For a Transmedial Narratology

Abstract

At a time when narratology is making its way beyond the limits of literary studies, this article addresses the need to maintain a comparative approach to the media. This approach allows, on the one hand, to reconsider fundamental notions such as that of the narrator, the point of view, the focalization, and, on the other, to understand the specificities of each medium in its way of embodying stories. The text also exposes the importance, through this comparative analysis, of defining the fundamental elements of narrativity, whatever the substance that the story conveys. Considering the place enjoyed by the narrative form in our society, the article advocates, within an interdisciplinary horizon, for a better general understanding of the forms and functions of narrative productions.

[Translation of the article “Pour une naratologie transmédiale” published in Poétique #182 (January 2017, pp. 155-175, https://doi.org/10.3917/poeti.182.0155)]