Vol. 9 No. 1 (2021): Literary Photobooks: Theory and History

Literary photobooks are frequently described as paradigmatic cases of intermediality. Authors have defined intermediality as “intertextuality that transgresses media borders” and “intermodal relations in media”. In literary photobooks, at least two systems are densely related – the verbal system and photography. The word seems to be linked to the photographic image through a bidirectional interaction, involving mutually modulatory influences connecting word and photographic image. They create a coupled system that can be described as a new system, or a new genre. Designed and produced since the end of the 19th century, this kind of multimodal experiment (or literary intermedia genre), has attracted writers, photographers and designers, from several literary and artistic domains. In the last decades this phenomenon has become more and more popular, as witnessed by anthologies and book series in many publishers’ catalogues. The technological development of editing processes and digital printing, with smaller and cheaper print houses, the emergence of independent publishers using new distribution channels, including online networks, contributed to the rise and consolidation of the photobook as a significant contemporary genre. This special issue brings together experts from different fields of research (literary history and criticism, photography, semiotics, media studies, intermedia and multimodality studies), interested in the photobook as a specific literary genre.

Ana Luiza Fernandes (Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro)
Karl Erik Schollhammer (Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro)
João Queiroz (Federal University of Juiz de Fora)