Telling and Re-telling

Stories
Telling and Re-telling
Stories:

Studies on Literary Adaptation

to Film

Edited by

Paula BALDWIN LIND

Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film

Edited by Paula Baldwin Lind

This book first published 2016

Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Lady Stephenson Library, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2PA, UK

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Copyright © 2016 by Paula Baldwin Lind and contributors

All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without
the prior permission of the copyright owner.

ISBN (10): 1-4438-8881-8

ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-8881-3
To my mum, who knew how to transform ordinary life
into an extraordinary film…
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................................................. x

FOREWORD.................................................................................................. xi

Part I: Theoretical Approaches on Literature and Film Adaptation:

Who Borrows What and from Whom?

CHAPTER ONE .............................................................................................. 2

Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist?
Patrick Cattrysse

CHAPTER TWO ........................................................................................... 25

Revisiting Plato: The Hermeneutics of Adaptation in the Light
of Theuth’s Myth of Writing
Diego Honorato E.

CHAPTER THREE ........................................................................................ 45

Adaptation, Re-adaptation, and Myth
Marta Frago

Part II: From Stage to Screen: The Problems of Theatrical

Adaptation to Film.

CHAPTER FOUR .......................................................................................... 62

From Theatre to Film: The Case of Ancient Greek Tragedy
Eleni Varmazi

CHAPTER FIVE............................................................................................ 79
The Film Industry Woos Shakespeare: Theatrical versus Cinematographic
Space in the Adaptations of Hamlet and Henry V by Kenneth Branagh
Paula Baldwin Lind

CHAPTER SIX.............................................................................................. 99
Duet for One: When Less is More
Mónica Maffía
viii Table of Contents

Part III: From Written to Visual Narrative: The Story behind the
Screen

CHAPTER SEVEN ...................................................................................... 114

Impossible Voyages and Possible Adaptations in the Work of Jules Verne
Ángel Pérez Martínez

CHAPTER EIGHT ....................................................................................... 126

Coppola’s Apocalypse Now as Hermeneutics of Conrad’s Heart
of Darkness
Braulio Fernández Biggs

CHAPTER NINE ......................................................................................... 137

Death in Venice: From Thomas Mann to Luchino Visconti.
An Artistic Interpretation of Art
Ismael Gavilán M.

CHAPTER TEN .......................................................................................... 145

In Dialogue with the Poetic Myth of Brideshead Revisited
Carmen Sofía Brenes

CHAPTER ELEVEN .................................................................................... 156

Auster versus Auster: An Analysis of the Feedback Process between
Cinema and Literature
Francisca Apey Ramos

CHAPTER TWELVE.................................................................................... 163

Nordic Noir: The World of Mankell and Wallander as Seen
on Sidetracked, the BBC Episode.
Juan José García-Noblejas

Part IV: Latin American Voices on Screen

CHAPTER THIRTEEN ................................................................................. 182

Bleeding the Rubber Trees: Parallelism and Paradox in La vorágine
and Fitzcarraldo
Carolina Rueda
 Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film ix

CHAPTER FOURTEEN ................................................................................ 202

Other Expressions of Indigenism: Film Adaptations of Two Stories
by José María Arguedas
María Ignacia López Duhart

Part V: Films and their Narrative Strategies

CHAPTER FIFTEEN .................................................................................... 216

Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir
Jorge Peña Vial

CHAPTER SIXTEEN ................................................................................... 242

Meta-Literature and Meta-Art in The Taste of Others
Eduardo Llanos Melussa

CONTRIBUTORS ........................................................................................ 260

INDEX ....................................................................................................... 265

 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Life may be seen as a path that splits in different directions. Each of them
becomes a choice, as one can turn right or left, or walk straightforward.
Choosing one direction implies leaving another aside, but usually each
election becomes a new challenge that opens the way to new opportunities
and experiences. Editing this book was, at the same time, a choice and an
opportunity, especially an occasion to learn from others’ ideas and new
approaches to the topic of literary adaptation to film. It was also an
opportunity to meet wonderful people. I am profoundly grateful to Peter
Lubin, not only for reading and revising the first draft of this collection of
articles, but also for his judicious and insightful comments and suggestions
on editing.
My sincere gratitude goes to the Department of Research at
Universidad de los Andes (Santiago de Chile) for granting the Fondo de
ayuda a la investigación (FAI) which funded part of this project. My
colleagues at the Institute of Literature –Braulio Fernández and Miguel
Donosoí supported me from the beginning onwards with their advice and
companionship. I am also grateful to Carmen Sofía Brenes, who gave
valuable feedback, especially at the beginning of this project.
The editors and staff at Cambridge Scholars Publishing have patiently
helped me by responding and solving all my varied queries. In particular, I
wish to thank Anthony Wright, Commissioning Editor, and Samuel Baker,
Marketing Manager, for their technical advice. I also owe special gratitude
to Amanda Millar, Typesetting Manager, and to Sean Howley for their
advice and professional editorial work in the revisions of the book
manuscript and marketing information.
Finally, special thanks go to my friends and family for generously
allowing me to spend time working in this publication. I dedicate my work
to my mum, who chose the path to Heaven when I was about to finish
editing this book…
 FOREWORD

Are we living in the age of adaptation? In contemporary

cinema, of course, there are enough adaptations íbased on
everything from comic books to the novels of Jane Austení
to make us wonder if Hollywood has run out of new
stories. But if you think adaptation can be understood by
using novels and films alone, you’re wrong. Today there
are also song covers rising up the pop charts, video game
versions of fairy tales, and even theme park rides based on
successful movie franchises and vice-versa. We constantly
tell and retell stories; we show and reshow stories; we
interact and re-interact with stories íand these three
different modes of engagement (and their interactions)
allow us to rethink how adaptation worksí and why.
1
—Linda Hutcheon’s presentation of A Theory of Adaptation.

At the end of a meeting in the autumn of 2013, a group of academics

from the Institute of Literature and the Master in Screenwriting and
Audiovisual Development at Universidad de los Andes (Santiago de
Chile), decided to organise an international conference on literary
adaptation to film. The purpose was to bring scholars from all over the
world to the university in order to generate discussion and to create
worldwide links that could result in future research on the field of
Literature and Film Studies. The call for papers was so successful that in
October 2013 we inaugurated the first International Literature and Film
Conference at our university, with the participation of delegates from
Japan, Spain, Belgium, Rome, Israel, Turkey, the United States, Mexico,
Colombia, and Peru, as well as academics and postgraduate students from
different universities in Chile. This book is the result of a selection of
papers presented at that conference, apart from others that the organising
committee decided to ask some experts to provide.
The volume aims to address the yet unresolved question of whether it
is possible to adapt literary sources to the screen or, more exactly, what
elements from a written narrative should be transferred to a visual medium

1
http://individual.utoronto.ca/lindahutcheon/theory_of_adaptation.html (accessed
March, 2015).
xii Foreword

and how. In addition, each chapter intends to answer different questions,

as for example, what is the relationship between literature and film? What
is meant when speaking about “adapting” a literary work to the screen? Is
it possible to adapt? And if so, how? Are there films that have “improved”
their literary sources? Is adaptation a “translation” or, rather, a “re-
interpretation”? What is the impact of adapting literary classics to a
modern context? Adaptation is an interpretative and creative act that
involves a process of creation and re-creation, of interpretation and re-
interpretation, and, as Linda Hutcheon argues, a transposition of a
particular work or works. According to the well-known scholar in the field
of Film Studies, “[t]his ‘transcoding’ can involve a shift of medium (a
poem to a film) or genre (an epic to a novel), or a change of frame and
therefore context: telling the same story from a different point of view
[…]. Transposition can also mean a shift in ontology from the real to the
fictional, from a historical account or biography to a fictionalized narrative
or drama.”2 In fact, making a film out of a narrative has tempted many
film makers to transfer stories to the screen, sometimes so successfully
that the adaptation has become a film classic or a “better” version of the
source story. However, the transition from literature to film is not easy and
sometimes the filmed version may result in a poor adaption of a great
story. Thus, what can films borrow from Literature? What exactly can be
adapted from literary works such as novels, short stories, poems, and
drama? Are the topic, the setting and the space that frame these narrations
adaptable? Are the characters whose actions move the plot or the plot itself
what constitutes the essence of adaptation? Can we argue that all of these
elements can be adapted? To an extent, the answers to these questions may
be quite simple and straightforward, as, in practice, each of these elements
is prone to be adapted; nevertheless, “[m]ost theories of adaptation assume
[…] that the story is the common denominator, the core of what is
transposed across different media and genres […].”3
The assumption that the Aristotelian poetic mythos, which the Greek
philosopher describes as “the soul of tragedy”4, is the element that gives

2
Linda Hutcheon, A Theory of Adaptation (New York and London: Routledge,
2006), 7-8.
3
Ibid., 10.
4
Aristotle, Poetics, 1450 a 40-41. The myth is «the “soul” (or life-source) of
tragedy», in The Poetics of Aristotle, Translation and commentary by Stephen
Halliwell (London: Duckworth, 1987), 93. In chapter six of the Poetics, Aristotle
enumerates the six elements of tragedy: mythos (plot), ethé (characters), dianoia
(the characters’ thoughts), lexis (the language by means of which the previous
 Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film xiii

unity and coherence to the source story and to the adapted version is
present in one way or another in every chapter of this volume. From
different perspectives, more or less explicitly, the authors analyse and
discuss the double sense associated to mythos as fable (the series of
incidents) and as plot (the combination of incidents in a story or the artistic
organisation of them). According to Marta Frago, what matters in the
process of adaptation is not the fable as syuzhet, which refers to the plot of
the original story, but the fable as myth;5 that is, the story in its pre-
narrative and abstract phase. This becomes a somewhat vital principle
within the story that gives consistency to the other elements in the
narration: plot, characters, language, setting, and so forth. According to
many of the authors, this dimension, which is usually neglected by
adaptation studies, could give unity to the story and make the adaptation of
literary works to film possible, as the new version may become a re-
writing of the former’s mythos. In other words, the screenwriter and the
film director who decide to adapt a literary narration to the screen would
not necessarily imitate –in Aristotelian terms– the story in itself –its
sequence of events or narrative structure–, but the human actions, feelings,
thoughts, and conflicts the story imitates. It is in this sense, I think, that
Carmen Sofía Brenes considers that the poetic myth may become a
“configurator of texts”6 and, in my perspective, a configurator of film
adaptations.
Taking ideas from Juan José García-Noblejas’s analysis7 of “mimesis
III” by Paul Ricoeur, Brenes resorts to the distinction between comprehension
and application when reading a text. She explains that despite the fact that
García-Noblejas does not make a chronological distinction between these
two moments during the encounter between film and spectator, he
suggests that in the moment of application readers, spectators,
screenwriters, and directors gain “access to the deep poetic structures of
the text or, in other words, the myth, by means of hermeneutical

elements are communicated), opsis (visual elements) and melopea (rhythm). In his
hierarchical design, plot is the most relevant.
5
Cf. Chapter Three in this book: Marta Frago, “Adaptation, Re-Adaptation, and
Myth”, 45-60.
6
Carmen Sofía Brenes, “The Practical Value of Theory: Teaching Aristotle’s
Poetics to Screenwriters”, Comunicación y Sociedad, 24:1 (2011): 107.
7
See especially: Juan José García-Noblejas, “Pensar hoy un sentido trascendente
para la catarsis aristotélica”, in Lavoro e vita quotidiana, ed. Giorgio Faro, vol. IV
(Roma: Edusc, 2003), and “Identidad personal y mundos cinematográficos
distópicos”, Comunicación y Sociedad, 17: 2 (2004): 73-88 (English version:
http://www.poetcom.org/2008/04/personal-identi.html, 13-9-2010);
xiv Foreword

analysis.”8 Hence, the same process should be followed when adapting

literary works to film: comprehending the story and applying a real-life
sense to it may constitute the hermeneutics needed to be able to adapt the
poetic myth, thus re-tell stories on screen.
The book is divided into five sections. The first one íTheoretical
Approaches on Literature and Film Adaptation: Who Borrows What and
from Whom?í, deals with issues regarding the problems and challenges
concerning the adaptation of literary works to the particular nature and
dynamics of cinema (relevance of images and sounds over text). In the
first chapter, “Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist?”,
the author explains that Descriptive Adaptation Studies have updated a
research programme that was developed in the mid-1980s and presented in
the early 1990s; this method was called a “polysystem” (PS) study of
adaptations. He points out that the PS approach and system theory more in
general have been under attack within the humanities from multiple
perspectives. So-called constructivist commentators have asserted that
systems do not exist, except as mental constructs or as fictitious heuristic
devices that help to describe and explain reality. This chapter argues that
following certain counter-arguments developed by realism, critics may or
may not consider system theory as relevant to adaptation studies, but they
cannot discard the approach on the basis that systems would not actually
exist.
The second chapter: “Revisiting Plato: The Hermeneutics of Adaptation
in the Light of Theuth’s Myth of Writing”, examines the myth, which Plato
presents at the end of Phaedrus. The author takes it in a broad sense –not
just dealing with rhetoric and writing– in order to exemplify Plato’s
mature views regarding the possibilities and limitations of rendering a
given account (or phenomenon) from one type of language into another.
Thus, following Plato’s steps along the Phaedrus and other mature
dialogues (e.g., Timaeus, the Seventh Letter) he argues that Plato’s
scepticism on writing (linguistic or iconic) is not complete, insofar as he
discriminates between different types or functions of “signs” [týpoi]. Some
reach its object or remember it from the outside by means of exterior signs
[éxǀthen], yet others do from the inside [éndothen], i.e., by themselves. To
this last kind of signs (or language), Plato also refers as alive and animated
forms of speech [lógon zǀnta kai émpsychon]. Therefore, any written (or
iconic) language which seeks to truly communicate (or adapt) something,
must be at some level an image or a reflection of such oral (dialectical)
word, which in fact transmits an original truth (related to a golden time)
now partly lost for us. Secondly, he defends the idea that a “secularized”
8
Brenes, 108.
 Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film xv

