THE STRUCTURE OF THE FANTÔMAS NOVEL SERIES BY PIERRE SOUVESTRE AND MARCEL ALLAIN AND THE PROBLEM OF SERIALITY IN POPULAR LITERATURE
Journal Title: Studia Litterarum - Year 2017, Vol 2, Issue 4
Abstract
The essay examines the structure of a 32-volume series of Fantômas novels created by Pierre Souvestre and Marcel Allain; it traces the origins and development of the serial genre and generic novelties related to seriality. The latter include a relative autonomy of each story in each volume and interconnection of the volumes via the figure of the criminal “slipping away” from the hands of justice. The study compares poetological techniques of the fabula development and points out specific features of the Belle époque reality as represented through the introduction of recognizable “cultural signs,” variations of everyday incidents, and newspaper chronicle of criminal events. It also analyzes the image of Fantômas and other recurrent characters of the series (such as Juve, Fandor, Hélène, Lady Maud Beltham, etc). The authors examine para-literary features that can be traced in many other different forms such as TV series and graphic novels. They include (1) mythologization of the main character as embodiment of Evil, or a “criminal genius”; (2) confusion of the real and the fictional, verisimilar and extraordinary, horrible and comic based on the variations of literary and journalistic clichés; (3) repetition of plot patterns, (4) attempts to guess and to meet reader’s expectations.
Authors and Affiliations
Kirill A. Chekalov
Keywords
Related Articles
- EP ID EP26187
- DOI 10.22455/2500-4247-2017-2-4-114-133
- Views 387
- Downloads 15
GOGOL: ACADEMIC AND COMPLETE
The ever-increasing international interest to Gogol explains the necessity of publishing a new edition of his works. The present Complete Collection of Gogol’s Works and Letters is an academic edition prepared and publ...
The Spirit of Laws and the Debate about Russian Despotism
The fate of The Spirit of Laws by Ch.-L. Montesquieu in Russia in the second half of the 18th century is an example of ambiguous reception that the French enlightener and his ideas received at that time prompting both...
THE FORMS OF PROSAIC SPEECH IN AL-SĪRA BY IBN ISHĀQ — IBN HISHĀM
The present article offers an analysis of forms of prosaic speech, seeing them as an important means for producing the literary/historical narrative of “The Life of the Prophet” (Al-sīra al-Nabawiyya) by Ibn Ishāq (d.150...
“YOUR P.C.W.” THE UNPUBLISHED LETTERS OF PAUL SCHEERBART TO ERICH MÜHSAM
The archive of a German writer and anarchist Erich Mühsam (1878– 1934) is a signifcant but “unexplored” part of the manuscript collection of the A. M. Gorky Institute of World Literature of the Russian Academy of Scien...
FATES AND BIOGRAPHIES OF THE AVANT‑GARDE ERA: INGEBORG PRIOR’S SOPHIE’S LEGACY. FROM HANOVER TO This is an open access article SIBERIA. A TRAGIC STORY OF SOPHIE distributed under the Creative LISSITZKY-KÜPPERS AND HER STOLEN PAINTINGS. (NOVOSIBIRSK: “SVIN’IN AND SONS,” 2016. 352 р.)
The article was prepared with the support of the Russian Foundation for The article was prepared with the support of the Russian Foundation for Humanities; project no № 16-04-00268: “Siberian avant-garde of the 1920s...