Email this article 
Narrative Worlds and Future Histories. Models of Serial Expansion from Pulp Magazines to Transmedia Franchises.
Abstract
The forms of modular and transmedia seriality developed in recent years, such as the new TV series or the transmedia franchises, have made central both in the scientific debate about the media and in the mechanisms of media production concepts such as "fictional worlds" and "worldbuilding”. A real aesthetics of worldness connecting movies, television, literature and videogames is emerging.
Using historical, semiotic and narratological methods, my paper aims at highlighting how this kind of seriality, based on the sharing of narrative worlds, is not a new phenomenon. Like other serial mechanisms, we can retrace the origins in the narrative practices of pulp magazines of the first half of the XXth century. In the second part of the paper I will focus on a particular model of serial construction, the so-called "future histories", that made its first appearance during the 1940s and is at the basis of the narrative expansion of science fiction transmedia franchises today.
Keywords
Full Text:
PDF (Italiano)References
Asimov, Isaac, I Robot (1950), trad. it di Roberta Rambelli, Io, robot, Milano, Bompiani, 1963.
______, The Early Asimov, New York, Doubleday, 1972; trad. it. di Beata Della Frattina e Hilia Brinis, Asimov Story: la storia e le storie introvabili di Isaac Asimov, Milano, Mondadori, 1973.
Ballard, James G., Vermilion Sands (1971), trad. it. di Roberta Rambelli, I segreti di Vermillion Sands, Roma, Fanucci, 1976.
Bertetti, Paolo, “Toward a Typology of Transmedia Characters”, International Journal of Communication, 8 (2014): 2344–2361; http://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/2597/1201, online (ultimo accesso 26/01/2016).
______, “Building Science Fiction Worlds”, Transmedia Storyworlds, Eds. Marta Boni – Martin Lefebvre, Amsterdam, Amsterdam University Press, 2016 (in print).
Blish, James, Cities in Flight (1950-1962), trad. it. di Lia Volpatti, Le città volanti, Milano, Mondadori, 1981.
Boni, Marta, “Mondi ed espica nella serialità contemporanea. Immersione, transmedialità e multi-autorialità”, La costruzione dell’immaginario seriale contemporaneo. Eterotopie, personaggi, mondi, Ed. Sara Martin, Milano – Udine, Mimesis, 2014: 25-34.
Bradbury, Ray, The Martian Chronicles (1950), trad. it. di Giorgio Monicelli, Cronache marziane, Milano, Mondadori, 1954.
Burroghs, Edgar Rice, Under the Moons of Mars (1912), trad. it. di Guido Gerosa, La principessa di Marte, Firenze, Giunti – Bemporad Marzocco, 1973.
Caimmi, Giuseppe – Nicolazzini, Piergiorgio, “Le storie future”, Le verdi colline della terra, Robert Heinlein, Milano, Armenia, 1978: 178-189.
Disch, Thomas, 334, trad. it. 334: romanzo, Roma, Fanucci, 1976.
Dolezel, Lubomir, Heterocosmics. Fiction and possible words (1998), trad. it. di Margherita Botto, Heterocosmica. Fiction e mondi possibili, Milano, Bompiani, 1999.
Eco, Umberto, Lector in fabula, Milano, Bompiani, 1979.
Eco, Umberto, “L’innovazione nel seriale”, Id., Sugli specchi e altri saggi, Milano, Bompiani, 1985: 125-145.
Freeman, Matthew, “Advertising the Yellow Brick Road: Historicizing the Industrial Emergence of Transmedia Storytelling”, International Journal of Communication, 8 (2014): 2362–2381; http://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/2486/1200, online (ultimo accesso 26/01/2016).
Gaudreault, André, “Narration et monstration en Cinéma”, Hors cadre, 2 (1984): 87-98.
Grasso, Aldo – Scaglione, Massimo (eds.), Arredo di serie. I mondi possibili della serialità televisiva americana, numero monografico di Comunicazioni sociali, 31. 1 (2009).
Heinlein, Robert A., Methuselah Children (1942), trad. it. di Giacomo Fecarrotta, I figli di Matusalemme, Milano, Mondadori, 1961.
______, Universe (1964), trad. it. Universo, Milano, Mondadori, 1965.
______, Time Enough for Love (1973), trad. it. di Roberta Rambelli, Lazarus Long, l’immortale, Milano, Nord, 1979.
______, The Past through Tomorrow (1967), trad. it. in due voll. di Giuseppe Lippi, La storia futura, Milano, Mondadori, 1987; La storia futura: ancora più lontano, Milano, Mondadori, 1988.
Innocenti, Veronica – Pescatore, Guglielmo, Le nuove forme della serialità televisiva. Storia, linguaggio e temi, Bologna, Archetipolibri, 2008.
Jenkins, Henry, Convergence Culture: Where old and new media collide (2006), trad it. Cultura convergente, Milano, Apogeo, Santarcangelo di Romagna, Maggioli, 2007.
Klastrup, Lisbeth – Tosca, Susana, “Transmedial Worlds – Rethinking cyberworld design”, Proceedings of the International Conference on Cyberworlds 2004, Eds. M. Nakajima et al., Los Alamitos, IEEE Computer Society, 2004: 409-416, http://www.itu.dk/people/klastrup/klastruptosca_transworlds.pdf, online (ultimo accesso 26/01/2016).