form of this argument, one which is actually found in some important

hermeneutic philosophers (i.e., Heidegger, Gadamer, Ricoeur), can
enlighten the epistemological ground which stands at the basis of this
book by asserting that (a) adaptation is possible and (b) that some
adaptations are better (or worse) than others.
In “Adaptation, Re-Adaptation, and Myth”, the third chapter of the
book, the author shows how due to the influence of transmedia
storytelling, adaptations from the same story to different narrative forms
have proliferated in the last years. These “re-adaptations” take multiple
directions, as they do not only converge towards film and television, but
also to literary forms and other narrative platforms such as musicals,
comics, videogames, ballets, thematic parks, to mention but a few
examples. In relation to this phenomenon, the chapter serves two purposes:
first, to describe how adaptation studies, generally linked to Literature
Departments, have faced re-adaptation cases and have had to review their
approaches and methods to literary theory by looking for a more
interdisciplinary scope. Second, this chapter aims to recover the semantic
analysis, focused on the fable as myth of the story, as a way to understand
re-adaptation better. That dimension of the fable directs the attention to the
core of the story, linking up all possible adaptations. Far from making
comparisons between main text and derived text, this perspective levels all
versions. As the fable-myth may dress up different clothes, any new
arrangement is welcome. The diversity of modes and interpretations reveal
the universal force of myth. Besides, the way to access from the narrative
work to the fable-myth always becomes a challenge for the screenwriter.
The second section íFrom Stage to Screen: The Problem of Theatrical
Adaptation to Filmí focuses on the specific problem of adapting theatre to
film and the challenges this implies; for instance, the unique experience of
staging, of being part of an audience, thus present during a performance,
and so forth. It presents three study cases taken from Greek tragedy,
Shakespearean drama, and from a modern theatre adaptation. In “From
Theatre to Film: The Case of Ancient Greek Tragedy”, the author analyses
how ancient Greek tragedy has been an inspiration for centuries to its
original art form: theatre. However, from the 60’s onwards there has been
an attempt to interpret, translate and transform ancient Greek tragedy into
film. The cinematic language had to challenge a long tradition coming
from theatre with various distinctive features regarding ancient Greek
tragedy such as outdoor performances, strict rules of acting and the austere
structure of this theatrical style, as well as its special logos.
Through case studies, the fourth chapter specifically examines the
alterations and innovations that cinematic language brought to light while
xvi Foreword

adapting ancient Greek tragedy in different modern contexts. Taking the

films of Michael Cacoyannis, Pier Paolo Pasolini, and Jules Dassin, the
author compares the proximity or the distance that the directors kept from
the original theatrical text and its performance in the attempt they made to
interpret ancient Greek tragedy. The chapter also discusses the reception
of these films by the critics and the audience, as well as the feedback they
received concerning the adaptation of ancient Greek tragedy into film
language.
Despite the fact that the raw material for adapting a play to the screen
is provided for the film director, as he/she accounts for both the story and
its written script, the complexities of adaptation from theatre to film are
manifold and have opened diverse discussions in Film Studies. In “The
Film Industry Woos Shakespeare: Theatrical versus Cinematographic
Space in the Adaptations of Hamlet and Henry V by Kenneth Branagh”,
the author questions the possibility of adapting a Shakespearean play and
explores how to reproduce its inherent spatial dimension, which she
considers essential for its meaning. She analyses two film adaptations of
plays by William Shakespeare: Hamlet (1996) and Henry V (1989) by the
British director Kenneth Branagh as study cases. By examining the films,
she pays special attention to the use of space, an element that adds
complexity to the process of adaptation because Shakespearean plays have
almost no stage directions or indications of place that guide and frame the
setting of scenes. This theatrical/technical aspect transforms the job of the
film director into a challenge of creative reinterpretation that goes beyond
the mere filming of a determined theatrical performance, but aims to
represent a certain notion of space precisely by filling the Shakespearean
flexible and empty space with film images and symbols. She suggests that
a “good” adaptation of Shakespeare to film –that which is a mirror of the
human conflicts proposed by the dramatist– will result not only from its
fidelity to the text, but from its understanding of Shakespearean spatial
poetics that the director will configure according to his/her own
interpretation of the dramatic mythos.
The second section ends with chapter six: “Duet for One: When Less is
More”, in which the author explores the problem of transposition of
theatrical material to the screen which, in turn, raises the question of
whether one can succeed in such a move from one medium to another at
all. She brings to the fore theories of intermediality, a concept that,
according to the Spanish playwright and scholar Guillermo Heras, is one
of the most relevant contributions to adaptation studies. Focusing on Duet
for One, a film by Andrei Konchalovsky released in 1986, based on a play
of the same title by Tom Kempinski –an English contemporary playwright–,
 Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film xvii

the author analyses its process of adaptation both from a theoretical

perspective, as well as from her own experience as translator, producer,
actress, and director of the play.
The third section íFrom Written to Visual Narrative: The Story behind
the Screení includes a good number of examples of literary works that
have been adapted to film or TV series. The six chapters in this section
function as “study cases” that aim to answer, in practice, the general
questions posed in the introductory section; that is to say, whether literary
adaptation to film works successfully or not, and in what ways or aspects it
does so. Literary authors are presented in chronological order; that is to
say, according to the years when they lived and published their novels or
narrative works.
Grounded in the idea that the theory of cinematographic adaptation
must consider the possibilities of subjective re-creation, the author of
chapter seven: “Impossible Voyages and Possible Adaptation in the Work
of Jules Verne”, argues that if Cervantes started his famous novel by
addressing an idle reader, a modern writer may implicitly address a busy
screenwriter. He will be able to see the possibilities of re-creation for the
screen in the writer’s work. Méliès, the cinematic pioneer, also turns out to
be a pioneer in his adaptation for that early cinema, of pre-existing literary
texts –in his case, those of Jules Verne. The example of Verne provides an
opportunity to consider the adaptation of science fiction, in order to
demonstrate that not only technical possibilities link science fiction to
cinema but there is also a relationship between both that resides in the
extreme landscapes that the science fiction text provides and that can be
adapted to the screen in a natural way.
A less explored aspect in the relationship between Literature and
Cinema is that of films that are hermeneutical exercises of the literary
works that inspired them –be that intended or not by their
screenwriters/directors. Starting with George Steiner’s notion that “true
theatre hermeneutics is representation”9, the author of “Coppola’s
Apocalypse Now as Hermeneutics of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness”
questions whether this hermeneutical process may occur, in a similar way,
with film adaptations of certain novels, so that a film, beyond its intrinsic
value, may become a hermeneutics of the novel on which it is based.
Following T.S. Eliot’s Tradition and the Individual Talent in the idea that
not only the new work is influenced by the canon, but it may alter the
canon itself, the author proposes that Apocalypse Now by Francis Ford
Coppola (1979) is a lucid hermeneutical exercise of Heart of Darkness
9
George Steiner, Real Presences (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press,
1991), I. 3.
xviii Foreword

(1899) by Joseph Conrad. That is, not only that Coppola’s film was
inspired by and is a “rewriting” of Conrad’s novel, but that the very
meaning and scope of Conrad’s novel has been deepened and enriched
thanks to the film. The reason would lie, in his view, in the fact that the
same mythos of the novel has remained in the film and this is “the
principle and [...] the soul of tragedy”10 in the words of Aristotle.
Furthermore, he argues that film adaptation of literary works is only
possible through rewriting the mythos of the latter.
The author of chapter nine: “Death in Venice: From Thomas Mann to
Luchino Visconti. An Artistic Interpretation of Art”, expands Steiner’s
theory regarding hermeneutics; that is to say, how a work of art can be
criticized, valued, weighed, and even broadened and corrected only by
another work of art: an artistic interpretation of art. By making a
comparison between Thomas Mann’s and Luchino Visconti’s Death in
Venice (the novel and the film), the author establishes a significant
landmark that allows us to examine Visconti’s film not only as a
movement of a written narrative into the realm of images, but also as an
expansion into a much more complex series of aesthetic problems. These,
he argues, do not only refer to literature, but also to a plurality of
discourses ingrained in a semiotic framework of a larger scope.
Chapter ten: “In Dialogue with the Poetic Myth of Brideshead Revisited”
charts the study of two cases of adaptation of the novel Brideshead
Revisited by Evelyn Waugh. One of them is the adaptation to the TV series
made by Granada / ITV in 1980, and the other is the film directed by
Julian Jarrold in 2008. The analysis starts from Marta Frago’s perspective
on adaptation, specifically her proposal of an alternate approach, besides
current semiotics. This approach focuses on the fable or myth as a
structuring element of the poetic text, in addition to an analysis of
structural and narratological issues. Frago understands adaptation as a
dialogue with the fable and its interpretation. One adaptation will differ
from another inasmuch as it manages to recreate, in an original way, the
same vital core that gives life to the original work.11 This poetic
perspective is used to analyse the two adaptations of Waugh’s novel.
The last two chapters in this section give way to the study of
contemporary authors such as Paul Auster and Henning Mankell. In
“Auster vs Auster: An Analysis of the Feedback Process between Cinema
and Literature”, the author explains how the rise of contemporary
literature created a structural break in the adaptation process ímainly

10
Aristotle, Poetics 1450a38-39.
11
Cf. Marta Frago, “Reflexiones sobre la adaptación cinematográfica desde una
perspectiva iconológica”, Comunicación y Sociedad XVIII, no. 2 (2005): 49-81.
 Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film xix

literary and cinematographicí that traces its origin to the beginning of the
film industry. Adapting this new linguistic line ísubjective and
psychologicalí presents more problems than solutions when available
mechanisms are insufficient to permit an adaptation from one medium to
another without disrupting the linguistic and conceptual balance of the
work. She presents an analysis of the works of the writer and screenwriter
Paul Auster, where cinema and literature are united to demonstrate that in
the contemporary world adaptation from one medium to another is a valid
alternative within this new way of representing human reality. In Auster’s
work, she argues, language is presented as a tool that provides balance
between two ways of representation in the cinematographic adaptation
process.
Finally, the author of “Nordic Noir: The World of Wallander and
Mankell as Seen on Sidetracked, the BBC Episode” studies the television
adaptation of ten novels by Henning Mankell made by the BBC. The
stories have Kurt Wallander as protagonist and are included in the Nordic
Noir genre of police investigation. This chapter has two main
characteristics: 1) it studies, in an holistic way, the critical view of the
social world offered by Mankell’s texts and its faithful British screen
adaptation, and 2) it fixes its attention on the strong “thematic sense” of
the personal and familial perspective that lies in the voice and conscience
of Wallander as protagonist. According to the author, because Mankell
explores real life in Swedish society, the analysis highlights the real extent
of his “strong critical sense” on society, and it does not only deal with the
story from the diegetic, generic and intertextual point of view. In other
words, the study wants to open a channel for dialogue with the “myth” that
rules Wallander’s world, a “myth” or soul that tends to make the literary
and the audio-visual version coincide, especially when the same person is
the reader and the viewer. He concludes that there is a “thematic feeling”
of melancholy, disappointment, and life difficulties both in Mankell’s text
and in its British adaptation. Thus, the focus is on revealing the presence
of a special nostalgia for a past in which family ties, especially parent-
child, and marriage, are stronger, more stable and personal than in the
literary and audio-visual Nordic Noir worlds in which Wallander lives,
those that in a more or less reliable way, reflect the world criticized by
Mankell.
The fourth section within the adaptation of written narratives into film
and TV series is called: Latin American Voices on Screen, as it includes
two chapters on literary works by authors from Colombia and Peru with
their respective adaptations to the screen. Chapter thirteen: “Bleeding the
Rubber Trees: Parallelism and Paradox in La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo”
xx Foreword

presents a comparative analysis between the novel La vorágine (1924) by

the Colombian writer José Eustasio Rivera and the film Fitzcarraldo
(1982) by the German film maker, Werner Herzog. Although there is no
factual connection between the film and the novel, a series of peculiar
parallelisms between both narratives appear repeatedly. The author
analyses the similarities between the two stories, which take place in the
early twentieth century during the Amazonian rubber extraction processes.
She explores the similitude between the two heroes (Arturo Cova and B.S.
Fitzgerald), their individualistic and romantic character, as well as their
desire to defeat the jungle. In addition, the chapter explores the epic and
partially autobiographic vision of both authors, highlighting the diffuse
line between reality and fiction that these texts present. Both authors, who
at times appear to become their own fictional character, had to confront
íin reality and in the fictional story they createdí the violent exploitation
of indigenous people along the Amazon jungle. The parallelisms
mentioned above, generate an uncanny effect, especially considering that
the film’s hero also incarnates the feared rubber lords constantly described
in the novel.
According to the author of chapter fourteen: “Other Expressions of
Indigenism: Film Adaptations of Two Stories by José María Arguedas”,
the Peruvian author, José María Arguedas, positions himself in a dual
space íboth biographically and textuallyí between the indigenous and the
white (“blancos”, term used in Peru, and elsewhere in Latin America to
identify people of non-Indian origin). In this way, he is situated in a
peripheral and privileged, but also pathetic place. His writing, within the
indigenous movement, tries to give an account of this reality, striding two
worlds, in modern Peru, through linguistic, historical, anthropological and
narrative resources. In this chapter, she examines two of Arguedas’s
stories: “La agonía de Rasu Ñiti” (1962) and “El sueño del pongo” (1965),
together with their corresponding film adaptations: La agonía de Rasu
Ñiti, a short film made in 1985 by Augusto Tamayo for the
Communications Centre at Universidad Católica de Perú, and El sueño
del pongo, a documentary short film by the Cuban director, Santiago
Álvarez, in 1970. The purpose of this study is to analyse the way in which
these films succeed in telling two stories, namely, the one about the last
dance performed by the danzak’íor scissors dancerí Rasu Ñiti, and of his
tormented death; and the story about the abject pongo (native man freely
working in a house-estate), who suffers his master’s constant abuse.
However, the main objective of the author is to show how (and by what
means) the directors of both films incorporate Arguedas’s aesthetic and
ideological approach in their filmed versions of the stories.
 Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film xxi

