French Literature Reviews - 2026

Andrea Del Lungo, La Fenêtre. Sémiologie et histoire de la représentation littéraire
Literary Theory, Linguistics and Stylistics

An excerpt from the book is available in the Atelier de théorie littéraire:

Toward a "Historicized Semiology"…

and in Acta Fabula (October 2014, vol. 15, no. 8), a review:

"Referential Object & Cultural Object: A Semiohistory of the Window in European Literature" by Sébastian Thieltges.

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What purpose do windows serve in literature? How and to what end do they so frequently frame the adventures of fictional characters or the meditations of poets, from the courtly Middle Ages to the highly urban 19th and 20th centuries? Functioning as a two-way threshold between the interior and exterior, as well as between the subject and the world, the window connects individual identity to the emergence of alterity. While opening up the finite space of a representation, it simultaneously facilitates access to knowledge.

Through its multiple functions, the window is conceived here less as a referential object or a literary theme than as a theoretical object, defined by the concept of the hypersign: that is, as a core of representation that governs the system of signs established by the work, intensifying meaning and laying the hermeneutic foundations for its decryption. The wager of this book is to offer a renewed vision of the concept of representation by defining an innovative approach known as "historicized semiology," capable of bridging literary theory and history.

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Andrea Del Lungo investigates the recurrent motif of the window across European literature, tracing its evolution from courtly medieval texts to urban nineteenth- and twentieth-century narratives. Rather than treating the window merely as a descriptive property or a thematic device, the study approaches it as a foundational theoretical object. The author demonstrates how this architectural threshold functions as a two-way passage between interior privacy and exterior reality, connecting the subjective self to the broader world and enabling new forms of knowledge and poetic meditation within the text.

Central to the methodology is the concept of the hypersign, a concentrated core of representation that organizes the semiotic system of a work to intensify its meaning and guide interpretation. By proposing a historicized semiology, the book offers literary scholars and students an innovative framework that unites formal textual analysis with historical context. This approach enriches contemporary debates on literary representation, making it a valuable resource for readers interested in narratology, semiotics, and the history of ideas across European literary traditions.

Also read on nonfiction.fr: "Literature Behind a Glass Pane", by N. Aude.