Abstract The Buck Rogers in the 25th century A.D. comic strip first appeared in the newspapers on 7 January 1929, an important moment in the history of comics. It was the first science fiction comic strip, and, along with Tarzan – which curiously debuted in comics the same day – the first adventure comic. However, many people are unawere that the origins of Buck Rogers are not rooted in comic strips, but in popular literature. In fact, Anthony Rogers (not yet “Buck”) was the main character of two novellas published in the late 1920 s in Amazing stories, the first pulp magazine: Armageddon 2419 A.D. (August 1928) and its sequel, The airlords of Han (March 1929). At first, the stories in the daily comic strips closely followed those of the novels, but soon the Buck Rogers universe expanded to include the entire solar system and beyond. This expansion of the narrative world is particularly evident in the weekly charts published since 1930. Soon, Nowlan’s creature became a real transmedia character: in the following years Buck appeared in a radio drama series (aired from 1932 until 1947), in a 12-episode 1939 movie serial, as well as in a 1950/51 TV series. Toys, Big Little Books, pop-up books, and commercial gifts related to the character were produced, before the newspaper comic strip ended its run in 1967. In recent years, the character has been reeboted a couple of times, linked to the TV series of the late 1980 s and to a new comic book series starting in 2009. Buck Rogers thus found himself at the centre of a truly character-oriented franchise, showing how transmedia characters can be traced back almost to the origins of the modern cultural industry. The following article focuses on the features that distinguish Buck Rogers as a character and on the changes of his identity across media, presenting a revised version of an analytical model to investigate transmedia characters that has been developed in previous publications.
{"title":"Buck Rogers in the 25th century: Transmedia extensions of a pulp hero","authors":"P. Bertetti","doi":"10.1515/fns-2019-0013","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/fns-2019-0013","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The Buck Rogers in the 25th century A.D. comic strip first appeared in the newspapers on 7 January 1929, an important moment in the history of comics. It was the first science fiction comic strip, and, along with Tarzan – which curiously debuted in comics the same day – the first adventure comic. However, many people are unawere that the origins of Buck Rogers are not rooted in comic strips, but in popular literature. In fact, Anthony Rogers (not yet “Buck”) was the main character of two novellas published in the late 1920 s in Amazing stories, the first pulp magazine: Armageddon 2419 A.D. (August 1928) and its sequel, The airlords of Han (March 1929). At first, the stories in the daily comic strips closely followed those of the novels, but soon the Buck Rogers universe expanded to include the entire solar system and beyond. This expansion of the narrative world is particularly evident in the weekly charts published since 1930. Soon, Nowlan’s creature became a real transmedia character: in the following years Buck appeared in a radio drama series (aired from 1932 until 1947), in a 12-episode 1939 movie serial, as well as in a 1950/51 TV series. Toys, Big Little Books, pop-up books, and commercial gifts related to the character were produced, before the newspaper comic strip ended its run in 1967. In recent years, the character has been reeboted a couple of times, linked to the TV series of the late 1980 s and to a new comic book series starting in 2009. Buck Rogers thus found himself at the centre of a truly character-oriented franchise, showing how transmedia characters can be traced back almost to the origins of the modern cultural industry. The following article focuses on the features that distinguish Buck Rogers as a character and on the changes of his identity across media, presenting a revised version of an analytical model to investigate transmedia characters that has been developed in previous publications.","PeriodicalId":29849,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Narrative Studies","volume":"27 1","pages":"200 - 219"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2019-11-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83189954","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract Dealing with a de- or recontextualized cartoon affords media users a number of challenges and opportunities. The approach proposed here traces these effects not merely as consequences of universalized converging media, storyworlds, and transfictional or transdiegetic character models, but complements that view by reversing the question and asking which semiotic feats media users are invited to accomplish as they engage with a cartoon and gradually build consequences around that encounter. From a deduction of general properties applied to a specific instance, I move to abductions that generalize by departing from said instance. I propose distinguishing three different aspects of the phenomenon alongside three different questions that one might ask of a given cartoonish depiction of some character. By categorical deduction, one might first ask, “Who is this cartoon?” In a pragmaticist reversal that takes its cue from the semiotics of Charles Sanders Peirce, one might then ask, “What shall I do with this cartoon?” And finally, from a point of view that conceives of the transmedial aspects of the challenge by foregrounding the uncertainties that establish the decontextualized encounter in the first place, one might adapt a concept from Jacques Lacan’s psychoanalysis and ask, “Which tyche is this?”