The fifth and last section of the book: Films and their Narrative
Strategies, also consists of two chapters which deal with the structures and
devices that film directors use in order to tell stories. In chapter fifteen:
“Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir”, the author shows the
stylistic unity that brings into focus the notion of cinema d’auteur íboth
European and classic Americaní in the films of Weir. He argues that this
is not a mere eclecticism that consists of working for feature films in an
interesting way, but a true synthesis that embodies the best of both
traditions. Weir admirably combines his extensive knowledge of classic
Hollywood with the narrative discipline of European art cinema. In the
author’s perspective, what gives unity to Weir’s films is his cinematic
technique of high artistic quality, but mainly, the configuration of the
narrative plot, as the director considers himself primarily as a story-teller
and is not afraid of addressing the major issues related to human existence.
The chapter offers an analysis of the narrative strategies deployed in most
of Weir’s works, focusing first on common structures the film maker uses
in the configuration of the films’ frame, and then, on how different
developments of these are embodied in the narrative of his films.
The last chapter of the book: “Meta-Literature and Meta-Art in The
Taste of Others”, deals with the dramatic comedy The Taste of Others
(France, 2001), as an example of a meta-literary and even meta-artistic
work. The author explains that the film’s protagonist is an actress who
plays roles in two plays (Racine’s Berenice and Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler)
and is preparing for a role in The Imaginary Invalid, by Molière. Her
friends are artists and/or dilettantes who allude easily to such playwrights
as August Strindberg, Werner Schwab, and Tennessee Williams. In
contrast, her co-protagonist is a businessman with no connection to the
world of culture; he is, however, comically similar to Monsieur Jourdain,
the Molière character who is unaware he has been speaking in prose.
However, according to the author, the film does not glorify art for art’s
sake. Rather, its reflection is subtle, distancing itself from both narcissistic
self-reference (so frequent in postmodern art) and biased, anti-artistic
criticism (representing the most conservative point of view), and
equidistant from both intra-artistic discourse and the embittered critique of
the extra-artistic world. Thus, the author concludes, The Taste of Others
offers a smiling criticism, which is simultaneously a self-criticism (Agnès
Jaoui, the director, is an actress and writer, and her husband and co-
scriptwriter is a well-known actor).
The list of contributors (included at the end of the book) shows the
variety of backgrounds and expertise of the academics involved in this
project. We hope this will contribute to widen the book’s readership, as it
xxii Foreword

will interest academics and researchers working in the field of comparative

studies between Literature and Film, novelists, screenwriters, film makers,
dramatists, theatre directors, postgraduate students, and those researching
on topics related to the philosophy of art and aesthetics from all over the
world.
The art of telling and re-telling stories originated long ago in ancient
times; soon, these oral narrations were adapted into written versions. Since
then, adaptations are present everywhere in our world, and we hope their
process and development is well told and re-told in this volume.

—Paula Baldwin Lind

Winter, 2015.
 PART I:

THEORETICAL APPROACHES
ON LITERATURE AND FILM ADAPTATION:
WHO BORROWS WHAT AND FROM WHOM?
 CHAPTER ONE

DESCRIPTIVE ADAPTATION STUDIES:

WHY DO SYSTEMS EXIST?1

PATRICK CATTRYSSE
UNIVERSITEIT ANTWERPEN AND UNIVERSITÉ LIBRE DE
BRUXELLES, BELGIUM; EMERSON COLLEGE, EUROPEAN
CENTRE, THE NETHERLANDS

1. Introduction
Descriptive adaptation studies (DAS) aims to describe and explain
adaptations in terms of systems and norms. It is based on a research
program called a “polysystem” (PS) study of adaptations. PS theory was
developed first in the 1970s by two Israeli translation scholars: Itamar
Even-Zohar and Gideon Toury, to study (mostly literary) translations.2 In
the late 1980s and early 1990s, proposals were developed to adapt the
research program to a PS study of adaptations.3 These proposals emerged
as a reaction to a number of then common criticisms within the field of
(mostly film) adaptation studies. Some of these criticisms still sound
familiar today. In response to the lack of meta-theoretical thinking in the
discipline, PS served as a conceptual and methodological framework that
allows scholars to study adaptations in a more consistent way. In an effort
to eschew value judgments, it aimed at a descriptive-explanatory approach.
1
This essay represents the first part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso
Internacional de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile,
9-10 October 2013, under the title: “DAS: Why systems do exist and good (or bad)
adaptations do not?”.
2
See, e.g., Even-Zohar, “The Position of Translated Literature within the Literary
Polysystem”; Even-Zohar, “Polysystem Theories”; Toury, In Search of the Theory
of Translation.
3
See e.g. Cattrysse, “L’Adaptation filmique de textes littéraires. Le film noir
américain”; Cattrysse, “Film (adaptation) as Translation: Some Methodological
Proposals”; Cattrysse, Pour une théorie de l’adaptation filmique.
 Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist? 3

In an attempt to step beyond the endless accumulation of ad hoc selected

case studies, the PS approach called for the development of broader
corpus-based research. It also entailed a break with the customary fidelity-
based discourse and the single-source text model. It suggested looking at
adaptations as adaptations, the production and reception of which are
determined by multiple conditioners to be found in both source and target
contexts. At once, the multi-source text model raised the question of
whether and how one can study adaptational relationships as a more or less
specific class that can be distinguished from other (e.g., intertextual
intermedial, intercultural,...) types of relationships. A PS study of
adaptations steps beyond Auteurism, i.e. it looks for explanations beyond
the level of individual agency (even if contextualized). It suggests
investigating also conditioners that operate at non-individual levels
(expressed in terms of systemic features and norms). In 1995, Toury
replaced the word “polysystem” with “descriptive” proposing DTS:
descriptive translation studies. In a recent study called Descriptive
Adaptation Studies: Epistemological and Methodological Issues, I
examine whether and how a similar update is possible within adaptation
studies. The focus remains on description and explanation in terms of
systems and norms, but the two words are redefined respectively as
“descriptive coherence” and “explanatory coherence”. Whereas systems
reply to what-questions, norms reply to why-questions.4 Coherence, as
opposed to randomness, may reveal itself in various “forms”. This
question is the subject of a research area that has become a discipline in
and of itself: system theory. System theory originated in Ludwig von
Bertalanffy’s General System Theory and since then it has been applied in
other fields: philosophical action theory (e.g. Donald Davidson, Michael
Bratman), social action theory (e.g. Talcott Parsons) or social systems
theory (e.g. Niklas Luhmann), systems as networks (e.g. Bruno Latour,
Michel Callon), social networks (e.g. Manuel Castells), so-called
“distributionists” (e.g. Miguel Nicolelis), etc. Hence, in DAS, systems and
norms, understood as descriptive and explanatory coherence or non-
randomness, may refer to more traditional notions of systems (e.g.
Ferdinand de Saussure, Itamar Even-Zohar, Gideon Toury), as well as to
the aforementioned more recent usages of the word.
To the extent that DAS adheres to a systems approach, it runs into two
types of criticisms. One concerns the ontological status of systems where
opponents claim that systems do not exist. The other concerns their

4
The distinction between description and explanation represents a fascinating and
ancient epistemological issue. For a more elaborate discussion with respect to
adaptation studies, see e.g. P. Cattrysse, Descriptive Adaptation Studies, 171ff.
4 Chapter One

relevance: when they display systemic features, so the argument goes,

phenomena are not interesting or not relevant. The following argues that
adaptation scholars may debate whether they find a search for systemic
coherences in adaptational phenomena scientifically relevant or not, but
following some arguments advanced in realist theories of truth, they
cannot claim that these systemic coherences would not exist.

2. System Studies: Attacks

It is an understatement to assert that for decades, film studies in particular,
and the study of the arts more in general have not embraced a science-
based approach.5 Therefore, it should not be a surprise that any systems
approach for that matter, and a fortiori one that calls itself a “polysystem”
approach, has not fared so well: not in translation studies and even less in
adaptation studies. As stated above, the co-founder of the PS approach,
Gideon Toury, abandoned the term in 1995, and replaced it with the label
“Descriptive Translation Studies”. His followers argue that systems do not
exist.6 Even in less science-antagonistic disciplines like behavioural
economics and psychology, high profile researchers like Daniel
Kahneman7 assert that systems merely represent fictitious heuristic devices
that help to describe and understand human behaviour. Attacks against
system studies have come from different directions. I hereafter briefly
discuss three: ontological and methodological individualism, a Romantic
view on art and culture, and relativism that propagates the Heraclitean
view that reality is in a constant flux.

Individualism versus Collectivism

The individualism/collectivism divide appears in a number of debates such
as the agency-structure debate and the mereological debate about parts and
wholes. The Dutch epistemologist Chris Lorenz8 distinguishes between
what he calls methodological and ontological individualism vs.
methodological and ontological collectivism or holism. With reference to

5
See, e.g., Bordwell, Poetics of Cinema, 3ff.; Grodal, Embodied Visions.
Evolution, Emotion, Culture, and Film, 13ff.; Boyd, Carroll, and Gotschall,
Evolution, Literature & Film: A Reader, 1ff.
6
See, e.g., Hermans, Translation in Systems. Descriptive and System-Oriented
Approaches Explained, 103.
7
Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow, 29.
8
Lorenz, De Constructie van Het Verleden. Een Inleiding in the Theorie van de
Geschiedenis, 175ff.
 Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist? 5

the study of history, Lorenz explains this fourfold divide as follows: the
ontological/methodological divide refers respectively to ontological status
and explanatory power; the individualist-collectivist distinction refers to a
focus on the parts or the whole, respectively. Hence, ontological
collectivism claims that what is composed is as real as the parts that
constitute it, while ontological individualism argues that only the parts that
make up the whole are real. For example, when studying history, society
or art, the ontological individualist states that only individuals are real
while the society they form is not; only individual films are real, genres
are not, etc. By contrast, the ontological collectivist claims the opposite.
Furthermore, the methodological individualist argues that the whole can
only be explained by its parts, while the methodological collectivist claims
that wholes may acquire relative autonomy from their constituent parts,
and thus function in ways that cannot be explained by considering each
part separately. When the whole is reduced to the sum of its parts, they call
it “reductionist”. Hence, in addition to describing which parts constitute a
whole, one must also investigate how these parts constitute the whole
through mutual interaction (e.g. networking). This fourfold distinction is
useful because an ontological collectivist may accept that social facts are
real, but argue, at the same time, that only their constituent parts can
explain them. In that case, the ontological collectivist would adhere to
methodological individualism. The ontological individualist, on the other
hand, may subscribe to the methodological collectivist view by stating that
wholes such as institutions, social classes or film genres do not actually
exist, but serve as heuristic devices for explaining the features and
functioning of the parts that constitute these wholes. Consequently, it is
not hard to see how a systems approach adheres to methodological
collectivism while an Auteurist approach for example adheres to
methodological individualism (see section 1). However, to acknowledge
systems studies also within ontological collectivism entails a significant
but controversial implication: systems are not merely heuristic devices that
help explain reality but are as real as the parts that constitute them. In
support to this argument, Lorenz9 compares a table, which is made up of
numerous particles, with a society, which consists of multiple individuals.
No one “in her right mind” would argue that the particles that constitute
the table are real, but not the table. Similarly, the argument goes, one
cannot assert that only the separate individuals that make up a society are
real, but not the society. Indeed, the claim that the composed would be less
real than the singular is inconsistent. If a society is not real because it
consists of numerous individuals, individuals are not real because they too
9
Ibid., 176.
6 Chapter One

consist of numerous biological particles, and these biological particles

would not be real because they in turn are made up of yet smaller particles,
and so on. The only difference, Lorenz argues, between a table and a
society is that the latter consists of elementary parts that are able to act
intentionally and to reflect upon things. The question about explanatory
power brings us to the next paragraph.

