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I don't think graphic novels are "the novels of the future" any more than movies are the novels of the future, or novels are the plays of the future. I think what you're saying ties back to what we discussed in class about whether transposing a novel into another medium (we talked about audiobooks and online text, but I think Braille books apply too) makes it into something other than a novel. Someone who cannot read a print-on-paper novel, for whatever reason-- because they don't have access to a library, because they're blind, because they can't read the language the book is printed in-- will not be able to have the experience of "reading" (in a very limited sense) that book. What difference that makes (if any) is, I think, what we were discussing.

If, as you suggest, to "read, listen to, or even perform the text of a book" can be included in a broad definition of "reading" that book, graphic novels that are made into radio plays or movies (or novels, although I've heard of the opposite happening more often) are also translations of their stories into other mediums, with the effect of making them accessible to audiences without access to one or more aspects of graphic novels.