{"title":"Which Donald is this? Which tyche is this? A semiotic approach to nomadic cartoonish characters","authors":"S. Packard","doi":"10.1515/fns-2019-0015","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/fns-2019-0015","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Dealing with a de- or recontextualized cartoon affords media users a number of challenges and opportunities. The approach proposed here traces these effects not merely as consequences of universalized converging media, storyworlds, and transfictional or transdiegetic character models, but complements that view by reversing the question and asking which semiotic feats media users are invited to accomplish as they engage with a cartoon and gradually build consequences around that encounter. From a deduction of general properties applied to a specific instance, I move to abductions that generalize by departing from said instance. I propose distinguishing three different aspects of the phenomenon alongside three different questions that one might ask of a given cartoonish depiction of some character. By categorical deduction, one might first ask, “Who is this cartoon?” In a pragmaticist reversal that takes its cue from the semiotics of Charles Sanders Peirce, one might then ask, “What shall I do with this cartoon?” And finally, from a point of view that conceives of the transmedial aspects of the challenge by foregrounding the uncertainties that establish the decontextualized encounter in the first place, one might adapt a concept from Jacques Lacan’s psychoanalysis and ask, “Which tyche is this?”","PeriodicalId":29849,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Narrative Studies","volume":"8 1","pages":"248 - 267"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2019-11-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87531639","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract The dominant turn towards transmediality across the contemporary media industries has brought a range of emerging digital innovations and new possibilities for telling stories, be it in interactive television experiences, apps, social media, and so on. Despite such rich possibilities, the transmedia phenomenon has also arguably led to a kind of indirect flattening out of how we now understand different media forms, platforms, stories, and even characters. This article will explore the character-building practices that have been employed in augmenting the televisual experience of The walking dead (2010–present) across platforms. It looks at The walking dead: Red machete (2017–2018), a six-part webisode series available on AMC’s website, the AMC Story Sync facility (2012–present), a double-screen application designed to enable audiences to post live comments about the episodes, respond to surveys, and talk to other audiences via a chat platform, and finally AMC’s Talking dead (2011–present), a 30-minute accompanying talk show. I demonstrate how these three examples of what I call augmented television draw on sociological and anthropological notions of communication, modern social life, and environment in ways that present chances for what I call sociological character-building.
{"title":"“We don’t get to stay the same way we started”: The walking dead, augmented television, and sociological character-building","authors":"M. Freeman","doi":"10.1515/fns-2019-0017","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/fns-2019-0017","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The dominant turn towards transmediality across the contemporary media industries has brought a range of emerging digital innovations and new possibilities for telling stories, be it in interactive television experiences, apps, social media, and so on. Despite such rich possibilities, the transmedia phenomenon has also arguably led to a kind of indirect flattening out of how we now understand different media forms, platforms, stories, and even characters. This article will explore the character-building practices that have been employed in augmenting the televisual experience of The walking dead (2010–present) across platforms. It looks at The walking dead: Red machete (2017–2018), a six-part webisode series available on AMC’s website, the AMC Story Sync facility (2012–present), a double-screen application designed to enable audiences to post live comments about the episodes, respond to surveys, and talk to other audiences via a chat platform, and finally AMC’s Talking dead (2011–present), a 30-minute accompanying talk show. I demonstrate how these three examples of what I call augmented television draw on sociological and anthropological notions of communication, modern social life, and environment in ways that present chances for what I call sociological character-building.","PeriodicalId":29849,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Narrative Studies","volume":"89 1","pages":"287 - 304"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2019-11-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"90960849","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract Since the late 1980 s, poets from the US and, to a lesser extent, the UK have increasingly featured superheroes in their work, mostly appropriating iconic figures along the lines of Batman or Superman and exploring some aspect of their personality (e. g., Batman’s