Theorizing Adaptation

Beginning to Theorize Adaptation. This is a topic that I have never really put much thought into until reading author Hutcheon’s statements on the matter. I, as Stram argues on page three, feel that the written word, literature specifically, is “axiomatically superior over any adaptation of it because of its seniority as an art form”. To whit this implies what Stram calls “iconophobia”, or  “a suspicion of the visual”. Implying that when we use visuals to tell a story we can cheat and use these visuals to relay the narrative we wish instead of the one that took great pains to build in our minds through words. As such, any attempt to move thoughts or ideas from text to film, or theater, would result in total destruction of the original art. I had not originally considered the idea that adaptation could make a positive contribution to the story telling. I believed that after reading a story like Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter, yes I know they are not works of literary genius, when experiencing them in film the editing of the text would leave only the message that could be best told through the medium of film and thus would lose the plot of the story for shock and awe.

However, after reading the text, I have revised this opinion. Sort of. There are several things to address here. First, is there an understood license that while adapting a novel, or other works of text, that there can be no alteration or changes to the meaning of the story? Must the story be told in the exact words and visuals conjured up through the words of the text? There is one problem here. Here on page eight, this idea of the ‘mind space’ or “res cogitans” is discussed in detail in regards video games, another form of adapting media. As the author here points out that,” [visuals] cannot easily adapt… what novels can portray so well: the “res cogitans,” the space of the mind.” What images my mind produces in reading the story, the ‘set’ shall we say, will most probably be different from the one you have produced in your mind. This is axiomatically a problem. So there must be a different visual produced by everyone. One reason why I dislike movie versions of books, are for example, the producer is not seeing Rivendale in the way I did while reading the novel.
The idea of adaptations from book to film or vice versa is fraught with all kinds of problems. But the idea behind it, the intellectually thought, is something I never before considered and evidently there is a lot to it.
So my question lay here. 
1. Is there an expectation that a story must not be altered as the medium is altered? 
2. Should we expect that novels are always at there best when the imagination of the reader is left to build the story in their own mind, or can someone else, like a produce of a film, do a credible job of this for us.

A Theory of Adaption: The Question of Fidelity

As a reader Hutcheon’s Theory of Adaption makes me nervous, and a little indignant. It suggests that ‘fidelity’ to the original is not as important as it is made out to be.  I hate the idea of someone taking a beloved story that I have treasured, and changing it to reflect their own feelings and interpretation. What about what it has meant to me? What about the way it touched me, changed my way of thinking, or embodies my childhood? It doesn't seem right to so freely use a story that was created by someone else, and treasured by so many, for a single person’s creative expression.

This attitude and these fears are what any artists attempting an adaption must struggle with from the fans of an original. Hutcheon brings this up in the last pages of her first chapter. She also brings to light, with some annoyance, the “unproductive nature” of that “morally loaded rhetoric of fidelity and infidelity used in comparing adaptions to “source” texts”.  Most discussions surrounding the quality of an adaption are about how well it stuck to the original. Any significant deviation from the ‘source’ is viewed with a righteous indignation, as if a holy text has been selfishly used by the unenlightened.

Hutcheon brings into question the necessity for fidelity. She explains that adaption is a creative work, and a creative expression separate from the original. The change in medium will change the way in which a story can be told. Each adaption must be viewed as “. . .its own palimpsestic thing”.  It is therefore impractical, and unproductive to judge an adaption solely based on fidelity. While this does not give adapters leave of responsibility to an original, it does give them creative freedom to a new way of expressing a story.

While as a reader adaption makes me nervous,  Hutcheon’s Theory of Adaption makes me excited as a writer. .  I love the idea of an adaption being an artist’s interpretation of a beloved work. I love the idea of a film being able to express “. . .things that could be conveyed also in the language of words;  yet it says them differently”. It is a beautiful way to express the power of a story, by changing the way people look at it.

Questions:

1). If infidelity does not necessarily constitute a bad adaption, exactly what does?

2).How important is it to maintain ‘author’s intent’ in an adaption, whatever the change in storyline?

