Percorsi della narratività/letterarietà nell’epoca transmediale. Dagli studi narratologici al caso di Game of Thrones

Authors

  • Anna De Biasio

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.13136/2281-4582/2020.i16.908

Keywords:

Transmedia narratology, Game of Thrones, transauthorship, adaptation, literariness

Abstract

The essay is divided into two parts. The first section offers a review of some influential narratological studies that in the last two decades have dealt with the challenge posed by transmediality. Special attention is given to key-concepts such as ‘storyworld,’ ‘narrativity,’ and more media-neutral descriptions of the functioning of the narrative voice and perspective. The discussion stresses the apparent marginalization of the literary model, which in fact re-emerges as an essential reference point of ‘postclassical narratology.’ The second part of the essay focuses on the television show Game of Thrones (2011-2019) as an adaptation of the fantasy novel series A Song of Ice and Fire (1996-2011) by George R. R. Martin. The first part of the analysis discusses collective authorship (or ‘transauthorship’) as a typical phenomenon of transmedia narratives, emphasizing the conflicts that it may entail. The second part of the analysis examines the pilot of Game of Thrones in a (neo-)narratological perspective, paying special attention to the audiovisual adaptation of Martin’s use of the limited point of view. The empowerment of the level of discourse in the episode has the paradoxical effect of increasing its ‘literariness,’ in the sense of the density and porosity of form. The second part of the essay, therefore, reinforces the relevance—at several levels—of the literary model to the comprehension of transmedia narratives.

Author Biography

Anna De Biasio

Anna De Biasio è ricercatrice di letteratura anglo-americana all’Università di Bergamo. Si è occupata di narrativa dell’Ottocento e in particolare dell’opera di Henry James (Romanzi e musei. Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry James e il rapporto con l’arte, IVSLA 2006; Transforming Henry James, Cambridge Scholars Publishing 2013). La sua monografia più recente è Le implacabili. Violenze al femminile nella letteratura americana tra Otto e Novecento (Donzelli 2016). Ha curato l’edizione di Sherwood Anderson, L’uomo diventato donna e altri racconti (Marsilio 2020).

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Published

2020-12-17