ABSTRACT
The “transmedia turn” which has taken place in media studies obliges us to look again at past theories which anticipated this phenomenon of text proliferation around a story. Among them is the concept of paratext (Genette 1997b), a transtextual modality found in the fuzzy threshold that exists between diegetic and extradiegetic worlds, products and by-products, monomedia and transmedia, ownership and creative freedom, and content and promotion. This chapter summarizes the Genettian theory, describes and compares the modulations paratextuality has undergone, and illustrates them with examples taken from official and amateur paratexts of recent transmedia fictional franchises.
