Digital adaptations of literary works possess an ambiguous status in education. Even though they have been in use several decades, their impact on learning is not sufficiently studied. Apart from lacking technological confidence, educators are skeptical about viewing digital texts as relevant to literary discourse. In their turn, developers are not always interested in fitting the school needs and tend to market their products as innovations. The study aims to provide a semiotic framework for regarding digital adaptations in a wider context of cultural autocommunication and placing them in the system of literary education. Existing examples of digital adaptations are collected, classified and analyzed.
The acknowledgement of literary discourse as an integral part of
the overall media landscape challenges the conventional
understanding of the literariness [
Digital adaptation can be seen as part of the universal cultural
process. In the tradition of the Tartu-Moscow semiotic school,
selfdescription is considered a fundamental principle of culture also
known as cultural autocommunication – “a process of
interpretation, mediation, deformation, elimination” of primary and
secondary texts [
The mnemonic and creative functions of cultural
autocommunication are not always recognized by the system of
literary education. Since the “translation from one system of text to
another always includes a certain element of untranslatability” [
The lack of the established terminology complicates the identification of digital adaptations. To create the current selection (Table 1), two methods were used. Some of the digital adaptations were found in iTunes’ catalog under the sections Books, Education, Entertainment. The others were revealed through the direct search on Google using keywords such as “interactive books”, “digital books”, “digital literature”, “digital adaptations”.
The study focuses on the products that include the full-length text or, at least, the full story. In order to be placed on the list, an adaptation needs to fit the following requirements: to be based on previously existent literary work; to present the whole story in a full or abridged version; to be released in last ten years; to challenge the traditional practices of reading and learning; to be suitable for literary education in middle or high school; to have an Englishlanguage version.
At the next stage, the adaptations were divided into three large
groups based on Bolter and Grusin’s remediation theory.
According to the scholars, the rivalry between media may be
described as duplication, enhancement, refashioning, or absorption
[
Sherlock Holmes for the iPad S. Holmes The Raven (HD) The Great Gatsby interactive book A Clockwork Orange iPad App Jack Kerouac's On the Road James Joyce – The Dead Joyce’s Ulysses: A Guide Poems by Heart Shakespeare Starting Shakespeare The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education Education
80 Days
The idea of consistency between printed media and digital adaptations is reluctantly acknowledged by some developers and educators. At the same time, it allows not only revealing certain heredity, but also discovering global trends, instead of thinking in terms of specific media formats.
Developers tend to overemphasize the novelty of their products and adhere to rhetoric rather than to the objective description. In order to reveal the real nature of the object, a researcher has to filter out loud claims about „interactiveness“ or „innovation“ and focus on the structure of the product, its relation to more traditional media and its contribution to current practices or reading.
The final selection includes 58 digital adaptations which are divided into three groups. Enhanced books (27 items) include illustrated storybooks, multimedia collections, and reading platforms. Refashioning (19 items) is exemplified by transmedia environments, multitext editions and AR-products. Absorption (12 items) is presented in social media retellings, interactive fiction and video games. While the first type is the closest to the medium of the book, the third type is the most distant from it.
Simpler digital adaptations make the majority of the selection. Of all products, 27 may be described as slightly enhanced e-books, in contrast to only 4 literary video games. Almost all adaptations may be referred to as edutainment products, with each adaptation standing closer either to the education or entertainment pole. However, the borderline is not clear. Even though products in iTunes are targeted as either educational or entertaining, this is not necessarily related to their content. In most cases, their dominant function could also be derived from the description of the product or the profile of its developer (for instance, universities are more likely to deal with educational projects).
The entertaining function is dominant in 23 products in the selection. Interestingly, those are both the simplest adaptations (illustrated storybooks) and the most complex ones (social media retellings and bots, interactive fiction, video games). In both cases, the original texts are chosen for their potential visual appeal or the capability to win the attention of the audience.
The successful digitalization of literature is often predetermined by
the immanent characteristics of the original text. To a large extent,
the same features attract the authors of cinematic adaptations.
Firstly, successful texts are those that provoke suspense, curiosity,
or surprise. For these reasons, “thrillers, detectives, and spy novels
are always high on best-seller lists”, since they “are not read for the
information they contain, but for the pleasure they provide” [
As may be seen, entertaining products are mostly based on the texts of the certain genre which are not typically used in classroom settings. This makes difficult to define whether the unpopularity of such products among educators results from their digital form or simply the content.
