Make Believe in Film and Fiction: Visual vs. Verbal Storytelling - Karl Kroeber.pdf

Describing in detail precise differences between the psychological experience of reading a novel and watching a movie, Make Believe in Film and Fiction shows how movies' unique magnification of movements produces stories especially potent in exposing hypocrisy, the spread of criminality in contemporary society, and the relation of private experience to the natural environment. By contrasts of novels with visual storytelling the book also displays how fiction facilitates sharing of subjective fantasies, frees the mind from limiting spatial and temporal preconceptions, and dramatizes the ethical significance of even trivial and commonplace behavior, while intensifying readers' awareness of how they think and feel.

Review
"Filled with brilliant analyses of many classic films and novels, Kroeber's fascinating and witty study argues in persuasive detail for the special charms of the visual and, even better, for the extraordinary imaginative power of the verbal. This generous and accessible book should be read by everyone interested in the workings of narrative, both visual and verbal."--Susan Morgan, Distinguished Professor of English, Miami University of Ohio
"Kroeber takes on the vexed comparison between verbal and visual storytelling and produces the best account we have--a revelation."--Tobin Siebers, University of Michigan
"Kroeber's Make Believe in Film and Fiction wears its considerable erudition lightly and will probably reinvigorate interest in some of the first principles of film and literary aesthetics. Kroeber writes pleasurably and convincingly about the fundamental differences between seeing and reading, as well as about the different forms of imagination that good movies and good books elicit. His analysis of classic films and books is consistently intelligent, producing a seamless blend of criticism and theory.--James Naremore, Indiana University

About the Author
Karl Kroeber, Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University, has published a score of books on ecology, the visual arts, and European, American, and Native American literatures, giving special attention to problems of narrative, interconnections between science and literature, and the relation of 19th century culture to post-modern aesthetics.