SOURCE: “Cinematic Qualities in the Novel Kiss of the Spider Woman,” in Literature/Film Quarterly, Vol. 15, No. 3, 1987, pp. 164-68.

In the following essay, Karetnikova and Barber trace the role film has in the structure and content of Puig's Kiss of the Spider Woman.

The Novel as Film

Kiss of the Spider Woman by Manuel Puig is an entirely cinematic book. Its content and style, indeed every sentence of the novel, appeals directly to the reader's visual perception. There are no author's digressions or abstract concepts which often intersperse a novel's text; Puig's main concern is with what people do and say, and when he does reveal what they think, it is through visual (cinematic) images rather than words. Virtually the whole novel is written in the present tense, which reinforces the effect of actions taking place right now, this moment, in front of you. There is no space...