More than a half of all products (35) may be considered as mostly educational. Some adaptations are affiliated with universities and possess an explicit educational function: Walden Project by the State University of New York at Geneseo; James Joyce – The Dead by the University College Dublin; The Homer Multitext by Harvard University; Of Mice and Men Study App by Oxford University.
Within the educational domain, reasons for digitalization can also be manifold. First, digital products aim to facilitate the comprehension of old texts. Thus, 14 products based on Shakespeare’s works offer translations into modern English, videos of word-for-word staging, thorough annotations, profiles of characters. The study guide for John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men contains profiles of characters and historical locations, while Tolstoy. Live Pages maps the complex interrelations of real and historical events via interactive infographics. The second explanation is related to the complex structure or genre of literary works. The Homer Multitext project reflects the heterogeneous structure of Iliad and Odyssey, while a digital edition of Thoreau’s Walden explores the stages of development through a series of drafts. Many digital products deal with 20th-century texts that are not easily comprehended without a context. A Clockwork Orange iPad App supplements Anthony Burgess’ novel with archive video and audio; mobile version of Jack Kerouac’s On the Road includes interactive map of the story, archive photos, texts, and videos; T. S. Elliot’s The Waste Land is enhanced with multimodal comments and scans of the original manuscript; applications based on James Joyce’s works contain elaborated annotations and multimedia. Digital environments are more flexible than paper-based editions, which makes them suitable for presenting the heterogeneity of modern and postmodern texts.
Educational features can usually be demonstrated in more or less complex products, including interactive reading platforms and transmedia. They can facilitate comprehension of the old or obscure texts and explain the complex structure of literary works. However, there are no educational products under the third type – the absorbed text seems to be standing too far from its newer version.
For sure, there cannot be a universal technological solution to the problems of literary education. The possibilities offered by each product can be creatively adopted and integrated by teachers in various situations. However, there are some characteristics that may be regarded as inherent to different types of adaptations. Enhanced versions provide more opportunities to literary education, but may contain distractive features. The most effective ones seem to be those that contain collections of literary-related materials or allow students to interact with peers and teachers. In the latter case, the digital book may become a core element in a “flipped classroom”.
Refashioning shifts the reading patterns, causing that the story is not necessarily perceived linearly and solely from words. The borders between formats are blurred: a literary experience is no longer limited to reading, but implies an interaction with digital environments. These products reconsider the limits of literature, undermine the linearity and the authority of literary texts, and, subsequently, are not easily adopted by conservative teachers. Finally, absorption often implies reconstruction of the whole storyworld using unconventional means (such as visual art or artificial intelligence) and may be extremely costly. In most cases, these products are positioned as games rather than books. Users acquire control over development of the plot while acting within the immersive environments. Implementation of such products calls for a new multidisciplinary pedagogy that will reconcile literary education with the needs of contemporary media communication.
The current research can help educators to find consistency between literary works and their digital adaptations, while appreciating advantages offered by different formats. Developers, in their turn, may use it as a hint on how to find a balance between entertainment and education. For instance, some educational projects may benefit from more educational features, while distinctly entertaining formats – such as video games – could be adapted for educational environment. Judging by the popularity of commercial digital adaptations, it is clear that the literary experience could be highly demandable. The real challenge is to make popular the works that do not fall into specific genres and are not so entertaining on their own.
Potential educational applications of digital adaptations are much wider than listed above, even though they are yet to be realized. Apart from improving already existent practices on the level of comprehension, new technological means allow performing activities that were hardly feasible with printed books. For instance, in some digital environments, it is possible to discuss literary texts with other readers, do exercises and even contribute to the construction of the storyworld by submitting new works of art. Now these products are not widely used at schools, that is why the thorough examination of different functions is still needed. Elaboration of the current research can take different directions. Firstly, the theoretical findings could be supported by practice in real-life literary classrooms. At the same time, the ideas may be tested in collaborative work with the developers of digital books. Secondly, the research may embrace a wider range of objects, including not only full-text adaptations, but also compact retellings, comic strips, book trailers, and other media forms.