More than fifty years ago, back in the summer of 1973, when more normal children were playing sports and learning hobbies, I spent virtually every free minute obsessively reading J.R.R.
You might perhaps widen the theme from the filming of saga or science fiction into what leads to successful dramatisation. As your essay suggests modern dramatisation is visually literal as perhaps it had to become once lifelike dinosaurs stomped on screen. But I think that to be successful a dramatisation needs to be as poetically inventive as the work it represents. It is not trying to translate page to screen but to visualise the author's ideas. That is what lies behind the success of say the black and white version of Les Miserables with Harry Baur as Jean Valjean and what makes the Korda interpretation of the Pagnol trilogy with Raimu as Cesar touching in a way that Manon des Sources with Depardieu never becomes. In a word, computer graphics and budgets get in the way.
My father was a linguist with a special interest in English which he came to as a second language. He recommended I read the Tolkien trilogy when I was fifteen on the basis that his language was what English would have become had the Normans not invaded. I read them once almost back to back and have never read them again. But they remain in my subconscious a half century and I have never wished to see film versions, knowing they would not compare well with that marvellous inspiration
"Jackson himself turned The Hobbit into a bloated misfire of a trilogy of its own, about which the less said the better" - yes. A clear case of hubris.
A fun essay! It made me think of another tension: between watchability/readability on the one hand, and sensory/conceptual overload on the other. As a piece of storytelling moves from the first to the second, its audience shrinks, especially with books rather than film.
I loved THE HOBBIT as a child, and could recite my way through Star Trek TNG and DS9, but never found Star Wars immersive (names and world too much effort; always felt like I was watching a confection, not - ahem - a real world), and much preferred Jackson's rendition of LOTR (you can see the amazing landscape) to the never-ending landscape descriptions in prose that (for me) felt wooden.
That's not a reason not to make something that requires a lot of effort from the reader... but it's a tension for creators to navigate. I think Rebecca Kuang's BABEL, which I finished a few days ago, does this amazingly well. It's as easy to read as eating cake, and yet the prose is gorgeous and creates a complex world.
Interesting! It certainly matters what one is exposed to first, especially as a child. For instance, I grew up with the original Star Trek series, and while I loved Patrick Stewart and Avery Brooks, otherwise I found TNG and DS9 a comedown. And I loved the original Star Wars film when I saw it in 1977. Simply blown away by the visuals and the effects, which were so far beyond anything previously seen on a big screen...
Ha - I didn't see Star Wars in the movie theatre until it was re-released in - the 1990s? Weirdly for someone for whom The Muppets were totally believable, the effects didn't work for me, on the small screen or the large.
On reflection, Star Wars is surely much more accessible than Star Trek TNG or DS9, so I think I'm just wired to find space sci-fi easier to consume than medieval-laden fantasy. Do you know the fabulous podcast Our Opinions Are Correct? Science, pop culture, and tech from two brilliant and funny hosts and authors. I was JUST listening to the latest episode, which has a lot of Star Trek in it: https://www.ouropinionsarecorrect.com/shownotes/2024/9/5/episode-159-when-fiction-becomes-a-microaggression-with-evelyn-douek
You might perhaps widen the theme from the filming of saga or science fiction into what leads to successful dramatisation. As your essay suggests modern dramatisation is visually literal as perhaps it had to become once lifelike dinosaurs stomped on screen. But I think that to be successful a dramatisation needs to be as poetically inventive as the work it represents. It is not trying to translate page to screen but to visualise the author's ideas. That is what lies behind the success of say the black and white version of Les Miserables with Harry Baur as Jean Valjean and what makes the Korda interpretation of the Pagnol trilogy with Raimu as Cesar touching in a way that Manon des Sources with Depardieu never becomes. In a word, computer graphics and budgets get in the way.
My father was a linguist with a special interest in English which he came to as a second language. He recommended I read the Tolkien trilogy when I was fifteen on the basis that his language was what English would have become had the Normans not invaded. I read them once almost back to back and have never read them again. But they remain in my subconscious a half century and I have never wished to see film versions, knowing they would not compare well with that marvellous inspiration
Excellent points!
"Jackson himself turned The Hobbit into a bloated misfire of a trilogy of its own, about which the less said the better" - yes. A clear case of hubris.
A fun essay! It made me think of another tension: between watchability/readability on the one hand, and sensory/conceptual overload on the other. As a piece of storytelling moves from the first to the second, its audience shrinks, especially with books rather than film.
I loved THE HOBBIT as a child, and could recite my way through Star Trek TNG and DS9, but never found Star Wars immersive (names and world too much effort; always felt like I was watching a confection, not - ahem - a real world), and much preferred Jackson's rendition of LOTR (you can see the amazing landscape) to the never-ending landscape descriptions in prose that (for me) felt wooden.
That's not a reason not to make something that requires a lot of effort from the reader... but it's a tension for creators to navigate. I think Rebecca Kuang's BABEL, which I finished a few days ago, does this amazingly well. It's as easy to read as eating cake, and yet the prose is gorgeous and creates a complex world.
Interesting! It certainly matters what one is exposed to first, especially as a child. For instance, I grew up with the original Star Trek series, and while I loved Patrick Stewart and Avery Brooks, otherwise I found TNG and DS9 a comedown. And I loved the original Star Wars film when I saw it in 1977. Simply blown away by the visuals and the effects, which were so far beyond anything previously seen on a big screen...
Ha - I didn't see Star Wars in the movie theatre until it was re-released in - the 1990s? Weirdly for someone for whom The Muppets were totally believable, the effects didn't work for me, on the small screen or the large.
On reflection, Star Wars is surely much more accessible than Star Trek TNG or DS9, so I think I'm just wired to find space sci-fi easier to consume than medieval-laden fantasy. Do you know the fabulous podcast Our Opinions Are Correct? Science, pop culture, and tech from two brilliant and funny hosts and authors. I was JUST listening to the latest episode, which has a lot of Star Trek in it: https://www.ouropinionsarecorrect.com/shownotes/2024/9/5/episode-159-when-fiction-becomes-a-microaggression-with-evelyn-douek
Wow I kept waiting for this to be about Barnier trying to form a government....
You didn’t figure out the deep allegory between Tolkien and the NFP? Getting slow, Greg!