding the whole 2020 situation- I have to ask... are you living under a rock? Among the many memes I've seen- some better than others- several I've seen have been poking fun at 'the movie we thought 2020 was going to be' and 'the movie that 2020 is'. As I'm slowly running out of books to write about on here, (aren't we all?), I'll be taking this time to ask the question: what kind of book is 2020?
Fiction vs. Nonfiction?
While this is obviously a real-life event- it of course by default has to fall into the category of Nonfiction. However, for the reason that I need something to fill up the rest of this review, I will continue this blog post under the assumption that the entirety of 2020 is a fictional event.
Realistic Fiction
Even though this is a real event that is happening as I speak, 2020 is not realistic fiction. Let's be real- this has never happened before: no one predicted it... really it's just not realistic given the rest of our lives. So therefore, it is not realistic fiction. This is not normal life for us.
Historical Fiction
2020 could be historical fiction.. I mean, plagues have happened in all the '20 years for awhile, maybe we're just writing a historical fiction about one of those times. Plus- in the future, historical fiction could be written about this event.
Dystopian
2020 has similar tropes to many dystopian stories... the government is placing more strict than 'normal' rules, governments like the one in China are currently acting as many dystopian governments, with the total lock-down. Then there's the dumb asses (pardon my language) who are protesting the government's stay-at-home order, although this time the one's who are attempting to rebel against the government are not the heroes of the story. Is 2020 Dystopian? maybe...
Paranormal
Hear me out on this one... in the years 1720, 1820, 1920, 2020, and several of the "20" years before that all had massive plagues. Clearly, the year '20 is cursed. Therefore.. would that make 2020 a paranormal story? Maybe...
Horror/Thriller
While the note should be made that horror is NOT the same thing as a thriller, i'll group these two together for the purpose of this blog post. While no one is frantically hiding behind a sketchy street corner waiting for the coronavirus to jump out at them, landing some kind of a jumpscare, 2020 could have horror aspects as does contain a lot of fright in the whole "get coronavirus and you might die". Regardless, I don't think it's quite spooky enough to constitute a horror/thriller genre, rather it might only have some aspects of the genre.
Fantasy
I'm going to label 2020 as not a fantasy right off the bat... we are on earth, there is no new made up world building, it's just real life. So therefore, it doesn't have enough qualities of fantasy to constitute a fantasy genre.
Romance
I highly doubt any normal person is 'falling in love' during this pandemic. Besides the occasional story of two people falling in love even as they are staying in far distance, I'm assuming you've heard of the story where a guy asks this girl on her roof on a date, etc etc, I don't think the 2020 year as a whole constitutes a romance genre. I'm sure you could write a fantastic romance based off the year, not that I would read it per say, but you certainly could. However, it really doesn't seem like 2020 is a romantic year for the majority of the population.
Comedy
Besides the fantastic memes that have resulted from the pandemic, there isn't much to laugh about a deadly virus that is currently spreading across the world. Sorry, Comedy Genre, 2020 isn't the one for you.
Science Fiction
Studying the race to pass on a vaccine to stop the coronavirus epidemic... that sounds like something resembling a science fiction book to me! However, there are no aliens or portals or laser guns, so maybe it's not extreme enough to be science fiction. I'm not really familiar with this genre.. you'll have to be the judge whether 2020 is or is not a science fiction.
What even is 2020?
Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like 2020 can fit into any one genre. There are too many different stories to tell that 2020 can't be covered by any one type of book. Too many different people, 2020 will be a different 'genre'. Yes, I am aware that this blog post was utterly useless and you just read this entire thing without even learning the answer to the question "what genre is 2020?". I'm sure that you can tell I've run out of things to write about on here. I hope you enjoyed reading this none the less, don't get the coronavirus, oh- and, wASH YOU HECKIN HANDS!
Emily
This is quite an interesting post. All of the points you bring up do make sense. 2020 so far is that type of year that doesn't fit into one category of craziness. One thing I would say is, I'm sure there is some "Romeo and Juliet Social Distance" story somewhere in the world right now. Besides that, good job!
ReplyDeleteNice post! I think this is a creative idea, and you did a good job breaking down the genres and saying what genres 2020 could be. I would say it's kind of like those dystopian prequels, where they go back to the beginning of the whole thing and tell you how everything started. If you think about it, 2020 could be the beginning of a dystopian where everything suddenly starts falling apart (But I have to say, you could be on to something with the '20 years being cursed). I also appreciate the PSA to wash your hands and not get corona virus.
ReplyDeleteGreat post! I wrote my post based on this one. I personally believe that 2020 is the book series "A Series of Unfortunate Events". Every month something bad happens, and it seems like even during the small breaks we get (Kimmy's a vegetable?), they still turn out to be bad (oh nah he's alive). So therefor, I believe that 2020 is a combination of every genre. There is a little bit of everything so far. Who knows whats in store for June?
ReplyDelete2020 has been by far the most interesting and roller coaster year of my life and that's really saying something since I have never had a normal life per say. I would categorize it as a prologue to a dystopian fiction as we are currently in the process of creating a world where most of the population has been wiped out to a killer virus and the economy has crashed and its every person for themselves now. It's scary to think about how corona was just a meme a few months ago and now its a full blown thing that has had detrimental effects on most of the world. I just hope they let me swim in the next few weeks otherwise I might go insane and speed up the process of devolving into a dystopian fiction book.
ReplyDeleteHahah I loved this post so much, it's so different and super creative. It's able to shed a little light on the situation and gives you something to think about. i really liked the part about 2020 being paranormal with the idea that the year 20 is cursed. You did a nice job at making it fun and detailed while breaking down the different genres. But yeah man 2020 has been quite an interesting year, wonder what will happen next. Great job!
ReplyDeleteThis is a really creative post and you pose a difficult but very interesting question. I agree that it's hard to classify 2020 into just one genre, and after checking out a wikihow article (https://www.wikihow.com/Determine-the-Genre-of-a-Book) about how to determine the genre of a book, I'm still not sure. However, there's so much of 2020 left, and it seems like we're living in a giant cliffhanger in a book that you just don't want to put down no matter how bad it gets. Overall, this was a great post!
ReplyDeleteThis was a funny idea, and I'm glad it was thought of before the end of the blogs. If I were to make it a movie, I think I would make a movie with a dystopian feel that ends up with a (hopefully) happy and relatively uneventful ending that seems pretty anticlimactic. I'm just predicting the future, that's it. Anyways, many bolognas to you!
ReplyDeleteThis is a really imaginative post! Obviously, when people said 2020 would be memorable, no one was expecting what was to come. I also can't believe we are only in May, yet it still feels like March is just ending. If this year gets any worse (which it probably will find some way), I will be convinced the universe is just messing with us. However, it is heartening to know that people are still able to shine light during these times.
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