Signifiers in Story Books

Signifiers in Story Books

During this seminar, we had to look at the page structures in children books and how they are important element within the books. The book that I looked at was 'The Wolves in the Walls' by Neil Gaiman.

Firstly, we had to look at signifiers on the pages in this book. A signifier is "the form which the sign takes" and is seen as the "material (or physical) form of the sign - it is something which can be seen, heard, touched, smelt or tasted" (Chandler, 1994).

The main signifiers in the book were the characters; mum, dad, daughter and son, and the wolves. The most important signifier out of these was probably the wolves as the setting of the story changed at different parts due to the wolves, and the whole story revolved around them. If we removed the wolves from the book then the story wouldn't add up. After that the next important signifier is the daughter, Lucy, because she kept the story going as it's her story.

Secondly, the actual pages needed to be analysed, for example in this story there were two different types of pages, first being where the whole page was filled with a picture which was the majority of the pages. The second being, a few pages with 4 different pictures within a white frame.

 
           When the pages were filled with the picture it allowed for the reader to feel within the story compared to pages with a white frame where readers will then feel like an outsider to the story overlooking what's going on. Also, when looking at pages with the four different pictures we can see that they are used to show intense conversation between characters but to also show sequence of events to get the story moving. The final element I'll look at is how colour is used in this book and it's importance. Within this book the colour theme on the pages change, this is to show both a change in the atmosphere and a change in the setting. For example, when indoors and the family feel at ease without a worry the colour scheme is warm with reds and oranges and then the colour scheme changes to cold, dark blues when the family is pushed outside because the wolves have escaped have the walls. 












This seminar has again shown how a story isn't always told through text only and how different signifiers and elements can be essential in telling a story to a reader and making them feel connected to the story.

 

 

 

Chandler, D., 1994. Semiotics for Beginners. [Online]
Available at: http://users.aber.ac.uk/dgc/Documents/S4B/semiotic.html
[Accessed 14 11 2013].