123251 AR Literature Course - Literature 1/2 (MA) British/Irish/New English (2012S)

What happens when a literary text is turned into a motion picture? Can a film reflect the gist of a novel, short story, drama, or comic book accurately? And, more importantly: Does it necessarily aspire to do so? The rift between literary and cinematic productions seems huge (given the fact that, due to the nature of the medium, a film is required to conduct a number of changes, elisions, and interpolations). Nevertheless, film adaptations often stress the proximity to the original and capitalize upon the ‘magic’ power of literary works. “Well over half of all commercial films have come from literary originals – though by no means all of these originals are revered or respected” (D. Andrew). This course deals with the challenges that cinematic adaptations of literary texts usually face – in terms of their usage of compositional features, the cultural background of film and original, and the uncontrollable dynamics of reception. We will discuss numerous works of British, Irish, and American origin, the filmic result often being a truly ‘transnational’ product. Emphasis will also be placed on a subgenre called “meta-adaptation,” in which “the adaptive processes between media, texts and genres” are foregrounded (Voigts-Virchow). Films to be analyzed in class include Carol Reed’s The Third Man (1949), Victor Fleming’s Gone with the Wind (1939), Spike Jonze’s Adaptation (2002), and Michael Winterbottom’s A Cock and Bull Story (2005).