University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

Visualizing text as storytelling

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Visualizing text as storytelling

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Content Copyright 2021 Yara Razzouk

VISUALIZING TEXT AS STORYTELLING

by

Yara Razzouk

A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC ROSKI SCHOOL OF ART AND DESIGN
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF FINE ARTS
(DESIGN)

May 2021

ii

Table of Contents

List of Figures iii

Abstract iv

Introduction 1

Chapter 1: Marginalia - An Initiation into the Thesis 3
Marginalia in its Origin/Function 3
Case Studies of Authors’ Marginalia 4

Chapter 2: Literary Themes and Their Narrative Structures 6
Exploration of Thematic Literary Case Studies 6
Narratology - Syuzhet and the Fabula 8
Focus on Narrative Devices and Their Examples 9

Chapter 3: Narrative Structures Visualized 11
Visual Storytelling and Their Modalities 11
Case Study of House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski 12
Case Study of Building Stories by Chris Ware 15
Case Study Of 99 Ways to Tell a Story by Matt Madden 18

Chapter 4: Physicality of the Medium - Paper as Form and Function 22
Paper Manipulation and Paper Folding 22
Interactive Publications 23
Case Studies of Interactive Publications 24

Chapter 5: Conclusion - Personal Project Experimentation and Observation 29

Bibliography 36

iii

List of Figures

1.1 Sylvia Plath’s Marginalia 5
1.2 Alexander Pushkin’s Marginalia 5
2.1 Photo of a spread of House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski 14
2.2 Spread of Building Stories by Chris Ware 16
2.3 Photo of box set of House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski 17
2.4 Template panel of 99 Ways to Tell a Story by Matt Madden 18
2.5 Inventory panel of 99 Ways to Tell a Story by Matt Madden 19
2.6 Dialogue substitute panel of 99 Ways to Tell a Story by Matt Madden 21
2.7 Visuals substitute panel of 99 Ways to Tell a Story by Matt Madden 21
3.1 Photo of The Imp of the Perverse by Helen Friel 25
3.2 Photo of the deconstruction of The Imp of the Perverse by Helen Friel 26
3.3 Photo of a spread of Silhouette by Megumi Kajiwara and Tatsuhiko Niijima 27
3.4 Photo of a spread of Silhouette by Megumi Kajiwara and Tatsuhiko Niijima 28
4.1 Photo of the cover of ‘Colorless’ by Haruki Murakami 29
4.2 Photo of a spread of ‘Colorless’ by Haruki Murakami 30
4.3 Photo of a spread of ‘Colorless’ by Haruki Murakami 31
4.4 Photo of a spread of ‘Colorless’ by Haruki Murakami 32
4.5 Photo of a spread of ‘Colorless’ by Haruki Murakami 33
4.6 Photo of a spread of ‘Colorless’ by Haruki Murakami 34

iv

Abstract

In literature, the plot of a story is guided by a narrative structure of text. While there are
endless variations in the format, these variations follow a certain code of conventions and norms
that remain fixed in order to guide the reader through the narrative. Although they function as a
fixed and consistent framework, they still differ between themes, genres and authors – they do
not all follow similar codes, yet there remains a consistency for the guided narrative.

The crux of my thesis centers on the following main point: to visually communicate a
narrative to the reader while also using the additional voice of the medium itself, in this case a
book, and to explore the forces and constraints hidden within my implemented constructs of
visual communication. I am not adapting pre-existing literary text, but rather I draw from my
own personal narrative while including impositions of works I was influenced or inspired by that
also maintain the narrative theme.

The layout design and the physical aspect of the book itself, as well as the interaction of
the reader with the pages of the book, leads to the unfolding of the plot by mimicking the themes
that the book is attempting to portray. The diffusion of the story’s voice over these many
different elements causes its understanding to become compromised, as it now depends on the
reader’s participation in order for the story to continually unfold and present itself.

1

Introduction

This thesis explores the constructs of visual storytelling in my thesis. My paper covers
the topics of reshaping narrative structures and their themes, storytelling in both visual and
textual form, and the role that the medium itself can play as an additional narrative device. My
initial aim was to visually depict a literary work in the form of abstracted illustration, designed
from my own perspective. I had intended to visualize what is normally a deeply subjective,
individualistic experience that one goes through when reading a book and visualizing the story in
one’s mind’s eye and then generate its output. However, as I delved further into my research, my
aim shifted slightly. Rather than drawing from the pre-existing words of authors and adapting
their text, I now intend to draw from my own personal narrative and experiences. I decided to
perform a form of author’s intrusion - in which I impose myself into the story, either through
words, or by visualizing my own interpretation of the primary narrative and depicting the content
of those thought processes.

