All That Is Solid Turns into Sand: <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> across Page and Screen
This paper attempts a close study of Abe Kobo’s novel <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> and its screen adaptation (dir. Teshigahara Hiroshi 1964). Engaging adaptation studies, media studies, and sound studies, this paper moves from the conventional focus on the linear transfer of text from a sou...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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MDPI AG
2022-11-01
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| Series: | Humanities |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/11/6/144 |
| _version_ | 1797457404548349952 |
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| author | Xinyi Zhao |
| author_facet | Xinyi Zhao |
| author_sort | Xinyi Zhao |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | This paper attempts a close study of Abe Kobo’s novel <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> and its screen adaptation (dir. Teshigahara Hiroshi 1964). Engaging adaptation studies, media studies, and sound studies, this paper moves from the conventional focus on the linear transfer of text from a source to a result, to examine adaptation as a multilevel, multisensory, and multidirectional process of remediation. By mediating documentary cinema and avant-garde tradition, the filmic adaptation, as the paper argues, not only provokes and enhances its literary original, but also illuminates existentialist concerns that gained critical currency in the 1960s. The paper moves on to analyze Takemitsu Toru’s score in relation to Teshigahara’s surrealist imagery; in doing so, it elucidates the way the film gives the sand a form of human agency alluded to yet not fully realized in Abe’s novel. Scrutiny of Abe and Takemitsu’s early years in Japan-occupied Manchuria further connects Abe’s work to the issue of postcolonial identity while opening <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> to more interpretative possibilities as an I-Novel. Through mediating collective history and personal memory, adaptation opens a dialogic intersubjective horizon where questions of identity and affect intersect in the post-war media environment. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-09T16:20:40Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-698cc83be281411e998586e60ca5c6d7 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2076-0787 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-09T16:20:40Z |
| publishDate | 2022-11-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Humanities |
| spelling | doaj.art-698cc83be281411e998586e60ca5c6d72023-11-24T15:17:04ZengMDPI AGHumanities2076-07872022-11-0111614410.3390/h11060144All That Is Solid Turns into Sand: <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> across Page and ScreenXinyi Zhao0Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, Columbia University, New York, NY 10027, USAThis paper attempts a close study of Abe Kobo’s novel <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> and its screen adaptation (dir. Teshigahara Hiroshi 1964). Engaging adaptation studies, media studies, and sound studies, this paper moves from the conventional focus on the linear transfer of text from a source to a result, to examine adaptation as a multilevel, multisensory, and multidirectional process of remediation. By mediating documentary cinema and avant-garde tradition, the filmic adaptation, as the paper argues, not only provokes and enhances its literary original, but also illuminates existentialist concerns that gained critical currency in the 1960s. The paper moves on to analyze Takemitsu Toru’s score in relation to Teshigahara’s surrealist imagery; in doing so, it elucidates the way the film gives the sand a form of human agency alluded to yet not fully realized in Abe’s novel. Scrutiny of Abe and Takemitsu’s early years in Japan-occupied Manchuria further connects Abe’s work to the issue of postcolonial identity while opening <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> to more interpretative possibilities as an I-Novel. Through mediating collective history and personal memory, adaptation opens a dialogic intersubjective horizon where questions of identity and affect intersect in the post-war media environment.https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/11/6/144Abe Koboadaptationfilm soundI-novelneo-documentarismJapanese literature |
| spellingShingle | Xinyi Zhao All That Is Solid Turns into Sand: <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> across Page and Screen Humanities Abe Kobo adaptation film sound I-novel neo-documentarism Japanese literature |
| title | All That Is Solid Turns into Sand: <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> across Page and Screen |
| title_full | All That Is Solid Turns into Sand: <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> across Page and Screen |
| title_fullStr | All That Is Solid Turns into Sand: <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> across Page and Screen |
| title_full_unstemmed | All That Is Solid Turns into Sand: <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> across Page and Screen |
| title_short | All That Is Solid Turns into Sand: <i>Woman in the Dunes</i> across Page and Screen |
| title_sort | all that is solid turns into sand i woman in the dunes i across page and screen |
| topic | Abe Kobo adaptation film sound I-novel neo-documentarism Japanese literature |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/11/6/144 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT xinyizhao allthatissolidturnsintosandiwomaninthedunesiacrosspageandscreen |