relationship to Robin, Superman’s loneliness) in dramatic monologues. The prevailing if not sole account of this phenomenon argues that these characters provide a shared mythology to a generation of writers to whom biblical and classical references are no longer readily available. It also ties the superheroes’ provenance exclusively to the medium of comics. This latter point, in particular, is open to debate, insofar as since the late 1980 s, superheroes are, more than ever, part of media franchises that treat comic books as but one among many outlets. The present article hence views the superheroes in poetry not so much as an appropriation of comic book but of transmedia characters. Simon Armitage’s seminal poem “Kid” (1992), for instance – a diatribe by Robin directed at Batman’s dismissal of him – resonates as much with the 1960 s TV series or Tim Burton’s Batman films (1989, 1992) as with the dark knight’s reinvention at the hands of comic book writers such as Frank Miller or Alan Moore. At the same time, the article aims to locate the place of the seemingly insular genre of poetry within a “convergence culture” that disseminates superheroes in the media ecology. Evidently, the “superhero poems” are not licensed creations that partake in officially sanctioned transmedia networks. Neither, however, are they a product of fandom and participatory culture. Instead, I would suggest that poetry here tentatively engages with the media culture that has factored into its marginalization during the past decades.
{"title":"Versifying Batman: Superheroes in contemporary poetry","authors":"J. Thoss","doi":"10.1515/fns-2019-0016","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/fns-2019-0016","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Since the late 1980 s, poets from the US and, to a lesser extent, the UK have increasingly featured superheroes in their work, mostly appropriating iconic figures along the lines of Batman or Superman and exploring some aspect of their personality (e. g., Batman’s relationship to Robin, Superman’s loneliness) in dramatic monologues. The prevailing if not sole account of this phenomenon argues that these characters provide a shared mythology to a generation of writers to whom biblical and classical references are no longer readily available. It also ties the superheroes’ provenance exclusively to the medium of comics. This latter point, in particular, is open to debate, insofar as since the late 1980 s, superheroes are, more than ever, part of media franchises that treat comic books as but one among many outlets. The present article hence views the superheroes in poetry not so much as an appropriation of comic book but of transmedia characters. Simon Armitage’s seminal poem “Kid” (1992), for instance – a diatribe by Robin directed at Batman’s dismissal of him – resonates as much with the 1960 s TV series or Tim Burton’s Batman films (1989, 1992) as with the dark knight’s reinvention at the hands of comic book writers such as Frank Miller or Alan Moore. At the same time, the article aims to locate the place of the seemingly insular genre of poetry within a “convergence culture” that disseminates superheroes in the media ecology. Evidently, the “superhero poems” are not licensed creations that partake in officially sanctioned transmedia networks. Neither, however, are they a product of fandom and participatory culture. Instead, I would suggest that poetry here tentatively engages with the media culture that has factored into its marginalization during the past decades.","PeriodicalId":29849,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Narrative Studies","volume":"16 1","pages":"268 - 286"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2019-11-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75531184","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract This article proposes to take a closer look at a variety of contemporary Japanese “character” franchises which cannot be accounted for if the entities in question are primarily understood with reference to diegetic worlds or stories. Rather, virtual idols like Hatsune Miku, fictional mascots like Kumamon, or notorious product placement figures such as Hello Kitty all seem to circulate mostly on non-narrative artifacts such as clothes, office supplies, or decontextualized artworks, and within mediated performances such as stage musicals, cosplay, or public appearances in full-body suits. They are nevertheless quite typical for the Japanese “media mix” franchising model, designed to allow for user-level reshuffling and reenactment. Such “characters without stories,” or kyara, are thus best understood as “mediated performers,” as fictional actors that can take on any fictional role attributed to them within the participatory cultures and collective creations of fan manga (dōjinshi), fan artworks, or even cosplay. Theorists such as Itō (2005) or Azuma (2009) therefore differentiate sharply between kyarakutā und kyara, the latter being a pre- or meta-narrative “nodal point” for diverging games of make-believe. Kyara can just as easily be enacted and performed as they can be brought back into narrative (kyarakutā) contexts. The following article relates and contrast these notions to international (“Western”) character theories and argues for their relevance beyond “exotic” Japanese contexts.