The Romantic versus Classicist Value System

A strong and well-known proponent of methodological individualism can
be found in the Romantic value system. It prevails currently among
tertiary educated people in the West. The Romantic view values practices
and products that result from the free-willed creation of an individual
genius-Auteur. This genius-Auteur produces phenomena that are
considered “original” and “different”. Artistic expression is said to be
“free”, for example, when rules are bent, broken, or simply ignored. An
arduous defender of the Romantic view in film (adaptation) studies is the
Politique des Auteurs or Auteurism. Auteurism started as a critical
paradigm in the 1950s in France, and spread soon after in Europe, the US
and elsewhere. According to this view, systems refer to commonality
rather than to unicity, determinism rather than free-willed creativity,
structure rather than agency. That is why in this view, if systems do exist,
they are considered to be irrelevant in a study of the aesthetic, except to
depreciate a work of art or cultural phenomenon.10 However, each day,
more recent findings int. al. in social neuroscience11, behavioural
biology12, social biology13, and social psychology14 chip away some of
that intuitive belief in the explanatory power of so-called “individual free-
willed intentions”.15 They suggest one accord focus also to infra- and
trans-individual bio-psycho-social conditioners in order to explain
practices and products. DAS approach concurs with this suggestion.

10
Within the limits of this essay, I must simplify the respective points of view. A
more elaborate discussion of the legitimation process of genre studies for example
could offer a more nuanced illustration of the battle between the valuing of the
individual and the valuing of the common.
11
See, e.g., Harmon-Jones and Winkielman, Social Neuroscience. Integrating
Biological and Psychological Explanations of Social Behavior.
12
See, e.g., the work of Robert Sapolsky.
13
See, e.g., the work of Edward O. Wilson.
14
See, e.g., the work of Elliot Aranson.
15
See, e.g., Toleffson, “Collective Intentionality.”
 Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist? 7

The Heraclitean Flux

Finally, a third attack against a systems approach I mention here comes
from post-modern relativists who propagate the so-called Heraclitean view
that reality is a constant flux. I first explain the main features of this view.
Section 2 outlines some arguments realism has advanced to counter these
attacks. Section 3 draws some conclusions with respect to a systems-based
study of adaptations.
The Greek philosopher Heraclitus (6th century BC) purportedly uttered
the proverbial “All things are flowing”. Reality is constantly in flux. It
follows that “systems” are not useful as a concept because they cannot
account for constant change. The word “system” fixates so-called
“becomings”, processes or change, and thereby represents a falsification of
the world. For the reader who is not familiar with this Heraclitean view, it
is not difficult to explain how the world is constantly changing and
moving, both at the nano and galactic levels. At the nanolevel, the second
law of thermodynamics states that entropy16 will universally and
continuously increase in matter until a state of thermodynamic equilibrium
is reached. If matter changes continuously and humans consist of matter,
then humans change continuously, both physically and experientially.
Physically, most if not all the cells in a person’s body have changed or
been replaced after a certain number of years. This recalls the paradox of
Theseus’ ship17, and raises the question if after that time, I am physically
still “the same” person? But also experientially, every split second, I am
someone having experienced something I had not experienced one split
second before. One may think that personal pronouns such as “I”, “you”,
“we” refer to fixed identities, but apparently they do not. Moreover, while
the world is constantly changing, perception of the world takes time. It
follows that whatever I perceive is not what is but what was. When I look
at the sun from the Earth, I do not see the sun as it is, but as it was eight
minutes ago. If I talk to a student in front of me at a distance of thirty
centimetres (close, I know, but it makes it easier to calculate), I do not see
the student as he is but as he was one million femtoseconds18 ago, and the

16
Entropy refers to the degree of disorder, i.e. the randomness of energy
distribution.
17
Plutarch (46-120 AD) wondered about “the ship of Theseus” and asked himself
if all the parts of a ship have been replaced one by one, one can still consider it “to
be” the same ship, and if not, at what time it stopped “being” the same ship.
18
One femtosecond is one thousand of a trillionth of a second. These shorter
intervals are commonly used in computer and laser technology, and in high
8 Chapter One

same goes for the student who sees me. At the time we see and hear or
smell each other, we no longer exist as such; we have already changed.
Make the distance between the student and I three meters instead of thirty
centimetres and perception and communication, counted in femtoseconds,
take “forever”. Similar discrepancies between reality and perception apply
to all human senses. Whatever I hear, smell, taste, or touch takes “forever”
(again, in terms of femtoseconds) before the nervous system and the brain
register and communicate the sound, smell, taste, or touch to one’s
consciousness. To changes at the nanolevel, one must add changes at the
galactic level. While I am typing these disturbing data into my computer, I
and everyone else on this planet are spinning around the Earth’s axis at a
speed greater than the speed of sound. And while planet Earth and all of us
are spinning, we are at the same time racing around the sun at
approximately one hundred thousand kilometres per hour. And this racing
around the sun happens while our Milky Way and we are rushing through
the fabric of space at almost two million kilometres per hour. In fact,
according to Einstein’s special theory of relativity, the very notion of
“speed” or “absolute velocity” is problematic because it must be measured
with respect to some “inertial” frame of reference. Since everything
constantly moves in the universe, finding such a frame becomes
impossible.19 It follows that human perception can only be summarized as
“always too little, too late”.
It should come as no surprise that various postmodern or relativist
philosophers20 writing about “processes” and “becomings” in literary
studies, film studies and in cultural studies more in general, have used this
Heraclitean perspective as an argument against what Philip Bell21 has
called “empirico-realist epistemologies in Anglo-American humanities and
social science curricula”. On the basis of these writings, many critics have
concluded that only change and difference are real. Stasis and similarity
result from perception and construction, and are therefore not inherent
properties that can be recognized in the things themselves. Nelson

frequency trading. To put these dimensions somewhat in perspective: there are

more femtoseconds in one second than there are seconds in 31 million years.
19
See, e.g., Greene, Fabric of Cosmos. Space, Time, and the Texture of Reality,
24–29. See also Wikipedia on this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milky Way
(accessed June 24, 2014).
20
See, e.g., Mikhael Bakhtin, Nelson Goodman, Willard Van Orman Quine, Gilles
Deleuze, Jacques Derrida, Brian Massumi, Douglas Medin, etc. quoted, inter alia,
in Douglas, How Institutions Think, 59ff., and Bell, Confronting Theory. The
Psychology of Cultural Studies, 8.
21
Bell, Confronting Theory, 8.
 Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist? 9

Goodman22 goes as far as to contend that similarity is “a pretender, an

imposter, a quack”. If change is the only constant in life, then fundamental
notions in adaptation or translation studies such as “fidelity”, “identity” or
“sameness” do not exist. “Looking” at reality, human perception, and
communication in this way implies that one can never read a book or
watch a movie twice in identical ways for while reading or watching, both
we and the book or the movie have changed. Every single moment in our
reading or viewing process represents one unique “once-in-a-lifetime”
event on a one-directional timeline. Not only first impressions are unique,
but so are second impressions, and third ones, etc. As such, one can never
reproduce or relive them again. Once more, this is not a postmodern
invention. Cratylus, who was a teacher of Plato, and who is quoted by
Aristotle, already outdid his predecessor Heraclitus and explained that “not
only can you not step into the same river twice, but […] you cannot step
into the same river once.”23
It is not hard to understand that, on the basis of the above, it does not
make sense to look for systemic coherences in sets of translations or
adaptations. Even the question whether one can translate a book into
another language or adapt it into another medium while maintaining “the
same meanings” sounds naive. If identity does not exist, two identities can
never be identical. It would seem that this is the ultimate argument to
prove that translations or adaptations are impossible. And yet, translations
and adaptations do exist, and humans manage to make sense out of them
and to communicate successfully about them. The claim that reality is
merely a perpetual flux provides no understanding about how this can be.
A realist approach suggests looking for answers in a different direction.

3. The Realist Reply to the Heraclitean View

If the discussion about the “Heraclitean flux” and the postmodern
processes and becomings goes back to Antiquity, the debate still continues
today. It is therefore impossible to offer an overview of all the arguments
that have been thrown back and forth for and against the various
positions.24 I hereafter limit therefore the discussion to three (sets of)
arguments. The first argument is based on what has been called the
“recoil” argument25 (§2.1). The second argues for a distinction between

22
Goodman, Projects and Problems, 437.
23
Blackburn, Truth. A Guide for the Perplexed, 103.
24
For a more extensive and comprehensive overview of this philosophical debate,
see, e.g., Blackburn, Truth. A Guide for the Perplexed.
25
Ibid., 25.
10 Chapter One

perception and illusion (§2.2). A third and last section finally exposes
some logical fallacies in the aforementioned Heraclitean argument (§2.3).

3.1. The “Recoil” Argument

Heraclitus’ flux and Protagoras’ subsequent “man the measure”-doctrine26
have first and foremost been attacked for being self-refuting. To be self-
refuting means that if what a proposition claims is true, its content cannot
be true. For example, if reality is only a constant flux, perception and
knowledge of it, and communication about it are impossible.27 All
understanding amounts to nothing more than an illusion. However, if all
understanding is an illusion, how can I understand that I cannot
understand? If one cannot know anything about the world, how is it
possible to know this about the world? If all human beliefs are subjective,
is this one belief subjective as well? How is one to proof that there are no
proofs?28 Hence, time and again, the relativist perspective, -whether
expressed by Heraclitus, Protagoras or more recent philosophers-, runs
into the same old obstacle, and so far, no one has managed to remove it
yet, at least not in a generally convincing way.

3.2. Perception and Illusion

Both constructivists and realists agree that reality is too complex, i.e.
composite and multi-layered, to be perceived and known all at once.
Scholars within perception psychology, neuro-biology, cognitive studies,
and other related disciplines, generally accept that perception depends on
(induction-based) bottom-up or world-to-mind processes and (deduction-
based) top-down or mind-to-world processes. Cues from the outside world
trigger sensory perception to interpret these cues within pre-set boundaries
of nature and nurture. From this follows that perception does not represent
a one-on-one copy-paste representation of reality.

26
Protagoras’ famous aphorism that “man is the measure of all things” refers to the
idea that reality is measured by (the standards of) man’s perception of it.
27
At one point, Cratylus became so upset by the Heraclitean conclusion that,
according to Aristotle, he stopped talking eventually communicating only by
wagging his finger (Blackburn, Truth, 103).
28
The Stoics asked this question already to the Sceptics in ancient Greece
(Blackburn, Truth, 47).
 D
Descriptive Addaptation Studiees: Why Do Sysstems Exist? 11

Figure 1

To say thhat perceptionn does not rep

present a one--on-one copy of reality
is to say thaat one may finnd discrepanciies between thhe perception of reality
and reality iitself. W.E. Hill’s
H 1915 draawing of “Myy Wife & My y Mother-
in-Law” (Figgure 1)29 helpps to explain so
ome of these ddiscrepancies:

- Wherreas perceptioon is partial, reality

r is compplete. The vieewer may
eitherr see a younng girl in Hill’s
H drawingg, or an old woman.
However, it is phyysically imposssible to see booth figures at the same
time.

