In order for readers to engage emotionally in the story world of picture books, they first need to be fully aware of the different elements that are part of this fictional universe. This is made possible because authors and illustrators make use of various experiential (representational) resources that construe the story world by creating characters, by building the actions that the characters carry out –which move the plot of the story forward–, and by representing the circumstances –including the setting– under which these actions take place. Carter (2001) explains the rationale of analysing each element in isolation even if they make up one coherent whole:

Because the various elements of fiction –such as plot, dialogue, character, setting and so on– are so interlinked it can be very difficult to talk about each one wholly separately. For, when you discuss your characters, invariably you will talk about what your characters do, and therefore you will be mentioning plot. When you talk about what your characters are saying, you will be discussing dialogue. So, to deal with these aspects of fiction in isolation is quite artificial, as they all exist and function together. Yet it is necessary for students to consider each of these elements individually in order that they can see how fiction works as a whole. (Carter, 2001, p 79)

In this chapter we will briefly look at how characters are represented, how the action of the story is constructed and how the circumstances of the story are created. In other words, we will discuss the role of visual resources in building the story world in picture books.

2.1. Creating characters

When we think about creating characters, we consider the array of features that allow us to identify a character as him/herself and not a different one. These include, of course, the character’s physical appearance, but also his/her personality, habits, routines, thoughts, dreams, wishes, relationships, conflicts both internal and external, among others. Naturally, physical appearance is the easiest trait to represent visually. Even so, it would be inaccurate to assume that physical appearance is merely an external feature: it also manifests personal attributes and identity. The visual choices that represent appearance combine with other elements, such as the context in which these characters are portrayed, their gestures, the objects that surround them, their clothes and possessions, in order to hint at the characters’ age, ethnicity, role or place in the family.

In addition, we can infer a lot about characters from the actions they perform. These actions are visually represented by vectors that show a character doing a specific activity within a particular context, which is generally the way most narratives start –with characters engaged in ‘narrative processes’ (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2006, p. 59). Since narrative processes are at their core, these depictions are called narrative images. These are very common in picture story books because they are dynamic images that help advance the plot: they develop action and typically portray one-time events.

Even though the most frequent depiction of a character is through narrative images, they may also be introduced in more conceptual illustrations; that is, images in which the participants’ representations are more static and lack the vectors that indicate they are involved in action. Because there is no obvious action taking place, readers naturally gravitate towards reflection or interpretation. Thus, readers are expected to observe participants’ attributes, for example, or to reflect upon a particular moment in the story. In such cases, the verbal semiosis always facilitates interpretation or reflection.

The following images illustrate the distinction between narrative and conceptual images:

Examples of characters depicted in more narrative images are the representations of the grandfather in Granpa, by John Burningham (2003). The character is first depicted sitting on an armchair with his arms reaching to his granddaughter, as if inviting the little girl to embrace him or to sit on his lap. There is a pipe on a table next to him, which can also tell readers about his routine activities. Not only do readers get to appreciate the old man’s physical appearance, but they can also infer some of his personality traits and habits. The same happens in subsequent images in the story, in which the grandfather is engaged in some specific activity, always in the company of his little granddaughter. It is through these depictions of the man that readers can understand his role in the family and the importance of his presence in the life of the girl.

An example of a more static, conceptual image is that of Wangari on the first page of Wangari’s Trees of Peace, by Jeanette Winter (2008), a book which we will analyse in more depth in Chapter 4. Wangari, the main character in the story, is introduced in the context of the town in Africa where she lives, surrounded by nature. The girl is standing with a flower in her hands, just looking at the audience. Most probably, the aim of the author is to invite readers to establish a close relationship with Wangari from the very beginning of the story and to appreciate Wangari’s physical attributes, as well as those less visible but still present in the depiction: her peacefulness and her connection with nature and the town she belongs to.

By the way characters are depicted, readers can recognise them in action or reflect upon their role in the context of the events, thus grasping their importance in the story as well. As the story unfolds, readers are able to track participants by identifying features of their appearance in subsequent images. Clothing can also be evidence for readers to recognise characters. The placing of a character in the composition of the image is also meaningful: centralising a character grants him/her greater importance, while positioning him/her in the periphery renders them secondary. One character may shift from the centre to the margins and vice versa, which would reflect a matter of plot or character development. In addition, how often a specific character reappears in a story can tell readers about the significance of that participant in relation to the theme of the story (Painter et al., 2013, p. 60).

depiction style, the system of character drawing, shows different degrees of detail and realism of the illustration, ranging from a minimalist style to a naturalistic style. These different styles also contribute to the creation of particular characters and the connection to be established between them and the readers. In broad terms, these styles involve:

• the use of dot(s) and line(s) to form a symbolic representation of human faces (minimalist style). This is the case of Image 3 below.
• the use of shapes (i.e., circle, oval) added to represent two-dimensional human faces (generic style). This is the case of Image 4 below.
• the technique of shading (i.e., cross-hatching, smooth shading and adding volume) to create a three-dimensional effect (naturalistic style). (Tian, 2011 in Painter et al., 2013, p. 30-31) This is the case of Image 5 below.
• the techniques involving contrast and caricature (hyper-real style).

