O Corcunda de Notre-Dame em cordel

an Analysis of the Transmedia Nature of Notre-Dame de Paris in Northeastern Brazil

Abstract

This paper analyzes how spaces in Notre-Dame de Paris (1831), by Victor Hugo, a classic of 19th century French literature are reconfigured in the adaptation O Corcunda de Notre-Dame em cordel (2019), by João Gomes de Sá. To this end, it examines the relationship established between the different media. The novel is taken as the source medium for the elaboration of the cordel, which is the target medium. The focus is on the strategies for the displacement of the setting of Paris to northeastern Brazil in a new literary materiality: cordel literature. Studies of Intermediality, Elleström’s concepts of transmediation (2017; 2021) are mobilized, as well as his considerations on media modalities, especially the pre-semiotic spatiotemporal and material modalities which structure the representation of the cathedral as a privileged space in the two narratives. It is argued that the modalities of the constitution of the cordel, the language for the new audience and the change of narrative spaces contribute to the constitution of this new media product.