Beyond Fidelity The Dialogics Of Adaptation Pdf
AbstractThis article argues that despite the growing and articulate chorus of adaptation scholars who critique the language of fidelity and its consequential denigration of adaptation as an art form, some of these contemporary scholars continue to repeat reductive cultural hierarchies and the binary structure of fidelity criticism. I suggest that where this does happen, it does so because of a cultural binary that structures the language of fidelity: masculine/feminine. Consequently, critical discourses of adaptation often utilise a gendered language that constructs a masculine/feminine hierarchy between novel/film and frames the problems of fidelity and adaptation studies as feminine.
Beyond Fidelity AbstractBeyond Fidelity: The Dialogicsof Adaptionby Robert StamAbstract by Alyssa SmithThis articleargues that moralisticlanguage such as “fidelity” is limiting when describing a film adaptedfrom anovel. Many criticisms are based in concerns about whether anadaptation fullyembodied the critic’s ideal of the “fundamental narrative, thematic,andaesthetic features of its literary source,”(54). Stam claims that amoreeffective criticism will be based in “contextual and intertextualhistory,”(75)less concerned with vague ideas of “fidelity” and more concerned with“readings, critiques, interpretations, and rewritings of priormaterial,”(76).He believes that absolute fidelity is impossible due to the differenceinmediums between novel and film, the lack of a single absolutely correctreadingof a novel, and the intertextuality of all novels and films.A novel iscomposed of writtenwords, a film is composed of pictures and sounds. Certain changes areinevitable.
What was described only in general terms in the novel mustnow havea specific appearance in the film. There are also many levels availabletofilmmakers not available to writers, such as music accompanying theaction, andthe audience’s knowledge of an actor’s previous roles or private life.Filmmakers use these resources, often enhancing the experience of thestory butnecessarily changing it by that very enhancement.There is alsothe question of whatthe filmmakers are being faithful to. Is it the novel’s plot in everydetail orthe spirit of the original? It usually isn’t the plot details becausemoviesmust condense a thirty hour read into a two hour film.
Because of this,characters and plotlines may be condensed or changed. Point of view maybealtered to allow for a more “cinematic” experience. Company of heroes manual activation keygen free. These may also bechangedto make unpleasant or dated aspects of the film more palatable tomainstreamaudiences.
Beyond Fidelity The Dialogics Of Adaptation Pdf
Finding the spirit of the novel is also problematic. It isfallacyto believe in a single core essence of a text which can be taken andtranslatedto film, when in fact any piece of literature has dozens of readingsthat willproduce different notions of its essence. A story can be read throughthe lensof feminism, homoeroticism, or hierarchical values, all of which wouldproduceradically different films still based on an identical text.
This leavesverylittle solid work for a filmmaker to be truly “faithful” to in adaptinga bookto screen.What shouldinstead be studied isthe intertextuality of novels. The experience of a novel or its filmadaptationis necessarily affected by the other works referenced within the text(allusionor quotation), the packaging it comes in (cover art, favorable reviewsquotedon it, dedications, published remarks from the author about it, etc),theclassification derived from its title, and the variety of other textsit isbased on or are based on it (or its root theme, storyline, centralcharacter,etc). So a film adaptation isn’t really just a single lineartranslation of asingle original novel, but is part of a larger cycle of interconnectedworksthat is constantly growing.