Beginning to Theorize Adaptation Analysis

While reading this week, what particularly struck me was the vast similarities and key points being made about stories in general that relate directly to my English 3110 class, called Stories and Storytelling. In this text, Hutcheon states, “seen from the perspective of its process of reception, adaptation is a form of intertextuality: we experience adaptations (as adaptations) as palimpsests through our memory of other works that resonate through repetition with variation”, bringing about the point we have made in my other class how stories are essentially an endless circle of repetition. Fairly recently, science has proven that our minds process information through the form of narrative, and has displayed the power of stories themselves – and in this discovery has uncovered how all of the stories that we hear in our lifetime are already inside of us – we just have to experience them to process them as actual stories. In relation to this, adaptations are just versions of the stories we have already heard, simply portrayed in someone else’s experience of them. I find this interesting because as we view and study an adaptation of a novel, film, or other piece of work, we end up discovering more about the creator of the adaptation when new perspectives and “understandings” of the original work is displayed. So, as Hutcheon states, adaptations are second without being secondary, a derivation that is not derivative – they are complex, unique pieces of work, but also, an extension of an idea many people may already have inside of them. Surely, then, one cannot base a critique of such simply off of its fidelity to the original work. They are, in their own respect, worthy of analysis besides this point.

Questions: How does one determine what is the most proper form of an adaptation from an original work? If money were not such a common motive, would there be less adaptations in this world today, or more?

Macbeth Act II

In the second act of Macbeth, something that captured my attention was the overall restlessness on the night of the King's murder. Quite often in Shakespearean plays, the environment is used to accent the events unfolding in the story. For example when the witches appear in Macbeth, they are generally accompanied by thunder and lightning, and when sinister acts take place, the weather is often times stormy. Likewise on the night of the murder, the castle seems to be restless and uneasy. Reading Macbeth, I often got the feeling that evil and chaos manifest themselves within not only the people and situations, but environments as well. The second act begins with Banquo and his son Fleance roaming the castle in a seemingly aimless manner in the middle of the night. When Fleance questions Banquo about his restlessness, he replies that sleeping has recently caused him "cursed thoughts" (2.1.8). Meanwhile, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are similarly restless, wrapped up in their plot to murder King Duncan and experiencing moral conflicts about doing so. Likewise, Macduff and Lennox are up and awake very early in the morning so that Macduff can visit King Duncan. In scene three of the second act, Lennox even goes onto a rant that lasts from line forty-nine to fifty-six essentially stating that the night was one of great chaos unequal to anything that had been experienced in his life time. I found all of this particularly interesting because it wasn't just Macbeth and Lady Macbeth who experienced the chaos of the evening but that it had been shared by nearly everyone with substantial lines of dialogue throughout scenes one and two. It goes to exemplify how much of an evil and earth-shaking act that betraying the King was and it is very effective in setting the tone of the story.

Questions:
1. Is the decision to kill the King really due to Lady Macbeth's insistence? I feel like it is debatable as to whether or not Macbeth's drive for power would have led him down that path on his own.

2. Did Lady Macbeth hesitate to kill the King herself because he reminded her of her father and husband or did she have moral restraints on killing? It's difficult to tell just what her moral limit really is.

3. Are Macbeth's visions spawned by the witches in an attempt to manipulate him or are they simply signs of madness (or both)?

A Theory of Adaptation

One of Hutcheon’s points that stood out to me as I was reading the article was located on page 10. She stated, “Therefore, adapters are first interpreters then creators.” This stuck with me when thinking of favored movies, shows, and books. Using Lord of the Rings for an example, we can see how Peter Jackson is an interpreter when translating from book to film. Because Tolkien’s work was heavily descriptive, and not so emotionally centered many of the character’s emotions, and motivations had to be heavily interpreted when filming.  Now to continue with this point, Hutcheon pointed out that different interpreters would find different meaning from the same source. This would lead to varying adaptations. The analogy Hutcheon uses from E.H. Gombrich illustrates this very well. “If an artist stands before a landscape with a pencil in hand, he or she will ‘look for those aspects which can be rendered in lines’; if it is a paint brush that the hand holds, the artist’s vision will be in term of masses, not lines (1961: 65)” (page 11). In a word, because we all come from very different backgrounds, and see the world in our own unique way, we all interpret the same thing differently. Thus leading us to perhaps like or dislike certain adaptations. 

