Intersemiotic and Intralingual Translation in Frankenstein: The Graphic Novel

Abstract

This paper reads Frankenstein: The Graphic Novel by Jason Cobley and Brigit Viney as an exercise in two modes of translation working simultaneously: Intersemiotic, where Shelley’s prose becomes visual sign, and intralingual, where her language is reworded for a new medium and a new audience. While Frankenstein has generated extensive scholarship on adaptation across film and visual media, the combined operation of these two translation modes within graphic novel adaptations has received comparatively little sustained attention. Three scenes serve as the ground of analysis: Victor’s confrontation with the creature, his dream following the act of creation, and the creature’s education in the De Lacey household. Read through Charles Peirce’s semiotic framework, the visual choices of the adaptation (iconic, indexical, and symbolic) do more than illustrate Shelley’s narrative; they press on its emotional and thematic pressure points in ways the prose expresses through different semiotic resources. Umberto Eco’s attention to cultural codes anchors the visual language in the interpretive expectations of contemporary readers, while Julia Kristeva’s concept of the abject serves as a supplementary lens in the nightmare sequence, where the horror of bodily dissolution is most acute. Across all three scenes, visual sign-making and verbal rewording work together to reshape Shelley’s representations of power, horror, and isolation for a new readership.