The Bottle Imp: a graphic adaption

School:  Literatures, Languages and Cultures

Team Members: Michelle Keown, Harvey Dingwall

Abstract

This is a creative, interdisciplinary collaboration between academics and undergraduates from the Edinburgh College of Art and the School of Literatures, Languages and Cultures, led by Dr Michelle Keown (Senior Lecturer in English Literature, LLC) and Harvey Dingwall (Lecturer in Illustration, ECA). The project will result in a graphic adaptation of R.L. Stevenson’s short story ‘The Botttle Imp’ (1891) illustrated by students from Harvey  Dingwall’s Design Externality 3 Major course at ECA.

Dr Keown, an expert in Pacific literature, will deliver an opening lecture introducing the Design students to the literary/historical context of Stevenson’s story, which adapts elements of a German folktale exploring greed and the supernatural to the context of the economic exploitation of the colonised Pacific at the end of the nineteenth century. The Design students will then each be given a short segment of the story to adapt to a visual format, each employing their own individual artistic styles to create a unique collaborative work. Harvey Dingwall will give each student expert feedback from an illustration/design perspective during the drafting stage, and the final work will be published by ECA with an introduction by Dr Keown. Dr Keown will then use the adaptation as a teaching resource in her English Literature option course ‘The Graphic Novel: Narrative in Sequential Art’, also running an additional workshop bringing the ECA and LLC students together to discuss the adaptation within the context of intermediality studies, and to explore opportunities for future creative and pedagogical collaborations between ECA and LLC.

Final Project Report

Download final project report (PDF)