Phototextuality and the uses of literature in the modernist period 2

17 Maio 2018, 10:00 • Ângela Fernandes

The first part of the class is dedicated to chapter 5 of Mitchell’s Picture Theory, and in particular to Mitchell’s reading of ekphrasis as ways of dealing with otherness, and to his discussion of what he calls a confusion between “differences in medium” and “differences in meaning”.

The second part of this session is dedicated to word-image interactions in illustrated novels from the middle of the nineteenth century onwards. The class is based upon a thorough discussion of the opening chapter of Stuart Sillars, Visualisation in popular Fiction 1850-1960. Graphic narratives, fictional images (London, Routledge, 1995). Topics that are discussed include the cultural prejudices behind the relative neglect of the role of pictures in works of fiction, the multiple functions of illustrations in narrative fiction, the applicability of the concept of “unified discourse of word and image” proposed by Sillars, and the possibilities of a narratological analysis of this unified discourse. The students prepare the discussion on the topic of the session on the basis of a number of questions.