What I Do. Part I

As I suspected, updating the blog has fallen to the wayside. There's just much other stuff to deal with (including the football World Cup). But here, finally, is the promised presentation of what my project is about.

Method and Theory
Studying adaptations of Shakespearean plays naturally brought me to study adaptation theory. I found that modern adaptation theory, with its postmodern outlook, shares a few ideas with me. First and foremost is the notion that "originals" and "adaptations" should be treated on equal terms from a theoretical viewpoint. They may not be equally valuable, but unless proven otherwise they are equally valid. The former is, a priori, irrelevant while the latter is a necessity. This view, however, has certain terminological challenges.

The word "adaptation" suggests that a) something has been transformed, and b) that it has been accomodated, made more suitable for some purpose or other. Both of these senses are probably misleading when it comes to the way that "adaptation" actually works. First, an "adaptation" does not actually change an "original." Instead, we arrive at a situation where there are two different works between which a tension arises, a tension which is interesting to analyse, formally, aesthetically and socio-historically. A play is not an old car which has been pimped: it is a new, individual car, built according to current standards, with current tools and notions of aesthetics. Further, adaptations of plays need not be made suitable, as per the definition of the word: "ad-apt" = "to-fit". Frequently, an adaptation will fly in the face both of what is aesthetically acceptable today and what is acceptable as presentations of older material. It is possible to say that Shakespeare does not make for good comic books or films, and that films and comic books do not make for good Shakespeares (very simply put). What makes an adaptation of a Shakespeare play valid or valuable is a question I shall return to at a later stage.

Another somewhat damaging aspect of the term "adaptation" is that it usually relates to an "original". Adaptation theorists tend to eschew this term, because it just does not sit right after Deconstruction, Derrida, et al. Yet, they have not been able to find a satisfactory alternative. Finally, "adaptation" is problematical because it lacks proper theoretical demarcation. Some tend to think of it as a freely applicable term (something along the lines of intertextuality), while others use it specifically to denote transmediation (a play appearing in a different medium). Others again, use it to describe plays that are markedly different from the "original," but still in the same medium, while others propose "appropriation" for such usage. This has led to endless and mostly fruitless debates about when something is what. To take a stance within this debate seemed to me unwise.

I needed a new term, and I found one: configuration.

This, of course, is what your computer sometimes does when you start it up. The OED definition, however, is that to configure is "to fashion according to something else as a model". This insight provided me with a number of new tools with which I could explore "adaptation" in greater detail, while also allowing me to do away with certain time-consuming and inane discussions. Neil Gaiman's Sandman, for instance, deals with Shakespeare in a way which is part adaptation, part allusion, part appropriation and part biographical fun and games. Instead of working out what is what, I can move on to talk sensibly (I hope) about how this takes place, and what its effects are (on the comics, as a dialogue with a high cultural canon, for the reader). Even in this case, unfortunately, I need to negotiate a place for "configuration" among other terms that describe how texts and artworks interrelate, such as intertextuality, parody, influence and pastiche.

That, however, will be next time. Until then, ta-ra.

Welcome

Norwegian academics have been accused of being invisible in social media such as blogs and Twitter. This is my modest contribution to rectifying that situation. Now it only remains to see if anybody will ever bother following this blog - and more importantly - whether I'll remember to update it from time to time.

I am currently working on a Doctoral Thesis where I explore how Shakespeare is adaptded into comic books. My first proper post, due shortly, will be a presentation of how I challenge received notions about "adaptation," and how I move from this discussion into an exploration of iconotextual forms. Edge-of-your-seat excitement, in other words.