Abstract
Set in a post-war Paris electrified by jazz culture, surrealism and existentialism, Boris Vian�s L�Ecume des jours is an inherently transmedial text. In the foreword to his 1947 novel, Vian describes L�Ecume not as a roman, but a �roman-jazz�, an experimental hybrid at the interface of literature and music. Michel Gondry�s eponymous film adaptation re-imagines the novel�s apartment, with its many corridors and large windows, as a m�tro-maison; a repurposed metro carriage suspended above the street between an opulent 19th-century residence and a modern brick tower. This chapter uses the bridging motif of the m�tro-maison to understand the evolution of L�Ecume des jours from Vian�s 1947 novel to Gondry�s 2013 film. Just as the m�tro-maison is suspended between buildings of different eras, the text itself is suspended between time periods, media and authors. The m�tro-maison incarnates not only the shift from novel to film, in which some parts are carried along and others are left behind. It also encapsulates the text�s hybridity and rebirth as it travels from the 1940s to the 2010s, revealing as it does its interactions between technology and tradition, innovation and nostalgia, new media and traditional craft.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | Boris Vian: L'adaptateur adapté (Boris Vian: the right adaptor) |
Editors | Benjamin Andreo, Alistair Rolls, Clara Sitbon, Marie-Laure Vuaille-Barcan |
Place of Publication | Paris, France |
Publisher | Hermann |
Pages | 69-88 |
Volume | 1 |
Edition | 1st |
ISBN (Print) | 9791037001467 |
Publication status | Published - 2020 |