ADAPTING TRISTRAM SHANDY by Adria Young Submitted in ...

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direct transfer, as they confirm or deny the reader’s perception of the original work. Moreover, they are “familiar” and “novel” (Hutcheon 114). Like literary adaptations, film adaptations of comic books and graphic novels can also be appropriated to the fidelity camp because these original texts essentially provide film-makers with an already drafted storyboard to replicate, especially in the transfer to animation. 8 And, graphic novel adaptations of literary texts often have the same objective: replication (Hutcheon 7). Even if these kinds of adaptations encourage the fidelity approach, the fidelity approach is still the “umbilical cord that nourishes the judgments” of critics, viewers, and readers, who prefer to comment upon “what are effectively aesthetic and moral values” (Andrew 27). The fidelity approach is thus too subjective and too personal as an approach for some films that attempt to modernize or capture the spirit of a text; unless, that is, we might treat fidelity as broadly applicable to any adaptation that attempts to remain true to the spirit, if not necessarily the letter, of an original. Spirit is thus a metaphor for the qualities of a text that are recognized in the adaptation, and spirit is what is retained in the transfer to a new format. Moreover, the notion of spirit is conceptual in a way that modernized or reworked adaptations are not. Modernized and reworked versions of literary texts have different aims than direct text-to-screen transfers. The goal of a modernized or reworked adaptation is to create a film that is at once reminiscent of the original, but is a “good movie” in its own right (Hutcheon 121). This is not to say that direct transfers are not “good” on their own, but there is more room for broad interpretation and artistic distinction in reworked classics. Films that fit this bill include Clueless (Heckerling 1995), Romeo + Juliet (Luhrmann 1996), Great Expectations (Cuaron 1998), Ten Things I Hate About You (Junger 1999), 4
Cruel Intentions (Kumble 1999), and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Burton 2005). All of these films update the plots and characters of their source text in contemporary settings and situations, with the exception of Romeo + Juliet, which retains the Elizabethan dialogue. This style of adaptation removes the literature from its original context and centralizes the continuities between the historical and the contemporary. In the case of Cruel Intentions, for instance, an upper-class Manhattan-version of Les Liaisons dangereuses, the audience is reminded that, even in the 1990s, dirty deeds do not go unpunished, especially amongst the most powerful. And while the source text and the adaptation are in dialogue, the film is far enough removed from its original context that it neither alienates the uninitiated, nor relies upon the original for its cinematic success. While the “appeal” of direct transfers lies in the audience’s relationship with the original text, what Hutcheon calls the “pleasure of accessibility” (117), modernized adaptations have the ability to be viewed in isolation from their sources, and, in most cases, do not explicitly acknowledge their sources, like Apocalypse Now (Coppola 1979). Not all adaptations adhere to either of these formulae. There are some source texts that evade these types of re-presentations.Tristram Shandy is a peculiar, unusual novelistic text, and the only way it can be adapted is conceptually. The conceptual level of adaptation is appropriate for original sources whose qualities make the transfer to new media difficult. And, since Tristram Shandy is a particularly unique kind of text, one that denies a linear narrative, is highly intertextual, and obfuscates identities, a direct transfer or even modernized adaptation would be seemingly impossible. Tristram Shandy is also a text that calls attention to its own process of becoming a text; Jonathan Romney writes that a “Sternean” adaptation “should reflect its own fabrication” (36). The novel also 5
Page 1 and 2: ADAPTING TRISTRAM SHANDY by Adria Y
Page 3 and 4: AUTHOR: Adria Young TITLE: Adapting
Page 5 and 6: TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES v
Page 7 and 8: ABSTRACT Laurence Sterne’s The Li
Page 9 and 10: CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION Given its r
Page 11: notion of a literal fidelity” (7)
Page 15 and 16: narrative in the same way that Ster
Page 17 and 18: CHAPTER 2: ADAPTING THE SHANDEAN Of
Page 19 and 20: The critical tradition surrounding
Page 21 and 22: digressive, and it is progressive,
Page 23 and 24: contexts and manipulated to a great
Page 25 and 26: Shandean, and are hitherto unseen t
Page 27 and 28: and sale occupied less than five pe
Page 29 and 30: (Sterne 580). Neither do we receive
Page 31 and 32: himself was dying of, and died from
Page 33 and 34: “new depth” and it was Sterne w
Page 35 and 36: Widow Wadman’s preoccupation with
Page 37 and 38: (Sterne 472), alluding to both the
Page 39 and 40: to adaptation are the method or the
Page 41 and 42: Hutcheon’ s theory effectively si
Page 43 and 44: about the act of reading the novel.
Page 45 and 46: (Weiner 17). Critics began to value
Page 47 and 48: Figure 4.Rowson's homage to Gin Lan
Page 49 and 50: work, aided by the relationship bet
Page 51 and 52: adaptation is in the “mixture of
Page 53 and 54: (Rowson np), as a reference to Joyc
Page 55 and 56: Commentary about Tristram Shandy mi
Page 57 and 58: or does not relate at all; however,
Page 59 and 60: Sentimental Journey as a textual
Page 61 and 62: Yorick is drawn as the likeness of
Page 63 and 64:
spirits” (Sterne 1.1), and thus a
Page 65 and 66:
Rowson also illustrates context via
Page 67 and 68:
andRowson and Pete are drawn in a p
Page 69 and 70:
we are aware that we are watching a
Page 71 and 72:
critically approached. Fidelity as
Page 73 and 74:
critical interpretation (what ideol
Page 75 and 76:
associations and recognitions made
Page 77 and 78:
etween chapters and volumes (just a
Page 79 and 80:
fictionalized autobiography, and Wi
Page 81 and 82:
cutting room floor (even though we
Page 83 and 84:
fucking camera! He can be emotional
Page 85 and 86:
at “realism.” Coogan replies,
Page 87 and 88:
[Al] Pacino stand in for [David] Ga
Page 89 and 90:
properties of different media make
Page 91 and 92:
modes and conventions. On the abstr
Page 93 and 94:
fictional autobiography, a military
Page 95 and 96:
Figure 21: The final page of Rowson
Page 97 and 98:
11 Even this is tricky, and potenti
Page 99 and 100:
36 See Melvyn New. “Job’s Wife
Page 101 and 102:
59 Sterne had many Modern and Postm
Page 103 and 104:
86 That is, the “lack of formula
Page 105 and 106:
� Bibliography Allen, Dennis W.
Page 107 and 108:
Noble, 1978. Print. Corliss, Richar
Page 109 and 110:
Joyce Goggin and Dan Hassler-Forres
Page 111 and 112:
Hutcheon, Linda. A Theory of Adapta
Page 113 and 114:
McFarlane, Brian. “Part I: Backgr
Page 115 and 116:
---------- “Interview with Alex F
Page 117:
University of Adelaide, 2011. Web.
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