The thematic narrative categories of literature I was most drawn to were works that
intended to mimic reality, as well as blur the boundaries between the readers and the author by
allowing them in the author’s, or character’s, headspace. They were most accurate in
representing human thought processes and streams of consciousness. In order to visually reflect
stream of consciousness that is initially depicted in textual form without solely utilizing its
primary voice, I was led to think about other functions I could use to my advantage without
necessarily closing the interpretive door. I am adapting concepts of thematic literature pertaining

2

to the human psyche through illustrations and visual narratives drawn from my own crafted text,
while also utilizing physical aspects of the book as an additional narrative voice.

Acting as the primary narrator, I visually and textually relay the story to the reader while
also using the physicality of the medium – in this case, a book – as an additional voice, mirroring
the plot progression by communicating through its physical treatment. Inviting the reader to
participate and interact with the physicality of the book unfolds additional voices of the
narrative. It is not necessary for the reader to understand the narrative in physically sifting
through the book, as it is not a forceful imposition, but rather one that is intended for voluntary
participation in unfolding hidden layers to the story. This leads to an exploration of the
constructs of visual communication in layered forms, lending a narrative voice to different
elements.

My exploration of visualizing narrative text does not necessarily omit the text entirely
from the project, but rather primarily relies on the visual expression of the narrative and its
themes. As the medium attempts to mirror the tones present in the narrative, the portrayal
captures the elements in the primary function the text would have solely conveyed, and attempts
to substitute the absence of this primary voice through the means of utilizing and interacting with
the book itself as an additional communicative link between the reader and the author. As will be
evident in the prototype project detailed at the end of this thesis, my exploration of thematic
literary narratives that pertain to the human psyche, illustrations and visual narratives, while
augmenting physical aspects of the book itself as the plot’s additional supporting voice are
central to my attempts within my own developing practice of visual storytelling.

3

Chapter 1
Marginalia in its Origin/Function

My research began with a simple prompt of starting a sketchbook of concepts that
intrigued me and allowing the content to follow. However, the prompt of the process was what
led to initiating my research. I began to question the representation of my mindless abstractions
of doodles and ideas in correlation to my quick notes. I realized that I unconsciously and
unintentionally created a structure of visual information within the outlines of my own self-
imposed margins, bridging the gap between text and imagery.

This intention led me to the concept of marginalia – the fragments of thought and seeds
of insight that we scribble into the margins of a book. Although their forms are wide-ranging,
they can be categorized into distinctive types and vary depending on the physical medium. The
most common being that which readers scribble in private as they read a book; writing out
thoughts, comments or even casual, mindless annotations. This was notably highlighted in the
literary world as authors took to the margins of their peers’ works for their, ironically publicized,
private expression of ideas. Edgar Allen Poe expressed a great love for the space of the margin
and the affordability of its use for annotating thoughts, critiques and opinions. Sylvia Plath’s
annotated copy of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is a particular volume of sought-after
marginalia, as is Fitzgerald’s annotated copy of James Joyce’s Ulysses.

It is an act that is perhaps as old as the act of writing itself, yet it points to an interesting
development of communication in the way one interacts with their ideas through text. In what

4

could be construed as defacement of something that is meant to be preserved, marginalia could
be seen as acts of rebellion. They reject the notion of blind surrender to one voice; that of the
author and the sacredness of the text. It is an expression of ideas that is more suggestive or
reflective than forceful, as it does not have to correlate to the narrative it is lending its voice to,
nor does it intervene with the actual text in its layering. It disrupts the rigidity of the printed text
by humanizing it with handwriting, with notes sometimes void of grammar in their hurry to
scribble thoughts down, making one feel almost as though they are privy to the annotator’s
private thoughts.

Case Studies of Authors’ Marginalia

My interest in the ideation process led me to research artists’ sketchbooks and the
methods in which they visually mapped out their ideas. That research soon extended to the
marginalia of notable literary authors such as Alexander Pushkin, Samuel Beckett, Mary
Elizabeth Bradden and Sylvia Plath. Flipping through their works, I wondered about the idea of
creators who are famously known for their verbal expression, to instead rely on visuals to speak
to the eyes. Within the confines of their margins, fixed constructs and guides were no longer
taken into account; messy scribbles, illuminations, illustrative character portraits and mindless
doodles abound (fig 1.1 and 1.2).

5

Figure 1.1: Sylvia Plath's marginalia, taken from https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturepicturegalleries/8846565/Sylvia-
Plath-drawings-at-The-Mayor-Gallery.html

Figure 1.2: Alexander Pushkin's marginalia, taken from https://www.openculture.com/2014/03/revered-poet-alexander-pushkin-
draws-sketches-of-nikolai-gogol-and-other-russian-artists.html

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Chapter 2
Literary Themes and Their Narrative Structures
Exploration of Thematic Literary Case Studies

Marginalia became the initial step in opening the door to my thesis process; it led me to
wonder about the methods in which I visually convey my ideas and thoughts, which were
deliberate impositions into my sketchbook, some of which were reflections on my past words
and others were critiques. It was from there that I started thinking of my thesis in terms of
adaptation, as I had initially linked myself to the idea of imposing my own version of marginalia
onto a pre-existing text. In researching books that I wanted to draw from, I concentrated on how
to thematically visualize literary work and the opportunities for different stylizations of what I
would like to explore further. They soon became examples of reference, as I later decided to
draw from my own narrative voice instead, but they stand as highlighted sources in steering my
direction.

