LITERARY

TEXTS IN
MULTIMEDIA
PRESENTATION
Aug. 3, 2017
 The relationship between literary text and
media
 Before the multimedia presentation of literary
works existed, film was the most developed
medium, since it included the highest number of
singular media, or, in other words, of ways of
informing or influencing the user. That is why we
will consider the relationship between film and
literature and we will attempt to draw
conclusions which will refer to the multimedia
presentation of literary works.
 Media, especially film, have changed the
relationship between reader and book as well as
the literary reception of the text. They change
the literary value of a certain text. The access to
literature through media is becoming more
frequent, and so is the pushing aside of books.
Film and the media can reach all classes more
easily. A great number of literary texts in their
narrow sense are used today as the starting point
for media adaptations and thus lose their literary
autonomy.
 Around 1824 photography started to replace portrait,
which caused problems at the beginning. Photography
started to pursue art, but it took about a hundred
years to develop a media-specific use of the camera.
Portrait has stayed, as we know, as a specific art form.
After that, around 1895, film made an outbreak into
traditional art forms, which caused problems to the
theatre. The theatre has also stayed as a specific form
of art. Around 1945, television “forces” photography to
find a new market, to be competitive with the big
screen.
 Something similar happened with literature. Around 1900
literature underwent a period of crisis under the influence
of film (and photography). This was the period of realism
and naturalism when these “new” media could represent
reality in a more realistic way. However, this is when new
authors and new literary forms appeared. In the
20th century almost all literature and art movements had to
confront film. The issue is not whether literature is to be
replaced by media, but to restore the so far neglected area
of relationship between literature and media.
 Let us now look at some problems of adaptations of
literary works. When watching a film adaptation of a
novel we have read, we frequently have unrealistic
expectations. We usually expect the film to repeat, to
duplicate the experience we acquired by reading the
novel. This is, of course, impossible. The adaptation,
naturally, takes away some freshness from the original
by the very fact that it is a copy or a re-make which
starts from the original. But to obtain the real picture
of what the adaptation of a literary work can offer,
we have to study the factors that influence it.
 We have to expect certain changes from the fact itself that the
text, or the word, shifts to different medium. Since every
medium has its weaker and stronger spots, we have to be aware
of tat and attempt to transfer a work into a different medium in
using the stronger spots of that medium. Changes will occur, as
we have already stated, but they are inevitable. Even when the
author of the story writes the script himself, changes do occur,
and they occur at the very beginning. They are conditioned by
the length of the written text which has to be shortened in the
adaptation because of the nature of the text or of the medium
respectively. Of course, there are certain limits, and the original
text must be recognizable in the adaptation. In addition, some
texts are more suitable for adaptation than others.
 The viewers themselves, having read the original text
before watching the film, frequently create problems and
form attitudes that hinder them from enjoying watching the
film. From the above-mentioned literary theories it can be
deduced that reading itself is a creative process, too. As
readers, we have already created in our heads the images
of certain characters, dialogues and events. While reading,
some issues seemed more important than others. Now - a
new author, a director, prefers some different parts of the
story, presents the characters in such a way that they do
not represent any more what we have imagined or
experienced them to be.
The first problem that poses itself
is the problem of “point of view”.
It is very important, since it
defines the setting in motion of
the story. It is, actually, a question
about who is telling the story to
whom and how. It can be:
 The first person point of view - a character who takes part
in the story or observes it is telling us about it and is giving
his/her opinion.
 Theomniscient narrator point of view - the narrator knows
and can everything - even read minds and see different
places simultaneously.
 The third person limited point of view - the narrator knows
almost everything, but his possibility to read minds is
limited to one person. The thoughts of individual characters
are of great importance for a prose text, since in such a way
a specific character becomes the central one, and we can
follow the story through his eyes.
 4.The dramatic point of view - Here we are not aware
of the existence of the narrator, since the author does
not comment on the story, but he only describes a scene
by telling us what is going on and what the characters
say. In this way the reader has the impression of
witnessing the story.
 5.Stream of Consciousness or Interior Monologue - this
is a kind of first person narration, with the only
difference that the characters do not tell the story
consciously. It is, in fact, “an interior look”, as if there
was a microphone or a camera inside the hero.
 Literary texts in multimedia presentation
 In the very first attempts of multimedia presentation of
children’s stories we come across very different
combinations of media and different media solutions.
The basic difference between these stories and
“common” stories is in the fact that they are interactive
and dynamic. However, the first attempts of translating
works of children’s literature into multimedia
presentation consisted of a recorded story/voice which
would accompany static drawings. Some parts of the
drawings could be moved by using the mouse, and they
would then say something or produce a sound.
 Animation was frequently bad or inadequate (e.g. only the
mouth or the eyes could move). Examples of such
adaptations are the fairy-tales Little Red Riding Hood and
The Three Piglets - Bedtime Stories, Rainbow Technology).
They contained beginner’s drawbacks: e.g. the music or the
background sounds were frequently louder than the voice of
the narrator; the noises were at times very realistic or even
scary for the child, especially before bedtime (e.g. in Little
Red Riding Hood - cutting the wolf’s belly); pages could not
be skipped and the only way to go back to the beginning was
by listening to the story to the end.
 Itwas only possible to “jump” into another fairy-tale;
the characters, moved by the user, uttered their
sentences which were not connected with one
another, there was no dialogue; deviations from the
original text were considerable, and events were
retold, which considerably crippled the stories, etc.
  Write your comment in a one half crosswise.

“A multimedia adaptation of the original text must

take into consideration the original. Certain
differences are inevitable but it should not become
sheer entertainment. In addition, a literary work
requires identification with the lives of the
characters, which can be yet another way of
achieving excitement.”
Vladimira Velički