- Wherreas perceptiion is sequeential, (parts of) reality co-exist

simultaneously. Evven though I can only see the young girrl and the
woman alternaately, both Gesstalts do co-exxist simultaneeously.
old w

- Wherreas perceptionn is always perspectivized

p or observer-d
dependent,
realitty (i.e. the organization of the colouured pixels in Hill’s
wing) exists in an objective, mind-indepenndent way.
draw

It follow
ws that divergeent observatio ons may be eiither due to a different
perspective that was adoppted, -e.g. thee application of a differentt research
method-, or to a mistake. In the formerr case, all vary rying observattions may
be true, as iin fitting reality. In that casse, contradictiions are only apparent,
i.e. play at tthe level of peerception, not at the level oof being. The divergent
observationss may then be b seen as complementary,, and the law w of non-
contradictionn does not apply. For exam mple, viewer A may see a youngy girl
in Hill’s draawing while viewer
v B seess an old wom man. Even tho ough they

29
See Perry, “Literary Dynaamics: How thee Order of a Texxt Creates Its Meanings”,
M
51.
12 Chapter One

diverge, both perceptions may be said to be correct, i.e. to fit reality or to

be triggered by the intrinsic properties of Hill’s picture. Both Gestalts are
therefore complementary and not conflicting. Similarly, with respect to the
aforementioned Heraclitean view: to acknowledge that there are discrepancies
between reality as it is and perceived reality explains how paradoxes may
emerge at the level of perception which do not correspond with
contradictions at the level of reality. For example, as indicated above, the
fact that perception is partial and sequential entails that parts or aspects of
reality, which co-exist at the same time, can only be perceived
subsequently. From this follows that the nature of perception involves an
“either or”-mode of thinking which does not apply to reality. This
discrepancy between reality and perceived reality may explain (not
justify!) why the aforementioned Heraclitean critics have difficulty
conceiving that (aspects of) the world may be at once static and changing,
the same and different. They seem to build the following argument: if I
cannot simultaneously perceive both change and stasis in the world, only
one of them can exist and the other must be false. Nevertheless, in order to
understand how reality can be both constant and changing at the same
time, it suffices to stop thinking of reality as one simple item one could
conceive all at once from some outside God’s eye view. As soon as reality
is understood as complex, and as soon as one understands perception as
partial, perspectivized and sequential, it follows that different angles of
perception will reveal different aspects of reality. This is how the
perception of reality at a level A may reveal constancy or sameness, while
the perception at a different level B may reveal change or difference. What
we learn from this is that the question: “Is reality static or changing?” is
simplistic and misleading. It suggests that it would be possible to perceive
reality from a perspective-less perspective.
Hill’s picture illustrates thus the importance of perspective in
perception and knowledge, i.e. how different perspectives may reveal
different aspects of one reality. Following this, post-positivists have
suggested to triangulate across methods or to adopt multiple-perspective
approaches, which allow for a less incomplete picture of the (parts of)
reality one investigates.30
However, divergent observations may also be caused by a mistake. In
that case, one or more of the observations must be false, as in not fitting
reality. For example, if someone were to “see” a pink elephant in Hill’s
drawing, that percept would be false, i.e. not fitting the intrinsic features of
the drawing. Unlike the Gestalts of the young woman and the old woman,
the percept of the pink elephant would emerge independently of the
30
See, e.g., Trochim, “Positivism and Post-Positivism.”
 Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist? 13

properties inherent in Hill’s picture. The divergent observation of the pink

elephant would then be considered as conflicting and not complementary
with the Gestalts of the young girl or the old woman, and the law of non-
contradiction would apply. The example of the pink elephant also shows
that the possibility of multiple perspectives does not automatically lead to
an “anything goes”-theory. In the end, it is the outside mind-independent
reality which sets the boundaries between what is true and what is false.
Conversely, to disconnect perception and knowledge entirely from reality
leads to an “anything goes”-theory where next to my truth, there is
everyone else’s truth, and all truths must exist on an equal basis. In that
case, the meaning of the word “truth” becomes vacuous and it is no longer
possible to decide who or what is right or wrong. All propositions
represent opinions that have equal value. Perception equals illusion, and
even that statement does no longer make sense.

3.3. Logical Fallacies

The acceptance that perception, knowledge and communication are partial,
perspectivized and sequential should not lead to some erroneous
conclusions.

1. It is not because perception is not perfect that it is entirely delusional.

Similarly, “partial perception” does not equal “no perception at all”:
the fact that I cannot perceive a phenomenon (e.g. book, movie) all at
once does not imply that I cannot perceive it at all. Both arguments
represent illogical jumps from all to nothing, which leave no space for
in-between solutions.31 Internauts love to post “visual illusions” on the
Web illustrating how the human brain and our senses may deceive us.
However, hundreds of thousands of years of successful interaction with
the world offer a formidable argument in favour of our senses. A
relativist approach which postulates that there exists no connection
between perception, knowledge and an outside world, or that indeed
there is no outside world, cannot account for this continued success of
human interaction with the world. Note that “success” should not be
understood here in any spectacular way. Successful interaction with the

31
A similar illogical jump can be found in the claim that if a distinction is not
always clear, it does not exist. I follow the opposite argument: if a distinction is not
always clear, it is sometimes clear, and if a distinction is sometimes clear, it must
exist first. This argument is useful in the debate about the distinction between
description and explanation and the one also between description and evaluation.
See Cattrysse, Descriptive Adaptation Studies, 65-227.
14 Chapter One

world may concern very simple actions such as me returning home

after a day’s work, or much less simple actions such as astronauts
landing their spaceship on the moon. If there is no connection between
perception and reality, then time and again, these “successes” must be
seen as sheer coincidences, as miracles indeed.32 In addition, with
respect to the question whether we should trust our senses or not,
scholars assert that distrust requires motive as much as trust.33 If I have
to choose between a few gimmicks on the Internet and thousands of
centuries of everyday experience, I know which side to choose, and so
does everyone else, it would seem, as soon as we look at their
everyday behaviour. Hence, instead of recurring to miracles, the realist
view suggests an answer that is both simpler and more down-to-earth.
If for millions of years, interaction with the world has been successful,
there must exist a consistent relation between perception, knowledge,
action, and the world. In that case, at least generally speaking, success
and failure are easy to explain: interaction is successful when
perception and knowledge are accurate; they fail when they are not.
Contrary to the relativist, the realist claims that it is “a plausible
response […] to think of the external world simply as a respectable
causal explanation of our pattern of experience”.34

2. Furthermore, the partiality of perception does not invalidate the

ontological status of the perceived: it is not because I perceive only a
part of a whole that that part or the whole would not exist. This
argument applies also to the two other features of perception:
perspective and sequentiality.

3. If the incompleteness of perception does not necessarily invalidate the

ontological status of the perceived, then one cannot conclude, ías
Nelson Goodman35 and others seem to do (see above)í, that only one
part of the perceived is real (say difference or change) and the other
part (say stasis or sameness) is not. If I can only see the young or the
old woman, I cannot conclude that, ceteris paribus, only one of the
Gestalts is real and the other is an illusion. To do so is to fall into the
trap of the aforementioned “either or” mode of thinking which applies

32
See Putnam, Mathematics, Matter and Method; Blackburn, Truth, 176ff.
33
See Peirce, “Some Consequences of Four Incapacities,” 140–157; Putnam,
Words and Life, 152, and Putnam, The Collapse of the Fact/Value Dichotomy and
Other Essays, 110.
34
Blackburn, Truth, 177.
35
Goodman, Projects and Problems.
 Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist? 15

to perception, but not necessarily to being. It also implies that one

trusts one’s senses with respect to one figure, say the young woman,
and distrusts them with respect to the other, say the old woman. Unless
there are convincing arguments, as in the case of the pink elephant, to
do so is inconsistent. Nevertheless, that is what relativists do when
they claim that only change and difference are real, and stasis and
sameness are not.

4. Whereas the previous argument concerns the ontological status of

change and stasis, sameness and difference, a fourth argument may be
built on the notion of relevance. Since Hill’s drawing may reveal both
a young girl and an old woman, there is no basis to automatically give
preference to one Gestalt over the other, to say for example that the
percept of the young girl is a priori more relevant than that of the old
woman, or vice versa. Similarly, in post-modern (film) adaptation
studies, the perception of the world reveals both stasis and change,
sameness and difference. One would therefore expect either side to
have a fifty percent chance of receiving critical attention. Yet the
Heraclitean view as explained above gives precedence to change and
difference over stasis and sameness.

5. It follows that this Heraclitean view is incomplete. With reference to

Hill’s picture, it sees only the old woman and ignores the young girl.
Sameness is said to falsely represent reality because it ignores change.
Yet the fact that the same criticism applies to difference is
conveniently forgotten. If change exists, so does constancy. How can
one even conceive of change without its counterpart stasis? What is
there to change?36 I may be made up of a bunch of constantly moving
and changing particles, and so is my home, but not just any pack of
particles makes up a person or a house. In his presentation of
Heraclitus, Daniel Graham37 suggests that Plato, Aristotle, and
Cratylus, may have misunderstood or misquoted Heraclitus, for the
latter does not say exactly that one cannot walk through the same river
twice. The actual quote goes as follows: “On those stepping into rivers
staying the same other and other waters flow.”38 It follows that the
river does not change because different waters run through it. Different
waters running through it is what actually makes it a river, and not a

36
The common reply that change is to be understood as continuous, not discrete, is
not convincing.
37
Graham, “Heraclitus,” n.p.
38
Ibid.
16 Chapter One

lake or a pond for example. And the same applies to the person that
crosses that river. Graham concludes that
The point […] is not that everything is changing, but that the fact that some
things change makes possible the continued existence of other things.
Perhaps more generally, the change in elements or constituents supports
the constancy of higher-level structures.39

Hence, according to Graham, Heraclitus does not hold the Universal Flux,
but recognizes rather a law-like flux of elements.

4. Conclusion
The general realist reply to the postmodern Heraclitean view on reality has
been that if reality is constantly fluxing, there is coherence in this flux. To
accept that reality consists of both change and constancy, and to accept
that perception, knowledge and communication represent a partial,
perspectivized and sequential process invests the realist approach with
some important advantages over its competitors. I hereafter list three.
Within a realist frame of mind, it is possible again:

- to make sense out of the world (§3.1)

- to be right or wrong (§3.2)
- to communicate successfully (§3.3)

In other words, DAS is possible again (§3.4). This does not mean that
DAS would solve all possible problems; far from it. Section 3.5 concludes
this essay with a new assignment for future research: DAS and the concept
of scientific relevance.

4.1. To Make Sense Out of the World

To accept invariance within variance and to consider both as equally real
explains how it is possible for subjects to make sense out of the world.
Knowledge, whether scientific or common, finds the permanent among the

39
Ibid. The distinction between change in elements or constituents and constancy
at higher-level structures occurs for example when humans categorize or when
they perceive token-type relationships. At a lower level, tokens are perceived as
partly similar and partly different. The similar features trigger the conception of a
higher-level category that unites the partly similar and partly different lower-level
tokens.
 Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist? 17

impermanent.40 This assumption is at the root of both Peircean and

Saussurean semiotics. Roman Jakobson reiterated the importance of the
concept of “invariance” in 1975:
Peirce belonged to the great generation that broadly developed one of the
most salient concepts and terms for geometry, physics, linguistics,
psychology, and many other sciences. This is the seminal idea of
INVARIANCE. The rational necessity of discovering the invariant behind
the numerous variables, the question of the assignment of all these variants
to relational constants unaffected by transformations underlies the whole of
Peirce’s science of signs. The question of invariance appears from the late
1860s in Peirce’s semiotic sketches and he ends by showing that on no
level is it possible to deal with a sign without considering both an invariant
41
and a transformational variation.

The Saussurean concepts of “sound-image”, distinctive features, and the

distinction also between parole (or singular utterance) and langue (or
system) did the same. Semiosis or meaning-making occurs when relevant
similarities and differences emerge among irrelevant similarities and
differences. They have been given various names such as “particles”, or
“Planck unit”, “centimetre” or “inch”, “scene” or “act”, “schemata” or
“script”, or system. Time and again, units or entities or identities or
Gestalts are discovered that consist of invariance among variance in a way
that allows them to be distinguished from other units, entities, identities or
Gestalts. Since both changes and constancy are seen as referring to
intrinsic properties of one reality, propositions about both change and
constancy may be true if their content fits these properties or false if they
do not. I repeat: the fact that distinctions are not always easy (or even
possible) to make does not imply that they do not exist.

4.2. To Distinguish True from False Statements

Postmodernists want their followers to understand that it is impossible to
understand. Yet they complain when they are misunderstood. To
misunderstand does not make sense if it is not possible to understand
correctly42, and to understand correctly requires a reality that cannot be

40
Blackburn, Truth. A Guide for the Perplexed, 99.
41
See Sütiste and Torop, “Processual Boundaries of Translation: Semiotics and
Translation Studies,” 189, and Jakobson, Selected Writings VII. Comparative
Slavic Studies, 252.
42
Simon Blackburn narrates some “amusing episodes of radical postmodernists
who suddenly forgot all about the […] indefinite plasticity of meaning when it
18 Chapter One

reduced to an unknowable, continuous shapeless flux. It is the acceptance

of a mind-independent world and the possibility to know some of it that
allow for perception and knowledge to be right or wrong, i.e. to fit the
world or not.
The co-occurrence of truth and relevance has led some thinkers to
conclude that what is true is what is relevant or useful.43 I am aware that
this represents an oversimplification of the Pragmatist model of thinking.
However, to the realist, this line of thinking is backwards. If I may borrow
Blackburn’s44 examples: maps do not “survive” in a Darwinian sense of
the word because they are useful, and neither do timetables that predict
when tides will come and go. One may imagine they survive because they
are accurate, i.e. represent things as they really are in the world. Hence, to
the realist, maps and tide tables are not true because they are relevant and
useful; they are considered to be relevant and useful because they are
accurate and true. A similar argument applies to the assumption that the
truth-value of a statement depends on the general assent of a relative
community. For centuries people thought that the Earth was flat and that it
was at the centre of the universe, and that general assumption was false.
Hence, to the realist whether statements are true or false can only be
decided on the basis of how things are in the world, irrespective of
whether many people agree, or important people agree, or the content of
the statements is useful and practical or not.

