Voices of "The Dead" - Comparing Film and Literature (PDF)

Seminar paper from the year 1990 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Comparative Literature, grade: very good, Ruhr-University of Bochum (English Seminar), course: Joyce - Dubliners and Protrait Of The Artist As A Young Man, language: English, abstract: In the last paragraph of the introduction it is said what this paper does not do but the exact aim of the study is not stated. This is, of course, not the ideal procedure how a "Seminararbeit" should be written - without having a specific aim in mind. My aim, in fact, was to compare Huston's film and Joyce's short-story in a way that made it possible to express some of the fascinating details of both. I did not know the results that this would lead to. To take the concept of 'point of view,' which exists both in literary and filmic theory, as a basis for comparison lead to a good and surprising result. It offered a way to do exactly what I wanted, that is simply to watch and to read. In this way the different techniques of the film and the story began to crystallize - or rather the way a reader or viewer was lead to an understanding.

The result was successful primarily because 'point of view' offers a metaphor which comprises seeing as well as telling and captures a notion of subjectivity as well as objectivity.

If one needed to state the aim of the paper the best would be to say that it was not to be lead by an idea but to let the film and the story have the lead and to see how their differences and characteristics would single out and the concept of 'point of view' is a concept which allows one to take up exactly that position as simply either a reader in the story or a viewer in the film.