I was intent on drawing my literary references from works that were an examination of
the human psyche, seemingly the closest representation of the human thought process or
representative of those that blurred the ordinarily guided structure of a narrative in their
unconventional experimentation. Of my list, the following works inspired me most in their
narrative structure and themes:
1. The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, 1963
2. The Golden Notebook by Doris Lessing, 1962
3. Hopscotch by Julio Cortazar, 1963
4. If on a Winter’s Night, a Traveler by Italo Calvino, 1979

7

Both Plath and Lessing thematically and structurally explore the fragmentation of the
subject as an aspect of 20
th
century literature and psychological experience. My research of
Plath’s marginalia actually led me to re-read The Bell Jar readied with my own annotations and
visual commentary. The book explores the protagonist’s slow descent into insanity as well as the
theme of disengagement; it undergoes its own in-depth examination of the human psyche as the
protagonist is distraught and undergoes a state of depression. The Golden Notebook’s protagonist
keeps track of her life in four different notebooks to keep those parts of her life separate,
ineffectually fragmenting herself in her efforts to keep her life from spiraling into a chaotic mess.

Cortazar and Calvino, by contrast, deal with the fragmentation of the textual form of the
novel itself. Cortazar’s Hopscotch is a non-linear book of over 500 pages that precede the story
with a table of instructions on how it can be read: in sequence, in which case it is split into two
stories, or in an instructed non-sequential order that requires the reader to jump back and forth
between chapters (at some point the author even asks the reader to skip a chapter entirely). The
multiple layers through which the story can be read offer a multitude of endings to the novel.
With If on a Winter’s Night, a Traveler, Calvino completely breaks down the fourth wall – a
concept derived from Brechtian theater in which the characters are aware of their role in relaying
information – as the audience is directly spoken to through the protagonist, bursting the illusion
of reality depicted within the medium. He appears to even read the story along with the reader as
he is always aware of the novel’s existence and speaks of it, often shifting back into second-
person narration throughout as the plot unfolds.

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Narratology: Syuzhet and the Fabula

Before turning my focus to the literary themes included in the above works that directed
me in my research, I will briefly consider the narrative text and the structures it adheres to. Bal
writes that:
“a narrative text is a text in which an agent relates (‘tells’) a story in a particular medium,
such as language, imagery, sound, buildings, or a combination thereof. A story is a fabula
that is presented in a certain manner. A fabula is a series of logically and chronologically
related events that are caused or experienced by actors. An event is the transition from
one state to another state. Actors are agents that perform actions. They are not necessarily
human. To act is defined here as to cause or experience an event.”
1

Her framework dictates the elements of the functioning parts of a narrative regardless of its
medium.

The narrative of a story and its structure is dictated by two main concepts: the fabula and
the syuzhet. Both are terms of Russian origin that are employed in narratology and narrative
structure. The fabula is the “raw material of a story”, and the syuzhet is “the way a story is
organized”.
2
The two terms clarified the approach in my narrative construction; in discerning the
role I was to take as the narrator of the story, I knew that I played a significant role in the raw
material of my content, yet I questioned the methods in which I had a discernible effect on its
structure. Bal also defines the following to be the characteristics of narrative text:

1. Two types of 'speakers' are to be found in a narrative text; one does not play a role in the
fabula whereas the other does. This difference exists even when the narrator and the
actor are one and the same person as, for example, in a narrative related in the first
person. The narrator is the same person, but at another moment and in another situation
than when s/he originally experienced the events.

1
Mieke Bal, Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1985), 5
2
Paul Cobley, Narrative (New York: Routledge, 2013), 13-14

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2. It is possible to distinguish three layers in a narrative text: the text, the story, and the
fabula. Each of these layers is describable.
3. That with which the narrative text is concerned, the 'contents' it conveys to its readers, is
a series of connected events caused or experienced by actors presented in a specific
manner.
3

Focus on Narrative Devices and Their Examples

Viewing these as separate parts allows me to play with how they are layered together; the
treatment of the text and narrative structure mirror the themes presented in the story. I draw from
the narrative devices and structures of Plath, Lessing, Cortazar and Calvino, who inspire my
approach to personal narrative. As notable literary examples of internal monologue, stream of
consciousness writing and non-linear narrative these books created a voice through the language
of the text itself as well as through their contents. In The Golden Notebook, Lessing mimicked
her protagonist’s descent into madness in reflecting it with her text. Similar to Anna, the
protagonist, the novel is also fragmented into distinctive parts reflective of her split-personality
and internal conflicts. By using the narrative mode of stream of consciousness, readers acquire a
better insight as the method attempts "to depict the multitudinous thoughts and feelings which
pass through the mind" of a narrator.
4