4.3. To Communicate Successfully

If it is possible to make sense out of the world, and to be right or wrong, it
is possible to communicate successfully. Successful communication
depends on conditions that also determine successful interaction with the
world. To consider stasis and sameness on a par with change and difference
implies a number of consequences: forms of content do exist, and so do
forms of expression. Furthermore, it is possible for communicators to fix
forms of content with forms of expression, and to transfer them within
certain semio-pragmatic boundaries from an addresser to an addressee.
Finally, it is possible to transfer them in such a way that the forms of
content as expressed by the addresser correspond sufficiently with the
forms of content as received by the addressee. The word “sufficiently”
refers then to an assessment of the ad hoc communication by subjects, e.g.

came to fighting about copyright and the accuracy of translations of their own
works”. See Blackburn, Truth, 170.
43
Blackburn, Truth, 104ff.
44
Ibid., 156-58.
 Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist? 19

the participants of the ad hoc communication, and it refers to what may be

called successful communication.

Hence, if postmodernists or realists want to communicate, they need to

establish some footing of commonality. Both addresser and addressee need
to share something, whether a common sense ascribed to some expression
or an expected effect following an utterance or a gesture or any other
criterion that might serve the ad hoc participants to consider the
communication successful or not. If, for practical purposes, I limit
communication to verbal communication, then words (e.g. “dog”, “car”,
“key”) still represent schematized categories. However, whereas in a
constructivist perspective, they falsify reality because they fixate ever-
changing features of an ever-changing reality, in a realist perspective they
capture the trans-historical essence of phenomena, and that trans-historical
essence is considered to be as real as its changing parts.45 Pragmatists may
add that semiotic processes are determined by each and every ad hoc
communicational situation, but this does not imply that semiosis would
occur completely randomly. Semiosis only emerges when conditioned in
one way or another, even if conditioners vary in space and time. For
example, if I ask Peter to open the door, and Peter opens the door, Peter
and I will have succeeded in fixating forms of expression with forms of
content to a degree we both accept as “sufficient” for the purpose of the ad
hoc communication: to open the door. If by contrast, I asked Peter to open
the door and Peter jumped out of the window, we could both decide that
the way I connected forms of expression with forms of content did not
correspond sufficiently with the way Peter connected them. From a realist
point of view, the first situation is as banal as the second is extraordinary.
From a relativist point of view that assumes there is no connection
between perception, knowledge, communication and reality, neither of the
two situations could even exist. However, everyday practice contradicts
this assumption. To acknowledge that it is possible for an addresser to fix
forms of content with forms of expression and to share that package with
an addressee in a way that maintains sufficient conditions of invariance
explains why, as a rule (and every rule has its exceptions), interaction with
the world and communication can be and often are successful.
This optimistic conclusion should not lead to an oversimplified notion
of communication as mere decoding. Indeed, communication frequently
involves less simple matters than opening a door; and for some people,
even opening a door may be complicated. Hence, it is generally accepted
45
Aristotle defines the word “definition” as “the statement that gives the essence”
(quoted in Robinson, Definition, 149).
20 Chapter One

that communication, like perception, always involves, even if to a varying

degree, both inductive (bottom-up) and deductive (top-down) processes. In
other words, if I may borrow Lawrence Venuti’s46 terminology, one
cannot claim that semiosis is either “communicative”, i.e. the message
reflects the content from the sender, or “hermeneutic”, i.e. the receiver
produces her own meaning. One may assume it to be both at the same
time, even if in varying degrees. The respective reflecting and producing
parts of semiosis will vary depending on the ad hoc communicational
situation: participants, types of texts or utterances or actions involved (e.g.
a product manual vs. a piece of conceptual art), the actual context in which
the communication occurs, etc. Hence, it would be prudent to first
examine specific communication sets before venturing any generalization.

4.4. Adaptation Studies Saved at Last

On a final note, it would seem that the postmodern tsunami that swept over
the humanities has left some realist icons standing. In other words, the
basic conditions for a realist and descriptive study of adaptations are still
met: perception, knowledge and communication remain possible. The
people who make and watch adaptations will indeed change during the
making and the watching process, and so will books, adaptations and their
surroundings. However, not everything will have changed at once
randomly. The coherence and structure in those changes will allow for
readers to read a book and to watch the adaptation, and to read and watch
them more than once. It follows that coherence and structure allow
scholars to perceive identities. Identities may emerge at all kinds of levels:
physical, logical, political, sociological, economical, aesthetical, etc. If
identities exist, two identities may be compared in terms of similarities and
dissimilarities, and one may call these (dis)similarity relations
“equivalence”. In other words, if coherence and sameness are as real as
change and difference, it is possible to adapt one and the same story across
media. Whether (dis)similarity relations between adapted and adapting
elements are always relevant to explain the adaptational shifts remains to
be seen. Indeed, items may be exchanged not because of the (dis)similarity
relations that obtain between the comparanda, but for reasons that lie
outside the exchanged items; e.g. in the host context(s) of the
adaptations.47

46
Venuti, “Adaptation, Translation, Critique”, 27-28.
47
For more information on this, see Cattrysse, Descriptive Adaptation Studies,
271ff.
 Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist? 21

Interestingly, renewed appreciation of identity, stasis and coherence

also allows for structuralism, íwhether of the so-called static or
Saussurean variant or the more dynamic48 Prague or PS variantí, to re-
enter the research scene as a legitimate alternative to the exclusive focus
on difference and change. Scholars in both literary studies49 and in
adaptation studies50 have often erroneously conflated the PS notion of
“system” with Saussurean semiotics, and claimed that a systems approach
would be unable to describe historical change. Systematicity may
characterize synchronically perceived situations as well as diachronically
perceived changes. A good example of a dynamic Gestalt or system is the
American film noir. In the summer of 1946, the French film critic Nino
Frank uses the words “film noir” to refer to five movie titles.51 When less
than a decade later, Raymond Borde and Etienne Chaumeton, two other
French journalists, write the first book on the genre, the words “film noir”
refer to more than four hundred titles.52 Both a synchronic Saussurean-
based systems approach and a diachronic PS or DAS-based systems
approach are descriptive, i.e. empirical and observation-based, and therefore
historical. However, the observation that meaning finds the permanent in
the impermanent demands that one reconsiders the traditional synchronic-
diachronic divide. It raises the questions if and how one can conceive of
change except as a fixed notion. Finally, if stasis and sameness are as real
as change and difference, system analysis cannot longer be discarded
merely on the pretence that its reference to fixed chunks of reality would
either essentialize reality or be fictional. The realist reply to extreme
relativism argues that one does not imagine regularities or systems but that
they exist. It is only because systems exist that claims about them can be
right or wrong, irrespective of general assent or practical usefulness.

4.5. What’s the Point? The Notion of Relevance

Among the many points that remain unexplored, there is one I want to
mention in conclusion: the concept of scientific relevance. The term has
come up a couple of times because relevance goes with description the
way perception goes with being. Even though one can only perceive one
side of the coin separately, both co-exist in reality at the same time.

48
“More dynamic” understood as in focused also on difference and change.
49
See, e.g., Even-Zohar, “Polysystem Theory (Revised),” 1-3.
50
See, e.g., Palmer, “The Sociological Turn of Adaptation Studies: The Example
of Film Noir”, 274.
51
See, e.g., Frank, “Un Nouveau Genre Policier: L’aventure Criminelle.”
52
Borde and Chaumeton, Panorama Du Film Noir Américain (1941-1953).
22 Chapter One

The notion of relevance results from the limitations of perception,

knowledge and communication. To accept that reality is too complex to be
perceived and known all at once, and to accept that perception is partial,
perspectivized and sequential, is to accept that perception involves
prioritizing: what to perceive vs. what not to perceive, what to perceive
first vs. what to perceive next, and what to perceive in a manner X and
therefore not in a manner Y. Whether made consciously or unconsciously,
those choices reveal relevance. One may assume that relevance will be
determined by factors such as the purpose of the investigation, awareness
and focus of attention, intensity and/or salience of the stimuli, memory and
previous experiences triggering expectations, which condition future
experiences, etc. The notion of relevance involves thus the distinction
DAS aims to make between description and prescription. Whereas
description produces statements of fact, prescription produces statements
of value.53 The very issue whether and how one can distinguish between
facts and value remains a matter of contention.54 However, based on that
distinction, it follows that facts in and by themselves do not have value;
they just are. Values on the other hand are predicates assigned by subjects
to objects. Consequently, a proposition may be perfectly true, and yet a
scholar may not value its content. For example, film scholars have noticed
accelerated cutting rates in US films made between 1908 and 1920.55 One
scholar may react: “How fascinating!” Another may label this type of
research “nitpicking.” The same applies to a systems approach in
adaptation studies. These examples suggest that relevance would only be a
matter of (inter)personal taste, a matter of value. Even though this is partly
true, there is on-going research that aims to develop arguments which
incorporate a bottom-up, fact-based notion of relevance.56 However, as
stated above, that topic will have to be dealt with in another upcoming
essay.

53
The fact-value debate represents another ancient epistemological discussion
which goes back to the Enlightenment, the writings of David Hume, and more
recent publications of philosophers such as George E. Moore, Phillippa Foot, and
others. For a more elaborate discussion with respect to adaptation studies, see
Cattrysse, Descriptive Adaptation Studies, 65–170.
54
Putnam, The Collapse of the Fact/Value Dichotomy and Other Essays.
55
Bordwell, Poetics of Cinema, 3.
56
See, e.g., Tversky, “Features of Similarity”, 342; Sperber and Wilson,
Relevance: Communication and Cognition.
 Descriptive Adaptation Studies: Why Do Systems Exist? 23

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Venuti, Lawrence. “Adaptation, Translation, Critique.” Journal of Visual
Culture 6, no. 1 (2007): 25-43.
 CHAPTER TWO

REVISITING PLATO:
THE HERMENEUTICS OF ADAPTATION
IN THE LIGHT OF THEUTH’S
MYTH OF WRITING1

DIEGO HONORATO E.
UNIVERSIDAD DE LOS ANDES, CHILE

1. The Myth of Writing

The French philosopher Jacques Derrida develops, in his essay The
Pharmacy of Plato2 (La Pharmacie de Platon), a controversial reading of
Plato’s Phaedrus, and in particular, of the myth of writing that is found at
the end of the dialogue. For Plato –in Derrida’s view– all forms of writing,
be they linguistic or iconic, are a phármakon, i.e. a drug that can serve as
either a remedy or as a poison. As the French philosopher reminds us, the
Greek word has this plurivocity, since it can signify one thing or another
according to the context. Thus, Plato would think of every linguistic or
pictorial inscription as being an imitation (mímesis) or representation
(apeikasía), which, through the act of remembering, would function at two
levels that are apparently contradictory: on the one hand, writing (or
pictorial representation) would constitute a “remedy” that would help in
remembering and, therefore, in knowing the original, of which the
representation would be a mark or trace; on the other hand, writing would
be seen rather as a “venom” that would weaken our memory and as a
result our own knowledge of the original. It would establish itself as a
1
This chapter is part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso Internacional
de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, 9-10 October,
2013.
2
Jacques Derrida, Dissemination, trans. Barbara Johnson (London: The Athlone
Press, 1981).
26 Chapter Two

palimpsest3 which, in order to be written on, must first be erased, thereby

rendering unintelligible the original writing. The question, indeed, consists
in rethinking the epistemic status of this intermediary, i.e., writing. The
question, for Plato, is this: does writing constitute a veiling that separates
or distances us from the original (as with an opaque veil that does not
permit us to see through it), or does it work instead as a means of making a
transition, of drawing us closer to the presence of the original (as with a
translucent veil)?
Derrida, as we know, thinks that the issue that this question points to is
undecidable, because in the final analysis it will be impossible to
distinguish the remedy from the poison:

These two types of repetition relate to each other according to the graphics
of supplementarity. Which means that one can no more “separate” them
from each other, think of either one apart from the other, “label” them; that
in the pharmacy, one can distinguish the medicine from the poison, the
good from the evil, the true from the false, the inside from the outside, the
4
vital from the mortal, the first from the second, etc.