Martin, Sara (ed.), La costruzione dell’immaginario seriale contemporaneo. Eterotopie, personaggi, mondi, Milano – Udine, Mimesis, 2014.
Menarini, Roy, “Schermi profondi. Lo spazio della narrazione tra cinema e televisione”, La costruzione dell’immaginario seriale contemporaneo. Eterotopie, personaggi, mondi, Ed. Sara Martin, Milano – Udine, Mimesis, 2014: 19-24.
Moskowitz, Sam, “A History of ‘the Scientific Romance’ in the Munsey Magazines, 1912-1920”, Under the Moons of Mars. A History and Antology of ‘the Scientific Romance’ in the Munsey Magazines, 1912-1920, Ed. Sam Moskowitz, New York – Chicago – San Francisco, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970: 291-433.
Nichols, Peter e Clute, John (ed.), The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. III edition online, London, Gollancz, 2011.
Nievo, Ippolito, Storia filosofica dei secoli futuri (e altri scritti umoristici del 1860), Roma, Salerno, 2003.
Pozzato, Maria Pia, “Introduzione”, in Pozzato – Grignaffini 2008: 9-24.
Pozzato, Maria Pia – Grignaffini, Giorgio (eds.), Mondi seriali. Percorsi semiotici nella fiction, Milano, RTI, 2008.
Ryan, Mary-Laure (Ed.), Narrative across media. The Languages of Storytelling, Lincoln, University of Nebraska Press, 2004.
Scolari, Carlos – Bertetti, Paolo – Freeman, Matthew, Transmedia Archaeology. Storytelling in the Borderlines of Science Fiction, Comics and Pulp Magazines, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2014.
Simak, Clifford, D, City (1952), trad. it. di Tom Arno, Anni senza fine, Milano Mondadori, 1953.
Smith, Cordwainer, Strumentality of Mankind (1950-1966), trad. it. Il ciclo della strumentalità, Roma, Fanucci, 1989, 2 voll.
Stapledon, Olaf, Last and First Men (1930), trad. it. di Antonio Ghirardelli, Infinito, Milano, Mondadori, 1990.
Suvin, Darko, Metamorphoses of Science-Fiction. On the Poetics and History of a Literary Genre (1979), trad. it. di Lia Guerra, Le metamorfosi della fantascienza. Poetica e storia di un genere letterario, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1985.
Wells, H.G., The Shape of Things to Come: The Ultimate Revolution, London, Hutchinson, 1933.
Wolf, Mark J.P., Building Imaginary Worlds: The Theory and History of Subcreation, New York – London, Routledge, 2012.
Sitography
Clute, John, et Al (eds.), The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, 2011, http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/, web (ultimo accesso 15/02/2016).
“Cronologia di Star Trek”, Wikipedia, https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cronologia_di_Star_Trek, web (ultimo accesso 15/02/2016).
“George Lucas e gli schiavisti bianchi”, Fantascienza,
href="http://www.fantascienza.com/20804/george-lucas-e-gli-schiavisti-bianchi">http://www.fantascienza.com/20804/george-lucas-e-gli-schiavisti-bianchi, web (ultimo accesso 15 febbraio 2016).
Klastrup, Lisbeth, “The Worldness of EverQuest: Exploring a 21st Century Fiction”, The International Journal Of Computer Game Research, 9.1 (2009), http://gamestudies.org/0901/articles/klastrup online (ultimo accesso 26/01/2016).
Memory Alpha, http://it.memory-alpha.wikia.com, Wikia, web (ultimo accesso 15/02/2016).
The Star Wars Expanded Universe Timeline, http://www.starwarstimeline.net, web (ultimo accesso 15/02/2016).
“Timeline of Star Trek”, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_Star_Trek, Wikipedia, web (ultimo accesso 15/02/2016).
Wookieepedia. The Star Wars wiki, http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page, Wikipedia, web, (ultimo accesso 15/02/2016).
“Universo espanso (Guerre stellari)”, https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universo_espanso_(Guerre_stellari), Wikipedia, web (ultimo accesso 15/02/2016).
Filmography
Avatar,Dir. James Cameron, USA, 2009.
Return of Jedi, Dir. Richard Marquand, USA, 1983.
Star Trek: First Contact,Dir. Jonathan Frakes, USA, 1996.
Star Trek: Nemesis,Dir. Stuart Baird, USA, 2002.
Star Wars,Dir. George Lucas, USA, 1977.
Star Wars. Episode I: The Phantom Menace,Dir. George Lucas, USA, 1999.
Things to Come,Dir. Cameron Menzies, Gb, 1936.
Serie TV
Star Trek, USA, 1966-1969.
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine ,USA, 1993-1999.
Star Trek Enterprise,USA, 2001-2005.
Star Trek: The Next Generation, USA, 1987-1994.
Star Trek: Voyager,USA, 1995-2001.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.13125/2039-6597/2122
NBN: http://nbn.depositolegale.it/urn%3Anbn%3Ait%3Aunica-17879
Article Metrics
Metrics powered by PLOS ALM
Between is published by the University of Cagliari - Maintenance for this OJS installation is provided by UniCA Open Journals, hosted by Sistema Bibliotecario di Ateneo.
Between Journal was founded in 2011 with the financial contribution of Fondazione Banco di Sardegna (years 2010-2011).
ISSN 2039-6597