Cortazar’s Hopscotch is a significant representation of the non-linear narrative crafted both
deliberately and suggestively. He does not impose it on his readers by structuring it into an
inharmonious syuzhet, but rather offers his intended sequential version of the story as a voluntary

3
Mieke Bal, Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1985), 9
4
J. A. Cuddon, A Dictionary of Literary Terms (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books,1984), 660–661

10

act in his table of instructions while leaving the narrative laid out chronologically. A point in
which critics of Hopscotch generally agree is that the novel is a game. Opinions differ greatly on
how to win, if winning is even possible, what can even be considered a victory or a signifier for
the end of the game and on why the other strategies result in failure.
5

5
Jaime Alazraji and Ivar Ivask, The Final Island: The Fiction of Julio Cortazar (Oklahoma: University of
Oklahoma Press, 1978), 97-108

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Chapter 3
Narrative Structures Visualized
Visual Storytelling and Their Modalities

Visual storytelling is any medium that utilizes sequential imagery, illustrations or graphics in
order to convey a narrative. When a narrative is conveyed without visuals, it is essentially left
wide open for interpretation – to say this is not to diminish purely textual narrative, nor does it
imply that it cannot instigate response or intended meaning absent of visual representation. If a
group of individuals were presented with a paragraph of text, the independent interpretations and
mental images that can be conjured up by each person’s understanding of it is endless. Adding
illustrations to that narrative of text narrows down the possibilities of interpretation to some
extent; all the readers will be viewing and perceiving the same pictures and piecing together the
same story. Would the same effect be achieved if one were to eliminate the paragraph itself, and
allow the intended meaning of the narrative to be supported through visual representation? While
its reader’s comprehension may vary, its purpose and method inherently remains the same; the
artist is to use the tools of their trade in such a way that they direct the audience to see and feel
what is meant for them to see and feel.

Neil Cohn states that modalities are expressions in visual, verbal or bodily nature that are
decoded by a sensory organ, such as eyes or ears. Language uses modalities to express abstract
or concise meanings to a specific audience, the structure of which uses a system of rules and
constraints for sequential expressions of meaning.
6
If these sequential references abide by such

6
Neil Cohn, The Visual Language of Comics: Introduction to the Structure and Cognition of Sequential Images
(London: (Cohn 2013)Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 2013), 4

12

rules, one can consider them to be understood and comprehended appropriately – thereby
grammatically. The vocabulary of a visual language can be built and adapted by following these
components of systematic expression and is applicable to any visual medium.

My research led to the question: how can I visually reflect a messy headspace and a stream of
consciousness that’s initially depicted in textual form? My intended exploration of visualizing a
work of literature does not omit the text from the project, but rather treats it similarly to its
content. Do I want this to be legible to the reader? Do I want to create a strain in understanding
and compromise its clarity? Or do I wish to relay the text directly as information? In the
following case studies, I focus on examples that have influenced the different ways through
which I can explore the relationship between visualizing the story alongside its text and how it
can be represented in different forms.

Case study of House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski is a novel that utilizes unconventional methods of
conveying a narrative through its text. The book belongs to the genre of ergodic literature; a form
of literature in which nontrivial effort and responsibilities occurring outside the confines of
human thought are required to allow the reader to traverse the text; the reader must participate in
constructing the narrative if they are to advance in reading it. This method implicates the reader
into not simply being a mere passive receiver, but also gives them an interactive and
participatory role in the ‘experiencing’ or consuming of the novel.

13

Roland Barthes states that when readers encounter literary text, his views are that the author
holds no power of the words, but rather it is upon the reader to interpret them to their own
meaning. Barthes’ challenging opinions are that the dissociation between a creator and their
work allows for the cultivation of more meanings to be interpreted by the reader and their
connection to the work. “The birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the author”.
7

The succession of handing over fragmentations of the novel’s plot in the form of varying clues
and decipherable codes leaves the reader capable of producing a narrative of their own, enabling
them to assume the role of the ‘creator’ while the author leaves merely a trail of visual clues for
them to interpret along the way.

Techniques implemented within the book are done in such a way that some pages contain
only a few words or lines of text constructed in unconventional formats to mirror the ongoing
events in the story, often projecting an agoraphobic and claustrophobic effect. Other techniques
include his rendering of mirrored text within a framed element – requiring the reader to
effectively interact with the book by holding it in front of a mirror in order to decode a passage
(fig 2.1).