{"title":"Kyara revisited: The pre-narrative character-state of Japanese character theory","authors":"Lukas R. A. Wilde","doi":"10.1515/fns-2019-0014","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/fns-2019-0014","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This article proposes to take a closer look at a variety of contemporary Japanese “character” franchises which cannot be accounted for if the entities in question are primarily understood with reference to diegetic worlds or stories. Rather, virtual idols like Hatsune Miku, fictional mascots like Kumamon, or notorious product placement figures such as Hello Kitty all seem to circulate mostly on non-narrative artifacts such as clothes, office supplies, or decontextualized artworks, and within mediated performances such as stage musicals, cosplay, or public appearances in full-body suits. They are nevertheless quite typical for the Japanese “media mix” franchising model, designed to allow for user-level reshuffling and reenactment. Such “characters without stories,” or kyara, are thus best understood as “mediated performers,” as fictional actors that can take on any fictional role attributed to them within the participatory cultures and collective creations of fan manga (dōjinshi), fan artworks, or even cosplay. Theorists such as Itō (2005) or Azuma (2009) therefore differentiate sharply between kyarakutā und kyara, the latter being a pre- or meta-narrative “nodal point” for diverging games of make-believe. Kyara can just as easily be enacted and performed as they can be brought back into narrative (kyarakutā) contexts. The following article relates and contrast these notions to international (“Western”) character theories and argues for their relevance beyond “exotic” Japanese contexts.","PeriodicalId":29849,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Narrative Studies","volume":"19 1","pages":"220 - 247"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2019-11-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74777644","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract This article sketches a theoretical framework and method for the analysis of transmedia characters that focuses on specific instantiations of these characters in individual media texts, before asking how these local work-specific characters relate to other local work-specific characters or coalesce into glocal transmedia characters as part of global transmedia character networks, thus evading what one could consider an undue emphasis on the “model of the single character” when analyzing the various characters that are, for example called Sherlock Holmes, Batman, or Lara Croft. The connections between these work-specific characters within transmedia character network could then be described as either relations of redundancy, relations of expansion, or relations of modification – with only redundancy and expansion allowing for medial representations of work-specific characters to contribute to the representation of a single transmedia character. In intersubjectively constructing characters across media, however, recipients will not only take into account powerful normative discourses that police the representation of characters across media but also draw on their accumulated knowledge about previously represented work-specific or transmedia characters as well as about transmedia character templates and even more general transmedia character types.
{"title":"Transmedia characters: Theory and analysis","authors":"Jan-Noël Thon","doi":"10.1515/fns-2019-0012","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/fns-2019-0012","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This article sketches a theoretical framework and method for the analysis of transmedia characters that focuses on specific instantiations of these characters in individual media texts, before asking how these local work-specific characters relate to other local work-specific characters or coalesce into glocal transmedia characters as part of global transmedia character networks, thus evading what one could consider an undue emphasis on the “model of the single character” when analyzing the various characters that are, for example called Sherlock Holmes, Batman, or Lara Croft. The connections between these work-specific characters within transmedia character network could then be described as either relations of redundancy, relations of expansion, or relations of modification – with only redundancy and expansion allowing for medial representations of work-specific characters to contribute to the representation of a single transmedia character. In intersubjectively constructing characters across media, however, recipients will not only take into account powerful normative discourses that police the representation of characters across media but also draw on their accumulated knowledge about previously represented work-specific or transmedia characters as well as about transmedia