From The Go-Between (L. P. Hartley, Joseph Losey) to Atonement (Ian McEwan, Joe Wright): Intertextual and Interfilmic Aesthetics

Abstract

Many essays have shown how rich intertextuality is in McEwan’s novel. Among the sources most often studied, L. P. Hartley’s The Go-Between is usually mentioned as both a thematic and generic influence. Joe Wright has also often alluded to Losey’s adaptation of the novel when commenting on his own work in Atonement. This article examines the conclusions on this intertextuality put forward by Natasha Alden, Earl G. Ingersoll and others, and questions whether they may be of any significance when considering interfilmicity in Wright’s adaptation. Losey’s influence is more immediately formal and aesthetic, revealing a complex web of correspondences between the two novels. Building on this double influence, I propose new interpretations of prominent motifs such as vision and focalisation, the tableau vivant, imagination as the vector of narration, the metanarrative questioning of language and the distortion of events in Atonement and its adaptation, within the framework of not only thematic but above all formal intertextuality and interfilmicity.

Keywords

• McEwan (Ian)
• Wright (Joe)
• Hartley (L. P.)
• Losey (Joseph)
• adaptation
• intertextuality