7
Roland Barthes, Image-Music-Text, Stephen Heath (Barthes 1977) (Barthes 1977, Throgmorton 2009) (London:
Fontana Press, Harper Collins Publishers, 1977), 148

14

Figure 2.1: House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski, page 134

15

Throughout the book, various changes in fonts also serve as a way for the reader to quickly
determine which of its multiple narrators they are currently following. Chapters include text that
runs backwards or upside down, a shift in the pace as some pages merely contain one or two
lines of text and therefore urge the reader to rush through them while in others, the reader is
made to slow their pace by having to constantly turn different parts of the book at various angles
in order to decipher the narrative. The very layout of his textual narrative mimics that of the
house itself, giving it a labyrinthine quality.
8

Case study of Building Stories by Chris Ware

The most focused case among my findings and of most relevance was Chris Ware’s Building
Stories. So much inspiration was drawn from the notion that the collection of fourteen
interrelated – though non-linear – stories, unconventional publications and flipbooks are
cohesively unified to present a full-blown exercise in narrative (de)construction to the reader. Its
purpose is to capture nothing less than the full experience of life itself for the anthropomorphic
building and its inhabitants (fig 2.2), and thus challenges the reader by the sheer amount of
presented material and its lack of arrangement. The way that the story’s plot unfolds and how
pasts, presents, and futures intersect within the setting provided, is structured on a non-linear
path; thus the medium is also reflective of the story’s content. Ware is self-consciously
disregarding linear narrative conventions in the box’s structure in order to mirror the stories
being told.

8
Molly Throgmorton, House of Leaves: Navigating the Labyrinth of the Deconstructed Novel (Ouachita: (Avella
2003)Ouachita Baptist University, Honors Theses, 2009), 8

16

Figure 2.2: Building Stories by Chris Ware, taken from https://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/21/books/review/building-stories-by-
chris-ware.html

17

Ware assigns feeling to non-sentient beings and gives a role of importance to inanimate
objects within the narrative that supply an experiential component; the subtleties present in our
daily lives accompanied by their own voice. He also incorporates heavy amounts of visual cues
and markers in detail that actually prove to hold relevance to the progression of the narrative,
although they are not arranged chronologically. In a sense, this publication – or rather, box of
publications – offers the reader the ability to completely shape their own interpretation of the
entire story in an infinite number of contexts and narrative possibilities, all depending upon the
degree of participation in its construction as well as the order and infinite combinations in which
the different fragments can be structured and inherently understood (fig 2.3).

Figure 2.3: Building Stories by Chris Ware, taken from http://shawnconner.com/2012/11/building-stories-cartoonist-chris-ware-
interview/

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Case study of 99 Ways to Tell a Story by Matt Madden

My last case study was perhaps my most influential, as it came in the form of a narrative and
a suggestion of exercises in pushing the constructs of sequential narratives. In 99 Ways to Tell a
Story, Matt Madden deconstructs the structure of a sequential narrative by essentially stripping
the power away from the creator and giving the reader all the means required to construct the
story. Madden achieves that by providing the audience with the template panel of the comic (fig
2.4); he has already given us all the tools required in order to piece together our own thoughts on
the different approaches he uses to construct the same narrative.

Figure 2.4: 99 Ways to Tell a Story by Matt Madden, page 3

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He does this figuratively as well as literally in a particular exercise page he titled “Inventory”
in which he deconstructed the elements that constitute the narrative of the comic itself and
dilutes it into the basic elements that form the story (fig 2.5).

Figure 2.5: 99 Ways to Tell a Story by Matt Madden, page 19

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This exercise of deconstruction provides the audience with an ironic view into what tools are
required to visually represent this narrative. Yet he proceeds to boil it down further with his
exploration of formats that change the setting entirely and/or change the dialogue entirely.

Some other examples of devices he used are depicting the on-going sequential action from
different perspectives of the characters involved, allowing the reader to develop a more
emotionally based experience with the comic by being allowed into their structural space and
interacting with the various cues. Depicting the entire scene within one large panel breaks the
concept of the perception of time as an on-going element within the comic, it depicts the scene in
the duration it takes for the sequence to occur, and then freezes. Although it does not necessarily
allow the reader into the structural space that the visuals content offers, this device is effective in
experimenting with the constructs of time and pacing within comics and graphic novels. In one
of his exercises, he experiments with the function of the character as the direct communicator
with the audience and allows him to break the fourth wall.

In another one of his exercises, he implemented the same panels of images as the template
but imposed the presence of an entirely different supplied dialogue (fig 2.6). Although the
dialogue has no relation to the depicted images whatsoever, the reader still manages to draw a
line of interpretation and subconsciously attempt to fit it into the context of the comic – Madden
also experimented in using the same notion through the visual elements, while the dialogue
remains consistent to the template (fig 2.7).

