Published Paper Details:

Narrative authority often shifts when literary texts are adapted into visual media, as storytelling moves from the controlled structure of written narration to the interpretive possibilities of film and television. This shift typically occurs because visual media rely less on verbal narration and more on images, performance, and cinematic perspective to convey meaning. As a result, authority that once belonged to a narrator or narrative structure in the text may be redistributed among characters, directors, and visual framing. This paper examines this transformation through the digital and visual adaptations of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. In the original Sherlock Holmes stories, narrative authority is largely mediated through Dr. Watson, whose role as narrator shapes the reader's understanding of Holmes's actions and maintains a certain narrative distance. Similarly, Frankenstein employs a layered narrative structure composed of letters and personal testimonies, distributing narrative authority across multiple voices and limiting direct access to events. However, when these works are adapted for film and television, their narrative frameworks are reconfigured to meet the demands of visual storytelling. Using a comparative approach, this study explores how narrative authority is redistributed in these adaptations. Many screen versions of Sherlock Holmes reduce Watson's narrative role and present Holmes directly through visual action and reasoning. Likewise, adaptations of Frankenstein often emphasize the creature's emotional presence, altering the moral focus of the narrative. The paper argues that visual adaptations do not merely reproduce literary texts but actively reinterpret them by shifting narrative authority within the storytelling process.