character templates and even more general transmedia character types.","PeriodicalId":29849,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Narrative Studies","volume":"8 1","pages":"176 - 199"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2019-11-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78360565","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Contemporary media culture is fundamentally shaped by a technological and cultural media convergence that has also led to the continued rise of transmedia franchises such as The lord of the rings or Harry Potter, Star wars or A song of ice and fire/Game of thrones, The walking dead or Doctor who, the DC or Marvel universes,Warcraft or Tomb raider. During the past decade, literary, media, and cultural studies have increasingly become aware of the socio-cultural significance of these franchises as well as of the considerable theoretical and methodological challenges their study presents. A range of book-length studies by scholars such as Henry Jenkins (2006), Kristin Thompson (2007), Robert A. Brookey (2010), Elizabeth Evans (2011), Mark J. P. Wolf (2012), Derek Johnson (2013), Colin B. Harvey (2015), Matthew Freeman (2016), or Dan Hassler-Forest (2016) examine important aspects of the production, aesthetics, and reception of transmedia franchises in convergent media culture. Yet, while virtually all of these studies mention characters at some point and there is a solid consensus that characters fulfil key integrating functions for many transmedia franchises, their reception, and the continued engagement of their fans within networks of collaborative creation, there is as of yet comparatively little research that focuses specifically on the forms and functions of characters across media (see, however, the discussion of “intertextual characters” in Margolin 1996; of “transtextual characters” in Richardson 2010; or of “transmedia characters” in Bertetti 2014; as well as various in-depth studies of “character-focused” franchises such as Brooker 2012, 2013; Condry 2009; Denson 2014; Hills 2010, 2015; Pearson 2015; Steinberg 2012). This is of course not to say that there are no attempts aimed toward a better understanding of the forms and functions of characters in different media. While it may still be true “that many have written only a little and only a few have written much on characters” (Eder 2008 a: 40; “dass viele nur wenig und nur wenige viel zum Bereich der Figur geschrieben haben”), we now have a range of mediumspecific theories of characters not only in literary texts and theatrical perfor-
从根本上说，当代媒体文化是由技术和文化媒体的融合所塑造的，这也导致了跨媒体特许经营权的持续崛起，如《指环王》或《哈利波特》，《星球大战》或《冰与火之歌》/《权力的游戏》，《行尸走肉》或《神秘博士》，DC或漫威宇宙，《魔兽》或《古墓丽影》。在过去的十年里，文学、媒体和文化研究越来越多地意识到这些特许经营的社会文化意义，以及他们的研究所带来的相当大的理论和方法挑战。Henry Jenkins(2006)、Kristin Thompson(2007)、Robert A. Brookey(2010)、Elizabeth Evans(2011)、Mark J. P. Wolf(2012)、Derek Johnson(2013)、Colin B. Harvey(2015)、Matthew Freeman(2016)或Dan Hassler-Forest(2016)等学者进行了一系列著作式的研究，研究了融合媒体文化中跨媒体特许经营的制作、美学和接受的重要方面。然而，尽管几乎所有这些研究都提到了角色，并且有一个可靠的共识，即角色在许多跨媒体授权中发挥着关键的整合功能，它们的接受度，以及它们的粉丝在合作创作网络中的持续参与，但相对而言，专注于跨媒体角色的形式和功能的研究相对较少(然而，参见Margolin 1996中关于“互文角色”的讨论;Richardson(2010)的“跨文本人物”;或者Bertetti 2014年的“跨媒体角色”;以及对“以角色为中心”的特许经营的各种深入研究，如Brooker 2012、2013;Condry 2009;Denson 2014;希尔斯2010、2015;皮尔森2015;斯坦伯格2012)。当然，这并不是说我们没有尝试去更好地理解不同媒体中角色的形式和功能。虽然“许多人只写了一点点，只有少数人在字符上写得很多”(埃德尔2008年a: 40;" dass viele nur wenig und nur wenige viel zum Bereich der Figur geschrieben haben ")，我们现在有了一系列中等具体的人物理论，不仅在文学文本和戏剧表演中
{"title":"Introduction: Characters across media","authors":"Jan-Noël Thon, Lukas R. A. Wilde","doi":"10.1515/fns-2019-0011","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/fns-2019-0011","url":null,"abstract":"Contemporary media culture is fundamentally shaped by a technological and cultural media convergence that has also led to the continued rise of transmedia franchises such as The lord of the rings or Harry Potter, Star wars or A song of ice and fire/Game of thrones, The walking dead or Doctor who, the DC or Marvel universes,Warcraft or Tomb raider. During the past decade, literary, media, and cultural studies have increasingly become aware of the socio-cultural significance of these franchises as well as of the considerable theoretical and methodological challenges their study presents. A range of book-length studies by scholars such as Henry Jenkins (2006), Kristin Thompson (2007), Robert A. Brookey (2010), Elizabeth Evans (2011), Mark J. P. Wolf (2012), Derek Johnson (2013), Colin B. Harvey (2015), Matthew Freeman (2016), or Dan Hassler-Forest (2016) examine important aspects of the production, aesthetics, and reception of transmedia franchises in convergent media culture. Yet, while virtually all of these studies mention characters at some point and there is a solid consensus that characters fulfil key integrating functions for many transmedia franchises, their reception, and the continued engagement of their fans within