21

Figure 2.6: 99 Ways to Tell a Story by Matt Madden, page 191

Figure 2.7: 99 Ways to Tell a Story by Matt Madden, page 193

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Chapter 4
Physicality of the medium
Paper Manipulation and Paper Folding

Finally, the physicality and framework for the text and image of a book warrants
exploration. I gathered extensive research into the different methods in which I could employ a
narrative voice through the medium. The physicality of paper is most commonly regarded as just
surface texture in the experience of visual narrative in print; a carrier for the primary medium of
representation – word and image – to the audience. It often remains unnoticed in the ongoing
transmission of “data” from the medium to the perceiver, yet it remains a vital gathered element
regardless. The physicality of the medium is of utmost importance; the medium itself requires
actual reader collaboration – in holding and interacting with the physical medium to varying
degrees of perception.
9
The reader is an implicit participant in physically unfolding the narrative
and structure, they are not merely passive spectators. Experimentation by calculated interference
through folding, cutting, binding and slicing are just some of the methods of expression and
representation made available through the physicality of a book.

These forms of experimentation have been extensively explored in the field of
publication design, where unconventional and experimental book formats are rendered to elicit
aesthetic responses or to catalyze communication and meaning. The intended aim is the concept
of reader participation and collaboration through a representation of experiential content, and
through the physicality of the medium embodied in this projection. Looking at the effects of how

9
Natalie Avella, Paper Engineering: 3D Design Techniques for a 2D Material (Switzerland: RotoVision, 2003), 7

23

this could be achieved through exploration of various case studies in which the conventional
elements of a book are carefully violated, and their functions are exploited, my research collated
detailed points and different examples in case studies found most relevant to the topic.

Interactive Publications

Interactive publications, or paper-engineered works, often involve an element of reader
participation. Many artists believe that design involving reader interactivity, in this sense
participation, tends to be more memorable and the information conveyed is absorbed more than
work that is simply observed on flat sheets. Reading is often little more than a process of
absorption rather than of interaction with a page. Experimentation within this domain led to the
disregard of traditional structures in order to explore more dimensional possibilities through
intervention with the physicality of the medium. The intention behind intervening with the
medium is to provide a more immersive experience of reading, in which the reader may choose
to interact with the work.

Following the notion of participation and immersive experiences, adding dimensionality
within the medium allows further possibilities of individual interpretation aside from those
projected by its content. Ed Hutchins, an artist and paper engineer, believes the structure and
design of a book has as much of an integral role in directing the reader through a narrative as text
or illustrations. He states that a great book is achieved when all the components of the medium –
text, illustrations, binding, covers, paper – come together to deliver intended meaning in a

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unified way. “It’s when the parts are so interconnected, so supportive of each other, that the sum
of their collectiveness is greater than each individual contribution.”
10

Case Studies of Interactive Publications

A form of intervention within the medium can be through exploring the subtractive and
additive effects of cutting. The concept of layering between the pages can be explored, as cutting
away shapes and pieces to reveal the contents of the previous, or upcoming page offer an
effective structural device. Indicative slits in a page can present the reader with the challenge of
constructing a three-dimensional form out of the pieces of paper. The experience of interacting
with a paper-engineered book entails that the reader is not just a casual observer but is complicit
with the designer in absorbing and crafting the intended message. A publication that uses an
effective method of a paper-engineered concept: Helen Friel’s adaptation of Edgar Allen Poe’s
The Imp of the Perverse (fig 3.1).

This interactive publication is designed in a way such that it suggests empowerment
through interaction, the reader must violate the medium in order to get to the content within.
Parts of the book are designed to be deconstructed in order to be constructed; each page is
perforated in a grid system with sections of text missing. There are directional guidelines marked
by slits and folds to manipulate the reader into destroying the pages by tearing them, and then re-
building them in order to decode the content and reveal the missing text (fig 3.2).

10
Nathalie Avella, Paper Engineering: 3D Design Techniques for a 2D Material (Switzerland: (Cobley 2013, Bal
1985)RotoVision, 2003), 51,135

25

Figure 3.1: The Imp of the Perverse by Helen Friel, taken from https://www.helenfriel.com/#/the-imp-of-the-perverse/

The idea behind the book is mirrored in its structure – that a book is often considered a precious
object, and its destruction is engineered to cause conflict within the reader about violating the
medium – this conveyed feeling is reflective of the plot of the narrative itself, thus manipulating
the physicality of the medium in achieving its desired effect.

26

Figure 3.2: The Imp of the Perverse by Helen Friel, taken from https://www.helenfriel.com/#/the-imp-of-the-perverse/

27

A relevant case study is a book titled Motion Silhouette by Megumi Kajiwara and
Tatsuhiko Niijima. Shadow art has traditionally been a performing art, but Kajiwara and Niijima
transformed it into a more intimate, personal experience of reading a book. It tells the tale in
which shadows differ by changing direction of light using pop-up silhouettes in-between pages.
As a light source is directed toward either side, a different moving image is projected on the page
to help tell the story (fig 3.3).