The minimalist style is more iconic, focusing mainly on feelings of un/happiness. This style does not truly depict a recognisable individual but a universal, archetypal character. The more detailed generic style enables the audience to see themselves in the protagonist’s role, relating to the character at a more personal level. The naturalistic style calls for a deeper interpretation of facial features, such as eye detail, head angle and facial proportions, together with bodily postures, stances, and gestures. The greater amount of detail makes meanings more intricate, rendering their harder interpretation more rewarding for the readers, who can engage with the characters as individuals: the character is no longer an archetype, but a distinct person (Welch, 2005 in Painter et al., 2013, p. 31). Hyper-real contrasts and caricatures have an alienating effect on the audience and “create their own kind of eerie unreality” (Painter et al., 2013, p. 34). This last choice is very unusual and therefore we will not provide further information on it.

Moreover, characters may be depicted with possessions that help readers assign these characters a particular role. These attributes appear as clearly salient in the composition of the picture, either because of their size, or a variation in colour or tone, or because they are foregrounded. They are outstanding because they carry a cultural weight and are already associated with certain themes or values. Images where elements such as these appear invite readers to appreciate the symbolic value of the events in a story which construe the themes of the narrative. Even though role-assigning possessions are most frequently depicted in conceptual images, they may also be represented in more dynamic images.

For example, in The Tin-Pot Foreign General and the Old Iron Woman (Briggs, 1984), the depiction style varies according to which character is being depicted. While the general and the woman are caricature-like, the islanders are generic drawings most readers would be able to sympathise with, and the fallen soldiers and their families are minimalist, shadowy entities that seem removed from the real world. The choice of drawing style not only contributes to their characterisation but also shapes the way we, as readers, relate to the characters. We also find symbolic elements in this picture story book: the first image that introduces the general shows him smoking a rocket, holding a sword smeared with blood in one hand and a flaming flag in the other. Here, these three elements stand out mainly because of their size and their incongruency. They reveal details about the character’s personality and ideology, since they are culturally associated with violence, wickedness, death, war and power.

2.2. Building action

As we all know, the action of a narrative moves the story forward, complicating the situation for the main character(s) more and more until it reaches a point where the conflict is resolved.

To represent action visually, it is very useful to go back to the concept of narrative and conceptual images. As we said above, conceptual images are static and show rather stable, essential attributes of an element. Narrative images, in turn, are dynamic and generally depict action that is carried out at a certain moment in time. While conceptual images focus more on what there is or what something/someone is like or has, narrative images show temporary happenings, events, processes (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2006, p. 59).

So of course, to represent action illustrators employ narrative images. These images are characterised by the use of diagonal lines which are associated with movement. Illustrators can depict an array of different types of actions or processes that are interpreted correctly by the readers because of a shared knowledge of the world (Painter et al., 2013, p. 68). The physical context surrounding the action, i.e., the location and elements being used or in the background, helps readers identify the activity correctly. Thus, characters can be depicted doing, saying, thinking or perceiving, behaving, and reacting.

Many times, only one character is involved in the action, as it is doing an individual activity, behaving in a particular way, thinking, or reacting to something that has happened to it or perceiving a phenomenon through its senses. Some of these processes can be represented through the visual modality clearly, while others need to be reinforced by what the text says, especially those related to saying, thinking, and perceiving. Although readers may be able to see characters are involved in one of these processes and in most cases determine which one it is, to know what these characters are thinking, sensing, or saying specifically, they need the verbal modality. In some rare cases, thoughts are represented visually when there is a thought bubble or section of a drawing that shows what a character is imagining.

For example, in Parts, by Tedd Arnold (1997), the protagonist is a young boy who is constantly imagining scary scenarios of what might be happening to him, such as becoming bald and losing all his skin, because he has not yet discovered that people naturally lose hair and skin. In several of these images the thoughts are depicted in a contextualised section of the image that encloses the imagined possible situation while the boy is drawn in the foreground, in front of the thought being represented. The discovery that triggers such thoughts (i.e., finding a hair in the comb) and/or the boy’s feelings of worry and dread are generally shown in the image foregrounded. This sort of thought bubble allows readers to get a glimpse of what the boy is thinking. These thoughts are also referred to in the text accompanying these images.

