ABSTRACT
This chapter celebrates hybridity and transmediality par excellence by focusing on Rushdie’s literary and ideological project, an extensive case of media transposition (Irina Rajewsky), which rejoices in the incorporation of pop and rock music into the form of a novel, a case which seems to offer space for a symbiotic coexistence of various techniques and material contributing to what might be called a “mezzaterra.” The chapter offers an in-depth analysis of the role of music and how it “migrates” from the original Orpheus myth to Rushdie’s novel The Ground Beneath Her Feet, and finally to the song adaptation by U2 of the lyrics of an imaginary song written by a fictional singer, Ormus Cama. Furthermore, the love story, condensed in the lyrics of the song, unfolds across another medium – the music video of the song inspired by Wim Wenders’ film The Million Dollar Hotel, which is itself a complex multi-layered narrative. The author wonders whether these phenomena may call for both transmedial and intermedial readings, showing that the combination of the two concepts is not only possible but also profitable and enriching, as theorized by Rajewsky.
