AUTOFICTION IN WORDS AND IMAGES: The Visual-Verbal Dialectic

Authors: Dix, H.

Pages: 87-98

DOI: 10.4324/9781003119739-9

Abstract:

This chapter argues that although most critical discussion of autofiction has focused on prose fiction, the consideration of autofiction in other media such as visual art, film and graphic novels has been gaining momentum. The chapter contributes to this process by fulfilling two aims. First it suggests that because autofiction is primarily identified as such paratextually, the identification of ‘author’ with ‘subject’ is enabled by a dialogue between two or more different works in the author’s oeuvre. Having established this, it goes on to argue that in examples of texts that integrate words and images, a visual-verbal dialectic is deployed, with each element contributing meaning in a different way. Through a reading of Pedro Almodóvar’s 2009 film Broken Embraces, Amy Sackville’s 2018 book Painter to the King and Siri Hustvedt’s 2014 novel The Blazing World the chapter identifies this visual-verbal dialectic as a particular form of autofictional intervention in specific areas of cultural politics.

Source: Scopus