Actions can also be directed at someone or something, many times affecting the receiver of the action by moving it or changing it in some way. This is represented visually by lines or vectors that connect the doer and receiver of the action. These vectors can be embodied in the doers’ extremities or objects they use to carry out the action. The direction of the characters’ gaze (both doer and receiver) is also very important to determine the connection both elements have to the action itself (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2006, p. 59).

For example, in Wangari’s Trees of Peace, by Jeanette Winter (2008), at one point in the story, a young environmental activist is brutalised by a police officer using a wooden club. The action of hitting is not visualised in any contact between the club and Wangari’s body, but instead becomes evident in the vector formed by the police officer’s arm and the club itself, both directed towards the woman. In this case, then, the action is interpreted as produced by the police officer, towards the woman, through the club –which connects both characters. Actions such as this help throw light on characters’ relative positioning as doer or receiver of actions. They also reveal relationships between characters, particularly those of unequal power. Painter et al. (2013, p. 70) also suggest looking at the relations between different actions. This is key in narratives because in this type of genre the action develops through time. It is very important for readers to be able to understand whether the depiction of actions in subsequent images belongs to simultaneous or successive actions.

Whenever readers see characters reappear “either within a single page, across a double-page spread or across a page turn, [they are] to infer a temporal relation of succession between the actions depicted” (Painter et al., 2013, p. 71). These actions may belong to the same activity sequence or a different one.

Events can be paced differently to afford more or less importance to given actions. If more space is granted to a certain action, smaller steps are taken to build up to a final action, then time is slowed down, so that readers pay attention to each little detail. Also, if in a story where all events take up several images suddenly one event employs a single image, time is frozen for readers to appreciate a sole action carefully.

For example, in The Way Back Home, by Oliver Jeffers (2015), a boy who gets stranded on the moon meets a Martian who has also got stuck on the moon and becomes friends with him. Together they brainstorm ways to get back home. At that point in the story, instead of having full-page images or two images per page at most to narrate the event, the readers find a sequence of nine images on one page that depict the instances of brainstorming in detail. This helps slow down the pace of the plot to highlight a significant moment in the narrative.

2.3. Representing circumstances

So far, we have looked at ways in which we create characters and build the plot in narratives. A third element that is closely related to these features of stories are the circumstances in which the characters carry out their actions. They represent how, why, what for, who/what with, how far/long, and of course when and where the action takes place. These last two circumstances are also referred to as the setting in time and place of narratives.

While some circumstances are more relevant to only one moment in the story, for instance the how, why, what for, who/what with of certain actions, others have an impact on longer sections of the narrative. The background that sets the events in place and time, for example, can help readers interpret the chronological timeline as they notice changes in the context along the story. It also contributes to set the tone or atmosphere at different points in the narrative and helps readers notice contrasts and changes in the mood of the story. We will discuss the impact of atmosphere in Chapter 4 below.

When creating the setting of a story, words can build a great range of circumstances, even when details of the story world are more readily available to the readers visually rather than verbally. In First Light, by Gary Crew (1996), for example, there is a very rich description of the main character’s bedroom on the first page:

The boy worked in his room, alone and happy. Spread about him were the plans for the aircraft that he was building. This was no plastic model made from a toyshop kit, but a prototype, designed by the boy himself. The single wing, of pale grey silk stretched over balsa wood, was a metre from tip to tip and so light that he could balance it on his fingertips. (Crew, 1996, p. 1)

Thus, the words create a detailed world for the boy to exist within: they add depth and specificity, making this setting seem real. Vivid though the verbal description may be, we need only glance at the next page to understand how effective images can be in conveying crucial details. Perhaps the materials from which the aircraft is built are not apparent in the image, for example, but we do grasp what it is the boy is building and where, while the position of the character and his expression certainly transmit the concepts of loneliness, satisfaction and pride that the words imply –and all of that in the split second that it takes to absorb the visual information.

Because it is in the very nature of images to show –unlike language, which tells or say–, they need to explicitly illustrate what can be left unsaid in the text. This is why the visual representation of some circumstances cannot be avoided. That is the case of circumstances of manner: quality (how), manner: means (what with), accompaniment (who with) and of location in time and place (when and where).

