Eighteenth-Century Illustration and Literary Material Culture

Richardson, Thomson, Defoe

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This Element studies eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century instances of transmediation, concentrating on how the same illustrations were adapted for new media and how they generated novel media constellations and meanings for these images. Focusing on the 'content' of the illustrations and its adaptation within the framework of a new medium, case studies examine the use across different media of illustrations (comprehending both the designs for book illustrations and furniture prints) of three eighteenth-century works: Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (1719), Thomson's The Seasons (1730) and Richardson's Pamela (1740). These case studies reveal how visually enhanced material culture not only makes present the literary work, including its characters and story-world. But they also demonstrate how, through processes of transmediation, changes are introduced to the illustration that affect comprehension of that work. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.