Ozoneocean at 12:06AM, May 20, 2020

I agree. Realistic fiction is often pretty stylised in its own way.

EssayBee at 9:23AM, May 19, 2020

Even quiet, "normal" fiction can tackle bigger ideas through subtext. Hemingway did it a lot. "Big Two-Hearted River" is a prime example, where, on the surface, it just seems to be about a fishing trip, but if you dig beneath the surface, you can uncover a commentary on war and its effects on people. That said, genre fiction is probably the easiest way to write about "big" ideas, since a lot of sci-fi is plotted around the idea of a "high concept" instead of around its characters or being bound by a sense of realism. (Of course, whether "realistic" fiction is truly more realistic than more fantastic fiction could be a subject unto itself.)