Figure 3.3: Silhouette by Megumi Kajiwara and Tatsuhiko Niijima, taken from https://www.thisiscolossal.com/2014/07/motion-
silhouette-an-interactive-shadow-picture-book/

Their aim in this project is that the illustrations and the shadows that fall on top of the page
overlap. In the work, figures stretch varying on the light source projected onto it, and the story
changes depending on the page on which the shadows fall upon (fig 3.4). Essentially, depending
on the environment in which you read the book, the images you create to help tell the story are

28

different—and because shadow is impermanent, it returns to the original state as soon as you
read it again.

Figure 3.4: Silhouette by Megumi Kajiwara and Tatsuhiko Niijima, taken from https://www.thisiscolossal.com/2014/07/motion-
silhouette-an-interactive-shadow-picture-book/

The aim of understanding the diverse codifications of discourses within every component
of the medium grants experimentation within their implementations. The findings and explored
notions of this paper are structured in the form of how it is to be built and understood – without
laying out the groundwork of decoding the different structures that literary narratives adhere to, I
could not have moved onto crafting visual languages within the medium’s narrative structures; I
could not have moved on to the understanding of their discourses and thus in turn explore the
dimensions in which they could be challenged, disregarded, shaped, or abided by.

29

Chapter 5
Conclusion

My intent for crafting a visual narrative grants access to a node of numerous possibilities
for opening the interpretive door – depicting the progression of the story conveyed, whereas the
understanding of the plot is additionally represented by the medium itself using physical aspects
of the actual book, and can vary depending on the degree of the individual person’s participation.
Now aware of the possibilities open to of experimental exploration, I am equipped with the
information relevant to the categories of how to instigate and manipulate my intended meaning
and achieve the goals that the proposal is comprised of, and the knowledge necessary to be able
to carry out the intents of a self-reflective medium. I set about carrying out these exercises with
experimentation.

Figure 4.1: Colorless, photographed by the author, cover

30

On a more personal note, I normally have a systematic approach to creating work; and
undertook creative exercises to help circumvent that tendency in order to freely explore my
stream of consciousness visualization. Due to COVID-19, the consequences of quarantine left
me with a lack of resources, and I started carrying out daily exercises of my own marginalia in a
“found” book in disarray, Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki
Murakami, the title of which I shortened to ‘Colorless’ (fig 4.1). I started imposing my own
author’s intrusion of personal memories, thoughts and visual interpretations of an existing
experience into a book that still stood on its own with its own story.

Figure 4.2: Colorless, photographed by the author, page 2

31

Figure 4.3: Colorless, photographed by the author, spread 7

I worked with the multiple layering in different ways, maneuvering through the existing
text with my own imposed text and image, as well as the actual physicality of the book. The
majority of my spreads work with a juxtaposition of head and heart - all my overthinking and
overanalyzing went into writing, and my visualization on the opposing page would be
represented free of being held back by the constraints of those thoughts (fig 4.2 and 4.3). I found
that I sometimes subconsciously draw from the book itself as I create, often without meaning to I
find myself mirroring the words he uses on the page after skimming through each one before I
write or sketch on it.

32

Themes about time and heavily interweave personal memories into an object that was
never really my own. It became a thoroughly immersive and interactive experience in not just the
multiple layers that reading it provided, but also in the different layers my own stories embedded
in the physicality of the medium. It started to “live” in another’s book and overtake the narrative
to become something different and new; in erasing Murakami’s voice, I had taken over as its
primary narrator. It requires you to pick it up, to turn it, to read it upside down, to weave through
it and read it multiple times to gain different understandings from different things, to hold it
close to your face and from afar, to pull tabs and look for hidden messages (fig 4.4 and 4.5).

Figure 4.4: Colorless, photographed by the author, spread 9

33

Figure 4.5: Colorless, photographed by the author, spread 9, details

I leave my prototype open to interpretation in the use of its color, the writing of the text,
the subject, the photographs I’ve taken and imposed as well as the languages I used throughout.
Reading it is entirely subjective for me, and it feels as though I took something entirely objective
and neutral and turned it into an extension of my headspace. Disorderly, orderly, hidden things
lying around and forgotten about, extracts of time and memory and personal thoughts, lyrics,
different languages and images and colors. I considered this exercise to be my trial run of the
different methods I had intended on utilizing.

34

Figure 4.6: Colorless, photographed by the author, spread 12

Throughout the course of my research, I steadily directed the concepts that I have learned
into applying, exploring and experimenting with their constructs. I started my process with a
visually annotated sketchbook laden with full margins and moved onto drafting a layered
personal narrative to build off of. I tried and tested methods of visualization that were,
subjectively, almost reminiscent of eliciting a reflective nostalgia (fig 4.6). I am aware that the
visuals do not achieve a wholly similar nostalgic effect through the perspective of others, but the
aim for connecting and interacting with the narrative is left to the voluntary experience of reader
participation.