Whenever an action is represented, the way in which it is carried out is depicted in one way or another. This is captured by circumstances of manner: quality, typically with the use of movement lines and/or in the characters’ body posture or facial expression. In some cases, the effects of the action on the immediate environment can also show the manner in which the action was carried out.

For example, in the Placement of Giraffes Can’t Dance, by Giles Andreae (2001), Gerald is shown running fast and falling hard against the ground. While the speed with which he runs is represented by movement lines, the strength of his fall is depicted by the position of his body and facial expression, as the giraffe is on the ground with his legs in the air, his knees bent, and a painful expression on his face. The impact of the action is also shown by a big cloud of dust arising from the ground around him that serves to emphasise how heavily he fell.

Circumstances of means and accompaniment are also very difficult to overlook in images. If an action is being carried out with something or in the company of someone, it makes sense that these objects or characters should appear in the image together with the doer of the action. The first type is generally realised by a characters’ body part, especially by their extremities, or by objects they use as instruments to perform the action. The second is typically embodied by secondary characters.

Unless the image is decontextualised, i.e., without a physical context, the circumstances of location in place and time are always present in the background of the image. As Painter et al. point out, elements in the background “provide details of the physical environment in which the characters act” (Painter et al., 2013 p. 78). Visual elements like flora, fauna, geographical features, walls and furniture, buildings, landmarks, maps and signs show readers where the action takes place; while clocks, calendars, the appearance of the sun, moon, stars, the colour of sky, and/or lighting of the scene, weather conditions and clothing used by characters reveal when the story occurs. Some of these features are more explicit than others, but they can all help set the events in time and place.

Other types of circumstances are more difficult to represent visually. Although they could be represented in images, they require more interpretation from the reader, as they need to connect details in the same or different images to understand the represented circumstance. Therefore, they are typically reinforced by what is said in the text or represented only through words. These are circumstances of cause: purpose (what for), cause: reason (why) and extent: distance and duration (how far/long).

Circumstances of purpose need to be deduced by readers. When there is an element being used to carry out an action, for example, the reader can assume they are using it to perform the action. Some other times, the characters’ depiction –their posture, the direction of their gaze and facial expression– can reveal their intentions. For example, in Image 6 below, the paintbrush is clearly an element the boy is using to carry out the action of painting the wall.

Circumstances of reason can be depicted by subsequent images or different information units within an image in which an event and its effect are shown. Thus, readers can infer, for example, the reason why a character reacts in a certain way because of a previous action or the appearance of another character. For example, in Images 7 and 8 below, the sequence of events reveals the connection: the reason for the expression of annoyance on the character’s face is the arrival of a boisterous group of tourists that interrupt his quiet contemplation of the painting.

Circumstances of extent that show how far a character or object has moved or is to travel are mainly represented by the physical distance between the element and the point of departure/arrival depicted in the image. Because of this, images that show this type of circumstance tend to be long shots, in which characters and objects are shown from far away.

Circumstances of extent that show how long it takes for an action to develop can be represented specifically by tally marks and crossed out calendars. This can also be seen in the contrast of the depiction of a character or the context at different moments in the story. For example, changes in the character that are part of growing up or in the context from a summer to winter atmosphere can give clues to the reader as to how much time has passed between one event and another. Here readers need to make the connection by gathering details from different parts of the story.

For example, in the wordless picture book The Arrival, by Shaun Tan (2006), about the challenges of immigration, the passing of time is represented in a spread by the inclusion of 24 small images that show a plant changing in the course of the four seasons of a year. This sequence marks the length of time it took the main character to get used to living in this strange place and how long he had to live without his family.

As we can see, circumstances of purpose, reason and extent can in fact be represented visually and they help readers make connections, especially in wordless picture books, in which images are all there is. However, because the depiction and interpretation of such circumstances is quite complex, most of the time they are clarified by words that accompany the image.

Finally, another set of circumstances seems to be too hard or impossible to represent visually because they refer to two parallel and different realities simultaneously, i.e., circumstances of condition. It would be quite difficult to represent both possible realities at the same time and clearly signal to readers which is the probable or hypothetical one.

The visual resources we have found for the representation of circumstances are summarised in the following table:

Table 1 – Circumstances and realisations.

2.4. Coda

In this chapter, we have looked at how different elements need to be thought-of, designed and combined to shape the story world. We have reviewed the ways those elements translate into images: how they are represented, how they convey different meanings, how they combine to transmit a message. In other words, we have explored the resources that come into play to construe the story world by creating characters, by building the actions that the characters carry out and by representing the circumstances that surround, accompany, or complete those actions.