1.     Can an adapter really capture the “spirit of a work?” Because to me anything adapted is going to be a watered down, or altered version of the original.

2.     Can anything be adapted? If so, is what are key elements of a work that are sacred? (Meaning how altered can a adaptation become before becoming a completely different story. 

Analysis of Hutcheon's Theory of Adaptation

Hutcheon's main argument throughout the chapter is that all types of adaptations are as important as any other type or style of art. The definition of adaptation may sound simple, but in fact allows for more issues than it fixes. Many, if not most works of literary and cinematic art are adaptations. On page 10, she stresses that not only do story lines become adapted, or the media in which the work is presented becomes adapted, but themes, ideas, and elements also become adapted. The theme of quests, magic, and innocence versus evil are not original themes, but are seen again and again through time and mediums. Hutcheon also argues that fidelity is not a necessary requirement when judging the successfulness of an adaptation. On page 7, she states, "Adaptation is repetition, but repetition without replication." She believes that adaptations should pay homage, but not replicate the work that is being adapted. Adaptations should want to better alter or express the story, not continue the story so it does not end. Since most works of textual, stage, graphic, cinematic, and lyrical art are not completely original, the word "adaptations" should no longer seem derogatory.

Questions:
1. If the re-usage and re-creation of all medias-themes, expression, elements, ideas, story lines-are not original, is there such a thing as an original work?
2. Because the word "adaptation" is sometimes used as a derogatory word, but 85% of Oscar winning pictures and 70 percent of TV movies are adaptations, do you think that the general public understands what constitues a work to be an adaptation?

Hutcheon's Theory of Adaptation

I'll start by saying I hope one day I know as much about a subject as Hutcheon does about adaptation. Hutcheon argues essentially that adaptations are important to any art form because they have a lot to offer, whether it's a different perspective or a more interactive experience. Also in many cases an adaptation will do it's part in keeping the original alive and helping it survive and flourish. He very clearly does not agree with the idea of "fidelity" from one piece to another because he says sometimes an artist is not trying to imitate something but rather trying to improve upon or supplant an existing story or idea. He says on page 20-21 "Perhaps one way to think about unsuccessful adaptations is not in terms of infidelity to a prior text, but in terms of a lack of creativity and skill to make the text one's own and thus autonomous." I think he's absolutely correct and that ties into his earlier statement that statistically speaking some adaptations that are from book to film are extremely successful. That's probably because the directors/producers/writers were just good at what they do, whereas an unsuccessful adaptation may well be the product of less talented people. On page 29 he talks about technology and how because it has provided a lot more mediums for expressing art and stories it has contributed to our idea of fidelity to the imagination. I'm one of the people that have been disappointed by movie adaptations of books that I love and that's because I have many expectations for what I want to see and experience. Also Hutcheon mentions that people are more likely to be critical of an adaptation if it is adapted from a classic. Many people don't want the meaning or significance to be lost. He also makes a really good point about producers creating adaptations because they are more likely to be financially successful and so they're taking less of a risk than they would be if they were making an original tv series or movie. "As George Bluestone pointed out early on, when a film becomes a financial or critical success, the question of its faithfulness is given hardly any thought." Also I just wanted to say that I believe some people's personal likes/dislikes make them more likely to enjoy a film for example rather than a book, or a video game rather than a play, that's just part of technologies impact on people. Back in the day the only option was reading a book or watching a play, whereas now there are many ways to discover a story.


Questions:
Why is it that if something is adapted into the same type of art form it is more offensive than when it is adapted into a different medium? I can't think of any examples but what I mean is if say I were to take the general outline for the Harry Potter books, change a few things, put it into a new setting with different characters but keep things pretty similar and write a book, that would be much worse than if I made a Harry Potter graphic novel.
What makes a particular art form more successful? Film, book, video game etc