35

In consideration of the degrees of participation that can be taken by the reader, it leaves a
lot of room for interpretation to occur on an individualistic perspective outside the realm of my
control as primary narrator. It is on this basis that I state that although the prototype book has
become more of a personal object into which I impose my own subjective narrative and voice, in
order to leave room for a voluntary interaction on the part of the reader, I do not disclose the
meaning and interpretation behind the visual language that I use. My aim remains with drawing
significance from giving the reader agency to choose whether or not to connect further with the
narrative or to interact further with the story and allowing it to unfold, outside of my control as
narrator and free of whatever association could have been considered on behalf of my intention
as the author.

36

Bibliography

Alazraji, Jaime, and Ivar Ivask. 1978. The Final Island: The Fiction of Julio Cortazar.
Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press.

Avella, Natalie. 2003. Paper Engineering: 3D Design Tehcniques for a 2D Material.
Switzerland: RotoVision.

Bal, Mieke. 1985. Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative, 3rd ed. Toronto:
University of Toronto.

Barthes, Roland. 1977. Image-Music-Text. Translated by Stephen Heath. London: Fontana Press,
Harper Collins Publishers.

Berger, John. 1972. Ways of Seeing. London: Penguin.

Calvino, Italo. 1981. If on a Winter's Night a Traveler. Translated by William Weaver. Florida:
Harcourt Brace & Company.

Caputo, Tony. 2002. Visual Storytelling: The Art and Technique. New York: Watson-Guptill
Publications.

Cobley, Paul. 2013. Narrative (The New Critical Idiom), 2nd ed. New York: Routledge.

Cohn, Neil. 2013. The Visual Language of Comics: Introduction to the Structure and Cognition
of Sequential Images. London: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.

Cortàzar, Julio. 1987. Hopscotch. Translated by Gregory Rabassa. New York: Pantheon.

Cuddon, J.A. 1984. A Dictionary of Literary Terms. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books.

Danielewski, Mark Z. 2000. House of Leaves. New York: Pantheon, Random House.

Eisner, Will. 2008. Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative. New York: W.W. Norton &
Company.

Hejazi, Seyedeh Fatemeh. 2017. Stream of Consciousness as a New Method of Creating Works
of Art. International Journal of Scientific Study. Volume 5, Issue 5.

Lessing, Doris. 1999. The Golden Notebook. New York: Harper Perennial Modern Classics.

Madden, Matt. 2005. 99 Ways to Tell a Story: Exercises in Style. Michigan: Chamberlain Bros.

Plath, Sylvia. 2005. The Bell Jar. New York: Harper Perennial Modern Classics.

37

Smith, Keith A. 1993. Non-Adhesive Binding: Books without Paste or Glue. New York: Sigma
Foundation.

Throgmorton, Molly. 2009. House of Leaves: Navigating the Labyrinth of the Deconstructed
Novel. Ouachita: Ouachita Baptist University, Honors Theses.

Ware, Chris. 2012. Building Stories. New York: Pantheon.

Watson, Aldren A. 1996. Hand Bookbinding. New York: Dover Publications.

Abstract (if available)

Abstract In literature, the plot of a story is guided by a narrative structure of text. While there are endless variations in the format, these variations follow a certain code of conventions and norms that remain fixed in order to guide the reader through the narrative. Although they function as a fixed and consistent framework, they still differ between themes, genres and authors—they do not all follow similar codes, yet there remains a consistency for the guided narrative. ❧ The crux of my thesis centers on the following main point: to visually communicate a narrative to the reader while also using the additional voice of the medium itself, in this case a book, and to explore the forces and constraints hidden within my implemented constructs of visual communication. I am not adapting pre-existing literary text, but rather I draw from my own personal narrative while including impositions of works I was influenced or inspired by that also maintain the narrative theme. ❧ The layout design and the physical aspect of the book itself, as well as the interaction of the reader with the pages of the book, leads to the unfolding of the plot by mimicking the themes that the book is attempting to portray. The diffusion of the story’s voice over these many different elements causes its understanding to become compromised, as it now depends on the reader’s participation in order for the story to continually unfold and present itself.

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Asset Metadata

Creator Razzouk, Yara (author)

Core Title Visualizing text as storytelling

School Roski School of Art and Design

Degree Master of Fine Arts

Degree Program Design

Publication Date 03/17/2021

Defense Date 03/17/2021

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag interactive publication,Marginalia,OAI-PMH Harvest,visual narrative,visual storytelling

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Wojciak, Ewa (committee chair), Fung, Alice (committee member), Greiman, April (committee member), O'Connell, Brian (committee member)

Creator Email razzouk@usc.edu,razzoukyara@gmail.com

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c89-429307

Unique identifier UC11667839

Identifier etd-RazzoukYar-9327.pdf (filename),usctheses-c89-429307 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-RazzoukYar-9327.pdf

Dmrecord 429307

Document Type Thesis

Rights Razzouk, Yara

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 2810, 3434 South Grand Avenue, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, California 90089-2810, USA