Literary style in the novel and on the screen: The intersemiotic translation of Far from the Madding Crowd

Since Roman Jakobson’s classification of intersemiotic translation as a sub-category of translation, the term has paved the way for many studies on the close relationship between literature and cinema. Among different semiotic systems, the adaptation of literary works to the cinema occupies a central position in intersemiotic translation. In this respect, the present study approaches Far from the Madding Crowd directed by Thomas Vinterberg in 2015 as an intersemiotic translation of Thomas Hardy’s novel under the same title. It aims to evaluate how Hardy’s two major stylistic markers in the novel, i.e. sentence structure and imagery, are brought to the film by Vinterberg. To this end, the notions of transfer and intersemiotic transposition were used to identify related stylistic components in the novel and to compare them with their visual representations in the film. Thus, Vinterberg’s specific choices in reflecting Hardy’s literary style were analyzed. The findings of the present study suggest that Vinterberg paid attention to Hardy’s literary style and attempted to transfer it to the film to a large extent, as he reflected the writer’s sentence structure and imagery through various visual and auditory tools. However, it can be also observed that possibly due to the limited duration of the film, Vinterberg sometimes had to avoid transferring Hardy’s elaborate narration in some scenes.

Keywords:

intersemiotic translation, transposition, stylistic analysis, Victorian literature Thomas Hardy,

PDF

___

Aguilar, C. (2015, May 1). A love affair between Thomas Hardy and Thomas Vinterberg: Far from the madding crowd. MovieMaker. https://www.moviemaker.com/thomas-vinterberg-far-from-the-madding-crowd/
Benyoucef, D. (2021). The ecological thought of Thomas Hardy: A comparative study of his selected novels and their movie adaptations [Unpublished doctoral dissertation]. University of Glasgow.
Bluestone, G. (1961). Novels into films. University of California Press.
Carelse, M. (2017). Vanity, gender politics, and fate: Origins of suffering in Far from the madding crowd and its film adaptations. The Albatross, (7), 30-41.
Chapman, R. (1990). The language of Thomas Hardy. Macmillan.
Childs, P., & Fowler, R. (2006). The Routledge dictionary of literary terms. Routledge.
Clüver, C., & Watson, B. (1989). On intersemiotic transposition. Poetics Today, 10 (1), 55-90.
Elliott, K. (2004). Novels, films, and the word/image wars. In R. Stam & A. Raengo (Eds.), A companion to literature and film (pp. 1-22). Blackwell Publishing.
Galpin, S. A. (2020). 200 miles outside London: The tourist gaze of Far from the madding crowd. In M. Stewart & R. Munro (Eds.), Intercultural screen adaptation: British and global case studies (pp. 46-63). Edinburgh University Press.
Gatrell, S. (1990). Hardy the creator: Far from the madding crowd. In D. Kramer (Ed.), Critical approaches to the fiction of Thomas Hardy (pp. 74-98). Macmillan.
Hardy, T. (2005). Far from the madding crowd. ICON Classics.
Hartwell, P. M. (1970). A quantitative approach to Thomas Hardy's prose style. College Composition and Communication, 21 (2), 150-156.
Hunter, A. (2015, May 1). Far from the madding crowd review: Thomas Hardy's tale is a real crowd-pleaser. Daily Express.
http://www.express.co.uk/entertainment/films/574218/Far-From-The-Madding-Crowd-review-starring-Carey-Mulligan-Matthias-Schoenaerts
Indiewire Contributor. (2015, April 29). Thomas Vinterberg talks Far from the madding crowd, working with Carey Mulligan, ‘The Commune’ & more. Indiewire. http://www.indiewire.com/2015/04/interview-thomas-vinterberg-talks-far-from-the-madding-crowd-working-with-carey-mulligan-the-commune-more-264583/
Jakobson, R. (2000). On linguistic aspects of translation. In L. Venuti (Ed.), The translation studies reader (pp. 113-118). Routledge.
McFarlane, B. (1996). Novel to film: An introduction to the theory of adaptation. Clarendon Press.
Niemeyer, P. J. (2019). What we see him: Boldwood and the role of the man in two film adaptations of Far from the madding crowd. The Thomas Hardy Journal, 35, 53-73.
Pinion, F. B. (1968). A Hardy companion: A guide to the works of Thomas Hardy and their background. St. Martin’s Press.
Pinion, F. B. (1977). Thomas Hardy: Art and thought. Macmillan.
Rokosz-Piejko, E. (2020). When ‘a pastoral romance’ becomes ‘a classic love story’: Thomas Vinterberg and David Nicholls’ 2015 adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s Far from the madding crowd. Tematy i Konteksty, 10 (15), 483-494. https://doi.org/10.15584/tik.2020.35.
Tymoczko, M. (2006). Reconceptualizing western translation theory: Integrating non-western thought about translation. In Theo Hermans (Ed.), Translating others: Volume I (pp. 13-32). Routledge.
Vinterberg, T. (2015, May 1). Far from the madding crowd: how Wessex was won. The Telegraph. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/film/far-from-the-madding-crowd-2015/carey-mulligan-behind-the-scenes