networks of collaborative creation, there is as of yet comparatively little research that focuses specifically on the forms and functions of characters across media (see, however, the discussion of “intertextual characters” in Margolin 1996; of “transtextual characters” in Richardson 2010; or of “transmedia characters” in Bertetti 2014; as well as various in-depth studies of “character-focused” franchises such as Brooker 2012, 2013; Condry 2009; Denson 2014; Hills 2010, 2015; Pearson 2015; Steinberg 2012). This is of course not to say that there are no attempts aimed toward a better understanding of the forms and functions of characters in different media. While it may still be true “that many have written only a little and only a few have written much on characters” (Eder 2008 a: 40; “dass viele nur wenig und nur wenige viel zum Bereich der Figur geschrieben haben”), we now have a range of mediumspecific theories of characters not only in literary texts and theatrical perfor-","PeriodicalId":29849,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Narrative Studies","volume":"25 1","pages":"169 - 175"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2019-11-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78043367","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract This article aims to characterize a commonly misunderstood and neglected critique of narratology and insists that the critique could advance the narratological discussions if taken more seriously. I describe the notions of three individual critics and one group of critics and their suggested alternatives to what they hold to be the dominating description of narrative fiction in narratology. In turn, I take up Sylvie Patron’s linguistic approach, Lars-Åke Skalin’s aesthetic approach, and Richard Walsh’s pragmatic approach, as well as unnatural narratology (which is less radical), and suggest that they have a Difference approach to narrative fiction. The critique is contrasted with what I refer to as a Sameness approach, guiding the dominating description of narrative fiction in narratology. The Sameness approach relates novels and short stories to a notion of a default mode of “narrative” which is based on situated speech about something that has happened. This is, according to the critics, a mistake. The main thrust of the critics, although with some exceptions, is instead that narrative fiction needs to be approached as sui generis in order to be described effectively. Yet how this should be done is still open for debate.
{"title":"The critique of the common theory of narrative fiction in narratology: Pursuing difference","authors":"Tommy Sandberg","doi":"10.1515/fns-2019-0003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/fns-2019-0003","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This article aims to characterize a commonly misunderstood and neglected critique of narratology and insists that the critique could advance the narratological discussions if taken more seriously. I describe the notions of three individual critics and one group of critics and their suggested alternatives to what they hold to be the dominating description of narrative fiction in narratology. In turn, I take up Sylvie Patron’s linguistic approach, Lars-Åke Skalin’s aesthetic approach, and Richard Walsh’s pragmatic approach, as well as unnatural narratology (which is less radical), and suggest that they have a Difference approach to narrative fiction. The critique is contrasted with what I refer to as a Sameness approach, guiding the dominating description of narrative fiction in narratology. The Sameness approach relates novels and short stories to a notion of a default mode of “narrative” which is based on situated speech about something that has happened. This is, according to the critics, a mistake. The main thrust of the critics, although with some exceptions, is instead that narrative fiction needs to be approached as sui generis in order to be described effectively. Yet how this should be done is still open for debate.","PeriodicalId":29849,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Narrative Studies","volume":"228 1","pages":"17 - 34"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2019-07-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"89196608","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Corrigendum to: Mapped stories: Cartography, history, and the representation of time in space","authors":"P. Carrard","doi":"10.1515/fns-2019-8888","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/fns-2019-8888","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":29849,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Narrative Studies","volume":"23 1","pages":"166 - 168"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2019-07-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"72632333","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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