TY  - BOOK
AU  - Wagner,Peter
TI  - Reading iconotexts: from Swift to the French Revolution 
T2  - Picturing history
SN  - 094846271X
AV  - PN53 .W24 1995
U1  - 704.949909 20
PY  - 1995///
CY  - London
PB  - Reaktion Books
KW  - Art and literature
KW  - Description (Rhetoric)
KW  - Revolutionary literature, French
KW  - 18th century
KW  - History and criticism
N1  - Includes bibliographical references (pages 197-208) and index; Acknowledgements --; 1; How to (Mis)Read Prints --; 2; Captain Gulliver and the Pictures --; 3; Frame-work: The Margin(al) as Supplement and Countertext --; 4; 'Official Discourse' in Hogarth's Prints --; 5; Obscenity and Body Language in the French Revolution --; 6; In Lieu of a Conclusion --; References --; Bibliography --; Index
N2  - Traditionally, texts and images have been discussed together on the assumption that they are 'sister arts', but in Reading Iconotexts Peter Wagner pushes beyond the word-image opposition in a radical attempt to break down the barriers between literature and art. He sets out here the new approach he has identified for dealing with the 'iconotext' - a genre in which neither image nor text is free from the other. Examples include Swift's Gulliver's Travels, a number of William Hogarth's best-known engravings, and a sample of the so-called 'obscene' propaganda prints that were published during the French Revolution. Throughout, the author argues for the importance of seeing text and image as mutually interdependent in the ways they establish meaning; It becomes clear in the course of Wagner's exposition that one cannot study prints without taking into account their accompanying inscriptions; whilst illustrated books contain two kinds of 'text' - one verbal, one visual - that are invariably at odds with one another. Drawing on theories of intertextuality and semiotics as developed by Barthes and Kristeva, as well as post-structuralist studies by Derrida, Foucault and others, Reading Iconotexts treats pictures as encoded visual discourse and illustrations in books as counter-discourse. The author's persuasively argued polemic in favour of recognising the 'iconotext' as a viable advance in methodology is an important contribution to current debates on word and image
ER  -