The Death of the Author and Birth of the Adaptor in Modern Arabic Adaptations of William Faulkner

Abstract

Historically, adaptation studies has been closely aligned to translation studies, as both deal with the process of rendering meaning from one culture to another. These two disciplines are closely related, but their theories are still being developed. This research aims to provide a contribution to the growing discipline of adaptation studies through a theoretical perspective, while investigating how different cultural interpretations of adaptation influence the final literary product. The core focus of research is to explore the differences between the meanings of adaptation in the West and the Arab world, through analysis of adapted texts in Arabic initially inspired from Western literature. The main works discussed are the adaptations and appropriation of William Faulkner’s novels, by the Arab authors Ghassan Kanafani, Naguib Mahfouz, Salaheddin Hariri and Khaled Khalifa. The qualitative analysis is based on comparisons between themes, plot, characters and narrative techniques, to prove that the Arabic authors depended on the process of adaptation rather than intertextuality, with insight into the differences that reflect the adaptor’s role in modifying the text from source culture to target culture. The analysis is guided by theories of adaptation studies to help in explaining the concepts of relocating, recreating and rewriting in the process of adaptation.

This research adopts descriptive exploratory methods, that fall under the interdisciplinary field of translation studies, related to adaptation studies and comparative literature, for the purpose of creating a valid theoretical framework or model for analysing the adaptation of English fiction into Arabic. The integrates Roland Barthes’ theory of the “death of the author” in the adapted text, Walter Benjamin’s “afterlife” of the text, Andre Lefevere’s theory of rewriting, and conceptions of authorship. In adaptation, the “death” of the author allows for the “birth” of the adaptor, offering them all the creative possibilities of authorship.