ADAPTING TRISTRAM SHANDY by Adria Young Submitted in ...

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These film conventions, and thus the film's methods of narrativity, all contribute to the feeling of the Shandean narrative method, precisely because all five operate simultaneously, or even as a blend of two or more, at various times throughout the film. This creates a narrative stasis because the confusion of convention stills any sense of action. We are merely there while the cast and crew sort out what it is they are doing with the adaptation in these various modes. We are made aware of these various genre conventions because they are repeatedly broken, ridiculed, or poorly executed, much like the battle scenes. Moreover, the blend of convention, which constantly challenges audience expectations of film narrativity, is true to the spirit of Sterne, who also challenged the conventions of the novel. In absentia of a linear narrative, the film operates in the Shandean intertexual way, which creates a dialogue between the original text and the film, and historical and literary contexts of the novel. We can sense the Shandean spirit throughout the film through Winterbottom’s remediation of Shandean intertextuality. 103 III. Intertexts and Contexts A Cock and Bull Storycaptures the spirit of Tristram Shandy by interpreting and re-creating the contexts and intertexts of the novel to create a dialogue with the original text. Various contemporaneous allusions substitute Sterne’s original, obscure, eighteenth- century intertextual and contextual gestures. Gow writes that these modernizations “encourage viewers to appreciate the wealth of reference in Sterne” (11). 104 Thus, the theory of Pavlov’s dog substitutes John Locke’s association of ideas, dirty Groucho Marx jokes take the place of allusions to FrançoisRabelais and Swift, and “Roger Moore and 78
[Al] Pacino stand in for [David] Garrick” (Gow 11). 105 At one point, Brydon quotes Samuel Johnson (“Every man thinks less of himself for not having been a soldier”) while being fitted for his military costume; this is one reference that we see in both Tristram Shandy and the film, even though it is of a different kind. Moreover, that reference is doubled when we see Coogan perform the chestnut scene. Although Sterne writes that, “there is no chaste word throughout all Johnson's dictionary” (4.27) for what Phutatorius yells when the smoldering chestnut gets into his breeches, Coogan uses the most common expletives while his personal assistant fishes around in his pants. 106 We also have the various conventions themselves that substitute for the various narrative modes that Sterne uses in Tristram Shandy: biography, dramatic romance, satire, travel writing, and so on. Moreover, the commercial interests of the film, represented by the financiers and producers who need constant reminders that this film is worth funding, are in keeping with Sterne’s anxieties about the production and sale of the novel. 107 But on the fictional level, of which all boundaries are blurred, the characterizations of the actors in the film reflect the intertexts of Tristram Shandy. Because A Cock and Bull Story is a documentary/mockumentary/biopic, the actors we see in the film play exaggerated and satirical portraits of themselves. We should remember that Sterne’s various identities are all meshed within Tristram Shandy; Parson Yorick is a veiled portrait of Sterne-as-preacher (since he used his own sermon as Yorick’s for Volume II), and Sterne also took on Tristram’s persona; after the publication of the novel, he received and signed letters by that name (Sterne, Letters). Not to mention the Yorick of A Sentimental Journey, and his role as Bramin in the Journal to Eliza. Likewise, in the film, Coogan’s ‘character’ is a conflation of his various 79
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ADAPTING TRISTRAM SHANDY by Adria Y
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AUTHOR: Adria Young TITLE: Adapting
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TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES v
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ABSTRACT Laurence Sterne’s The Li
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CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION Given its r
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notion of a literal fidelity” (7)
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Cruel Intentions (Kumble 1999), and
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narrative in the same way that Ster
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CHAPTER 2: ADAPTING THE SHANDEAN Of
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The critical tradition surrounding
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digressive, and it is progressive,
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contexts and manipulated to a great
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Shandean, and are hitherto unseen t
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and sale occupied less than five pe
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(Sterne 580). Neither do we receive
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himself was dying of, and died from
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“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: at “realism.” Coogan replies,
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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