The Derridean reading of Plato, not lacking in refinement and

perspicacity, under the sign of the ambiguity of writing as a phármakon,
ends up by making Plato’s edifice of truth collapse. In this way, writing –
or, in this case, any kind of transcription that involves the adaptation of a
given content to another form– constitutes a library of books or an infinite
puzzle, a labyrinth of signs in which the final signs do nothing other than
refer us to previous signs (books), which, in turn, refer us to others which
in turn refer to still others, in a sequence that has no end. The vision of the
original eidos, foundation of all truth, becomes impossible.
In other words –and dramatizing a little– we can almost hear Derrida’s
voice warning us: don’t try to decide whether this reading, or this version
of the “original” work, is better –you might perhaps even wish to say
“more faithful”– than the other. They are all equally true, because they are
all equally false. But the “original” –you might ask– is it not the case that
Shakespeare’s Macbeth is really something? Is it perhaps the manuscript
3
A palimpsest (Greek palimpsƝston, “written again”) is a papyrus or parchment
which has had its original writing erased in order to be able to write on it again.
Given the short supply of Egyptian papyrus, this practice became relatively
frequent beginning in the 7th century. On occasion, the original writing might still
be partially legible. Derrida uses the term on various occasions in order to refer, for
example, to metaphysics as a form of white mythology, that is, a mythology in
disguise (Cf. Marges de la Philosophie, p. 213).
4
Derrida, 169.
 Revisiting Plato 27

that I have before my eyes? What is it? Well, I believe –Derrida might
continue addressing us– that these signs, these black markings, do nothing
besides speaking to us of signs. Or do you want to waken the only
Macbeth that sleeps in them, reciting them internally? So, if you did this, I
believe that you will discover that these little physical inscriptions merely
direct you to a mental sign, and that this mental sign refers to another sign,
and so on to infinity. I would tell you, therefore, that there is no Macbeth,
but only a kaleidoscope, an infinite fluorescing of invented Macbeths in an
unending play of signs...
In this chapter I do not propose to respond point-by-point to the
Derridean reading5; instead I will present an interpretation of the myth of
writing that I consider to be more in accordance with Platonic
epistemology and ontology, I will seek at the same time to preserve the
question of original presence (i.e. the truth). I will argue that Plato does
not reject out of hand every form of writing (or iconic representation), but
only one form of it. In addition, I will briefly propose that the theses
sustained by Plato are more coherent with those contemporary forms of
hermeneutics where the concept of truth continues to enjoy a decisive
prevalence (as in, e.g., Gadamer or Ricoeur).
Finally, as the title indicates, I will not discuss the multiple theses that
Plato presents in the Phaedrus in detail. Rather, I will only determine
certain hermeneutical principles –which, beginning with the final section
of the dialogue, will have to be situated as fundamental theses of Plato’s
maturity– and which, I hold, will enable us to reflect, beyond the strict
frontiers in which the dramatic action is framed, on the phenomenon that
concerns us here: adaptation.

2. Plato’s Thamus and Theuth

The dialogue begins when Socrates encounters Phaedrus, who invites him
to take a walk outside the walls of Athens. Phaedrus had passed the entire
morning conversing with Lysias, the famous rhetorician, and, with one of
his discourses in hand, was seeking a pleasant place to read and practice

5
For a good overall presentation of Plato’s Pharmacy and a critique, in dialogue
with Heidegger, of the French philosopher’s position, see Christopher Smith, The
Hermeneutics of Original Argument: Demonstration, Dialectic, Rhetoric
(Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University Press, 1998), 134 ff; see also Yoav
Rinon, “The Rhetoric of Jacques Derrida I: Plato’s Pharmacy,” The Review of
Metaphysics 46, no. 2 (December 1992): 369-386; and Yoav Rinon, “The Rhetoric
of Jacques Derrida II: Phaedrus,” The Review of Metaphysics 46, no. 3 (March
1993): 537-558.
28 Chapter Two

his oratory. It is a warm summer day, and together they direct their steps
along the bank of the river Ilissos. They are barefoot and light of spirit,
dipping their feet in the stream, until they encounter a plane tree, in whose
shade they sit. This is a marvellous setting of the scene –and, indeed, a real
one6– which will permit Plato to introduce some of his most original
myths. It is also a splendid occasion for the two friends to maintain a
conversation that is vivid –and perhaps for this reason rather disordered–
about rhetoric, Eros, and writing. They stop here, and cooled by the gentle
breeze in this idyllic spot they recall the history of the abduction of Orithia
by the god Boreas. Phaedrus takes advantage of their situation to ask his
friend: “But I beseech you to tell me, Socrates, do you believe this tale
[muthológƝma] to be true [alƝthés]?”7 (229c5). The philosopher, however,
quickly dispatches Phaedrus’s question, while holding to an allegorical
interpretation of the myth that naturalizes the tale. It recounts how the
wind god Boreas roughly forced Orithia down while she was playing with
Pharmakeia.
So, introducing now the topic we are investigating, it is striking that
Plato not only begins his dialogue with a myth, but also decides to bring it
to a close with another myth: the myth of writing, of Thamus and Theuth.
Plato seems to have inverted the method of proceeding. If in the preface of
the dialogue he explains a divine intervention by naturalizing it, in the
conclusion he seems to have done exactly the opposite: he explains a
“natural capacity”8 in the human being (i.e. writing) by means of a myth
and a divine intervention. This would, therefore, be a foundational myth.
And it is so in a double sense: first because writing would be a divine gift,
and second, as we will see in what follows, because Socrates heard this
mythical story from “the ancients” [tǀn protérǀn 274c].
Let us move, now, towards the second half of the dialogue (261ff).
After those memorable pages in which Socrates teaches Phaedrus about
the mania or divine delirium that Eros produces, the final section of the
dialogue takes up again the problem of rhetoric, oral language, and
writing. Rhetoric [retorikƝ téchnƝ], we are told, is the art or skill that has
to do with the guidance of souls [psuchagǀgía] by way of words [dìa
lógǀn] (261a7). Nevertheless, as is well known, Plato (through Socrates)

6
Cf. Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, Platon. Sein Leben und Seine Werke
(Berlin: Weidmannsche Buchhandlung, 1959), 359.
7
All the quotations from the Phaedrus are from the translation by Benjamin Jowett
(2006).
8
Writing is clearly a téchnƝ (and in this sense it is opposed to physis), but it is a
capacity that is acquired naturally. Anyone, after a process of instruction, can learn
letters, thanks to a natural disposition within the human being.
 Revisiting Plato 29

critiques this art of words because it was constituted as a téchnƝ that is

indifferent to the category of truth. It seeks only to persuade in the fashion
of an eristic; that is, having the object of defeating one’s rival without any
interest in whether there is truth or justice in what one says. Therefore, the
orator must be an expert in opinions [dóxa]: “he who would be an orator
has nothing to do with true justice, but only with that which is likely to be
approved by the many who sit in judgment; nor with the truly good or
honourable, but only with opinion about them, and that from opinion
comes persuasion, and not from the truth” (260a). Rhetoric, therefore, does
not, in the final analysis, seek the truth [alƝtheia]; instead it seeks what is
most convincing and plausible. The terms that Plato uses are pithanós
(convincing) and tò eikós (plausible), which allude to that which is
possible or probable, that is, to doxa or to a common opinion that presents
itself to us as something probable. It is at this point (273d ff) that Socrates
asks the question of whether it would be possible to reform this praxis of
rhetoric, which in itself is indifferent to the category of truth: will it be
possible –Socrates wonders– to convert it into a philosophical rhetoric that
is based on the dialectical method of uniting and separating, and which, in
this way, understands that the probable, as the Greek term eikós indicates,
designates that which is probable or reasonable precisely in virtue of its
similarity to what is true in itself? Does this not mean that in order for the
rhetorician to be capable of grasping that which is only similar to the
truthful (i.e. the probable) he must have seen the truth in itself beforehand?

SOCRATES: Let us tell him that, before he appeared, you and I were saying
that the probability of which he speaks was engendered in the minds of the
many by the likeness of the truth [homoiótƝta tou alƝthous], and we had
just been affirming that he who knew the truth [tƝn alƝtheian eidǀs] would
always know best how to discover the resemblances of the truth (273d 1-
6).

It is interesting to note that Jowett’s translation “that he who knew the

truth” [tƝn alƝtheian eidǀs], could also be translated as “that he who ‘sees’
the truth.” Indeed, the participle eidǀs is constructed based on the root –id–
which derives from the verb horáǀ (to see). As is well known, for the
Greeks –and not only for Plato– knowledge par excellence corresponds to
a kind of “vision.” Therefore, who will be later more able to see than the
one who has seen the original –based on the genuine experience that he
has had of this model– to recognize the similarities that the plausible
contains? An authentic rhetorician, Plato seems to be telling us, must be
open to recognizing that the art of the word (which is a form of
transcription), can be convincing or reasonable, precisely because it refers
30 Chapter Two

internally to a primal truth or presence that precedes it.

That said, it is precisely here that the argument is interrupted and
Socrates asks Phaedrus about the appropriateness or inappropriateness of
putting discourses into writing.9 This is the passage that comes just before
the myth of Thamus and Theuth. Before introducing the myth in question,
however, I would like to make a brief detour into the issue of the plausible
and the probable (eikós), which, in the light of what has been expressed up
to now, permits us to see the everyday possibilities that these Platonic
reflections on language (linguistic or iconic) open to us in regards to the
phenomenon of adaptation. Therefore, it is fundamental to keep in mind
that the “plausible” for Plato is to be interpreted as being a “trace” or
“mark” that “refers” us to the truth, i.e. to the real itself. What implication
does this have?

3. Truth, Plausibility and Adaptation

Far from this being a purely philosophical or merely theoretical problem, I
believe that the Platonic proposal traverses, by extension, many of the
issues that are dealt with in this book. Indeed, if we think of the
advertising for a commercial product, for example, to what extent is this
advertising “adjusted” or “adapted” to the real nature of the object that is
being advertised? Is the advertising which, for example, promotes
products for losing weight, plausible or probable (eikós)? But even for a
great sceptic (for someone who holds that advertising basically consists of
lies), would it not be necessary to hold that there are advertisements that
are more plausible than others, or, at least, some that lie less than others?
And doesn’t something analogous occur with the historian and the
journalist? For above and beyond the many practices or manners of
exercising the office of historian or journalist, do we not ask of them both
that they be as credible in their reconstruction of sources as possible? It is
true, nevertheless, that the examples proposed only partially illustrate the
phenomenon of adaptation, given that even if it is true that we naturally
demand that these communicative praxeis have the goal of telling the truth

9
In addition to the myth that we are examining, Plato critiques writing in the
Seventh Letter: “I certainly have composed no work in regard to it, nor shall I ever
do so in future; for there is no way of putting it in words like other studies.
Acquaintance with it must come rather after a long period of attendance on
instruction in the subject itself and of close companionship, when, suddenly, like a
blaze kindled by a leaping spark, it is generated in the soul and at once becomes
self-sustaining” (341c-d). Cf. L. A. Post, Thirteen Epistles of Plato (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1925).
 Revisiting Plato 31

about the facts (singular and contingent), it is evident that the same does
not hold for fiction, since if fiction is plausible, it is so in a “sense” that is
different from the plausibility demanded of history.10 Therefore, a literary
or cinematographic work about what happened in Chile on the 11th of
September of 1973 need not possess the same ambition to arrive at the full
truth (i.e. the same “form” or “mode” of seeking the truth) that a book of
history must have. The type of plausibility and, therefore, the type of truth
that an advertisement refers to is not the same type of plausibility or the
same type of truth to which a work of fiction refers. In other words,
whether or not it is appropriate to speak of better or worse adaptations, i.e.,
interpretations of a work of fiction that are more or less plausible, we do
so by applying a sense of the plausible and of truth that is different from
that which we apply to a historical fact. Therefore, what we mean when
we speak of the truth of a historical text is distinct from what we mean
when we speak of the truth of a fictional work. The difficulty nevertheless
remains, because even if one accepts the distinction just made, how is it
possible to hold that there exist some film adaptations of a novel that are
better than others?
In the central part of this chapter I would like to offer some brief
indications based on the myth alluded to, which I hope will shed light on
the epistemological conditions involved in the transposition or adaptation
of any reality into language (logos), regardless of whether this is done
through concepts or images. I will attempt to show that Plato’s proposal
(at least beginning with his later, mature dialogues) cannot be thought of

10
Aristotle had already called attention to the fact that the “poetic” is more
universal than “history”, since the latter deals with particular deeds of the past,
whereas the poetic deals with what is possible [an génoito]. Cf. Aristotle, Poetics,
ch. 9, 1451b ff. However, in the latter part of the 20th century highly relevant and
controversial attempts have been made to bring the figures of the historian (and, by
extension, of the journalist as well) closer to models of a narrative-literary type. In
this line, the achievements of Hayden White and Paul Ricoeur are highly
interesting; from distinct hermeneutics they have both emphasized the configuring
and poiétic aspect of the historical account. While the attempt of White is closer to
French deconstructionism, his attempt never develops into a form of relativism that
completely erases the differences between history and literature. Cf. in particular
ch. 3 of “The Historical Text as Literary Artifact,” in Hayden White, Tropics of
Discourse. Essays in Cultural Criticism (Baltimore: The John Hopkins University
Press, 1978); and ch. 2: “Historical Emplotment and the Problem of Truth in
Historical Representation,” in Hayden White, Figural Realism: Studies in the
Mimesis Effect (Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press, 1999); see also
Part II, “History and Narrative” in Paul Ricoeur, Time and Narrative I (Chicago:
The University of Chicago Press, 1990).
32 Chapter Two

as a palimpsest11 which in order to transcribe upon it, one must previously

have erased the original inscription entirely; furthermore, it also cannot be
thought of as being a transposition or direct mimesis of the original
(language) into the secondary or derived (language).

4. The Inner Meaning of Words

The words with which Socrates introduces the myth are decisive (274c ff):
“I have heard a tradition [akoƝn] of the ancients [tǀn protérǀn], whether
true or not they only know [ísasin]; although if we had found the truth
ourselves, do you think that we should care much about the opinions of
men? [tǀn anthrǀpínǀn doxasmátǀn].”
Socrates, therefore, received history orally [akoƝn12] and as coming
from the wisdom of the ancients, in a time prior to writing and regarding
which he himself only had an indirect acquaintance. The men of old,
therefore, in a time which in Plato always refers to a form of original
wisdom, created a story that comes down to us as though it were an
inherited recollection or memory, and which only they, the first men, saw.
This originating truth and time that the myth refers us to is no other than
the time prior to historical time, when the gods lived together with human
beings in a lost age of civilization. In that time –Socrates continues– in the
kingdom of Naucratis, in Egypt, the god Theuth, a god of civilization and
of culture just as Prometheus was in Greece, visited the king Thamus in
order to offer him his inventions and to ask him to give them to all
Egyptians: number, calculation, geometry, astronomy, a number of games,
and in particular letters and writing [kaì dƝ kaì grámmata]. Thamus, while
Theuth explained to him the usefulness of each of these inventions, judged
them according to the good or evil that he saw in them. But, when they
came to writing Theuth explained enthusiastically: “This, said Theuth, will
11
We cannot, at least if the act of erasing prior writing was complete. In that case
our language would be, metaphorically speaking, in a continual process of
rewriting itself on the basis of itself. This is what we could call a hermeneutic that
is closed to tradition, since it makes the true be indistinguishable from the false.
Despite the games in Derrida’s formulations (the palimpsest would function as a
form of over-writing of language over language), I believe that his philosophy is a
clear exponent of a hermeneutics that is closed to the problem of “the truth of the
real.”
12
The Greek term akoƝ corresponds to a noun functioning as a direct object: the
thing heard, hearsay, report, news, tidings. Plato tends to use the expression ex
akoƝs légein (nearly identical to the expression in the text I am commenting on)
which signifies narrating or recounting something on the basis of what has been
heard.
 Revisiting Plato 33

make the Egyptians wiser and give them better memories; it is a specific
[phármakon] both for the memory and for the wit” (274e4). Thamus,
nevertheless, instead of agreeing with the god’s approval, responded to
him that this phármakon would not bring any benefit to memory –nor
would it bring wisdom to students. Rather it would poison memory and
would bring instead forgetfulness and ignorance:
SOCRATES: O most ingenious Theuth, the parent or inventor of an art is not
always the best judge of the utility or inutility of his own inventions to the
users of them. And in this instance, you who are the father of letters, from
a paternal love of your own children have been led to attribute to them a
quality which they cannot have; for this discovery of yours will create
forgetfulness in the learners’ souls, because they will not use their
memories; they will trust to the external [éxǀthen] written characters [hup’
allotríǀn túpǀn] and not remember of themselves [ouk éndothen autoީs
huph’ autǀn]. The specific [phármakon] which you have discovered is an
aid not to memory [mnƝmƝs], but to reminiscence [hupomnƝseǀs], and you
give your disciples not truth [alƝtheian], but only the semblance of wisdom
[sophías dóxan]; they will be hearers of many things and will have learned
nothing; they will appear to be omniscient and will generally know
nothing; they will be tiresome company, having the show of wisdom
without the reality (Jowett, lightly modified) (274e7 ff).

Written words [logoi gegramménoi], and also painting, which are

mentioned a bit further on, would not be a true phármakon, a remedy for
memory, mnƝmƝ, but rather would constitute a simple reminder, hupómnƝsis,
that is to say, an external artefact, something like a memorandum that is
intended to aid the soul from without [éxǀthen]. Nevertheless, this artefact
threatens to produce the greatest of all forgettings, the forgetting of the
return to the origin.13 Plato, in this way, would appear to be extremely
concerned that the fixing of the original knowledge by way of writing –
even if it appears to guarantee the transmission (transcription) of the
original form– might turn into an external mechanical process, i.e., into a
crutch that makes us repeat without understanding, like letters that are

13
In a certain way this undesired effect of the phármakon of writing is analogous
to that which another phármakon produces in the Odyssey (cf. IX, 92-102): the
fruit of the lotus. Odysseus’s men, when they ate this sweet fruit, forgot the
purpose of their journey (return to Ithaka). I believe that Plato would agree with
the idea that the great danger of these pharmakoi resides in making us forget our
origin, although in the case of writing the issue has an epistemological and
metaphysical origin (the knowledge of truth). See Álvaro García, “Myth,
Catastrophe, Writing or the Prologue of Plato’s Timaeus,” Revista Philosophica,
22-23 (1999-2000): 23-46.
34 Chapter Two

dead and stripped of spirit. Written words neither respond to nor discuss
with their interlocutor; they simply point, as though they were dumb
graphemes, in a monolithic direction. If we interrupt the reading of the
Platonic dialogue at this point, the conclusion would be entirely evident:
Plato not only condemns writing without exception, but he also, in writing
his dialogues, commits an astounding performative contradiction.14 Is it
possible that Plato’s attack was really this harsh?15 Is Plato’s condemnation
of this particular form of téchnƝ absolute?
In my opinion, anyone who reads the dialogue with attention will note
that Plato is not rejecting the forms of writing or symbolic or iconic
transcription in an absolute fashion. Rather, he is giving a serious warning
about their use. Indeed, any transposition or adaptation of an original
position or form into a human language runs the grave –and apparently
unavoidable– risk of transforming itself into a purely mechanical and
external sign or grapheme. That is to say, in the manner of words –as
Socrates notes– that are “tumbled about anywhere” (275e). And it is
precisely in opposition to this view of written (or iconic) language,
understood as a transcription of a purely external meaning, i.e. as pure
empty externality of meaning –and therefore as a dead sign– that Plato
exalts a kind of primal logos, a word with a real foundation and providing
real knowledge. That word which is written or engraved, accompanied by
understanding and knowledge [met’ epistƝmƝs16], in the soul itself:
14
This problem has drawn the attention of many scholars and various solutions
have been proposed. For example, Ronna Burger holds that rigorously speaking it
is Socrates who condemns writing, while Plato would be attempting a defence of
it. Cf. Ronna Burger, Plato’s Phaedrus. A Defense of a Philosophic Art of Writing
(Alabama: University of Alabama Press, 1980). Jasper Neel, on the other hand,
argues that Plato sought to carry out “the greatest theft of all time, the theft of
writing.” Cf. Jasper Neel, Plato, Derrida, and Writing: Deconstruction,
Composition and Influence (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1988),
6.
15
Nevertheless, it is necessary to compare what is expressed in the Phaedrus and
in the Seventh Letter with the position that Plato presents in the Laws, where
writing is seen in positive terms (it fixes the law in place). Regarding this issue, Cf.
Anthony Curtis Adler, “The choreographic writing of the law in Plato’s Nomoi”,
Journal of the Criticism and Theory Society of Korea, no. 27 (2010): 231-263; and
Emmanuelle Jouët-Pastré, “Un poème modèle: le jeu de l’ecriture du ‘Phèdre’ aux
‘Lois’”, in Plato’s Laws and Its Historical Significance: Selected Papers of the I
International Congress on Ancient Thought, ed. Francisco Lisi (Salamanca:
Academia Verlag, 1998).
16
Jowett translates this as “an intelligent word.” However, the Greek literally reads
“(a word) accompanied by (‘meta’ = with) knowledge, i.e. understanding or
comprehension (epistƝmƝ).”
 Revisiting Plato 35

SOCRATES: Is there not another kind of word or speech far better than this,
and having far greater power—a son of the same family, but lawfully
begotten [adelphòn gnƝsion, i.e. a legitimate brother]?

PHAEDRUS: Whom do you mean, and what is his origin?

SOCRATES: I mean an intelligent word [met’ epistƝmƝs] graven in the soul

of the learner [gráphetai en tƝi toࠎ manthánontos psychƝi], which can
defend itself, and knows when to speak and when to be silent (276a1-8).

Derrida has brought to light the fact that Plato, even if he introduces
myth as a form of critique of writing, has here ended up precisely
affirming the value of at least one form of writing, that is, an “internal
writing,” of which “external writing” would be a duplicate or copy, per se
incapable –Derrida thinks– of outpouring or transposing the spiritual
meaning of the “internal writing” (much less of attaining the primal truth
known by the ancients, i.e. the vision of the Platonic forms). Derrida, as I
indicated at the beginning of this chapter, establishes an impassable gap or
fissure here. Human language and knowledge would only be icons,
phantasms or simulacra, i.e. forms of hipomnƝseis, false memories or
pseudo-transcriptions (adaptations) of an original that is either non-
existent or else unknowable to us. That said, my opinion is that, even
though Derrida has grasped with great penetration the problem that arises
for Plato upon having made the forms into entities that are completely
transcendent, he has nonetheless distorted the manner in which Plato
understands the interconnection between internal writing and external
writing. The dialogue, which I had interrupted above, continues as
follows:

PHAEDRUS: You mean the living word of knowledge which has a soul
[lógon zǀnta kai émpsychon], which is possessed by one who knows [toࠉ
eidótos], and of which the written word [ho gegramménos] is properly an
image [eídǀlon]?

SOCRATES: Yes, of course that is what I mean. And now may I be allowed
to ask you a question: Would a husbandman, who is a man of sense, take
the seeds [spermátǀn], which he values and which he wishes to bear fruit,
and in sober seriousness plant them during the heat of summer, in some
garden of Adonis [Adǀnidos kƝpous], that he may rejoice when he sees
them in eight days appearing in beauty? At least he would do so, if at all,
only for the sake of amusement and pastime. But when he is in earnest he
sows in fitting soil, and practises husbandry, and is satisfied if in eight
months the seeds which he has sown arrive at perfection? (276a8-b8,
36 Chapter Two

Jowett’s translation, slightly modified17).

In the first place, the attributes that Plato confers on this writing of the
soul are striking. As opposed to external signs, which are mute and even to
a degree dead, Plato holds that the word inscribed in the soul is a logos
that has life [zǀnta] and which is animated (or full of anima) [émpsychon].
Even more, this word inscribed in the soul –which possesses that efficacy
that is characteristic of all living beings, since it grows and develops–
would possess (or at least could possess) an eídǀlon, an image or likeness,
i.e. a written representation [ho gegramménos]. The written word,
therefore, is an image that in virtue of its likeness to the living word that it
represents, would have the capacity to bring us, as though it were a
vehicle, to knowledge of the inner word. But in order that this might occur,
certain conditions are required, since not everybody can awaken –by
means of these external signs– the living word that is incarnate in the soul.
Indeed, Plato thinks that it is particularly “the one who knows” [toࠉ
eidótos] who will be able to remember as a result of reading those external
traces that are the written words [logoi gegramménoi]. The one who
knows, Plato continues, is like the farmer who plants the seed [spérma]
where he should, in fertile land, and at the correct time, as prescribed by
the art of agriculture. He will not plant in summer, in the Garden of
Adonis,18 as though it were a game or amusement; nor will he attempt to
artificially accelerate a process that requires patient waiting on the part of
the farmer and his hands. Nevertheless, Plato considers –as he will
indicate at a later point– that even the one who dedicates herself to playing
17
I have lightly modified Jowett’s translation, which literally runs as follows:
“You mean the living word of knowledge which has a soul, and of which the
written word is properly no more than an image?” “No more” is an addition by
Jowett that weakens the comparison. Plato notes that external writing can be truly
[dikaíos really and truly] understood as an image or likeness [eídǀlon] of the
writing of the soul. This reading, indeed, gives new value to external writing. On
the other hand, Jowett omits the translation of toࠉ eidótos “one who knows.” This
animated logos, which is full of life, is not possessed by all men, but only by the
wise.
18
The gardens of Adonis were a ritual practiced within the great festival of
Adonia, which re-enacts the death of Adonis, the handsome young man who was
Aphrodite’s lover. In the ritual the women planted seeds that would grow rapidly
íwheat, barley, lettuce and fennelí in small pots or woven baskets that they would
place on the roofs of houses and water for eight days. On the eighth day they threw
them into the sea or a creek. Plato presents the rapid germination, artificially
forced by heat and water, as being the antithesis of what a good farmer would do.
For a general treatment of the topic, see Marcel Detienne, The Gardens of Adonis
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994).
 Revisiting Plato 37

in the garden of letters simply “for the sake of recreation and amusement”
will store away memorials [hupomnƝnata] that will serve “against the
forgetfulness of old age” (276 d3). That is, even for the person who has
not been able to receive the living and animate word in her soul, and who
plays with external signs without truly understanding their meaning, even
for this person writing will have a certain utility. Thus, the Athenian
philosopher does not in any sense reject writing in an absolute fashion. But
Plato goes further. The essential thing in this passage is the description
that Socrates gives of the person who, having true knowledge of the living
word, dedicates himself to it with the seriousness proper to the philosopher
or dialectician (but not the rhetorician). For this person, the word that is
sown in the soul is understood as a living seed [spérma], from which other
words sprout or germinate [phuómenoi], according to a different nature
(external writing), words by which the seed planted in the soul becomes
immortal [aeì athánaton]:
SOCRATES: True, Phaedrus. But nobler far is the serious pursuit of the
dialectician, who, finding a congenial soul, sows and plants [phuteúƝi te
kai speírƝi] therein words full of knowledge [met’ epistƝmƝs lógous] which
are able to help themselves and him who planted them, and are not
unfruitful, but have in them a seed [éxontes spérma] from which there
spring up [phuómenoi] other words [álloi] with other attributes [en állois
Ɲthesi] [which] render [the seed] immortal [aeì athánaton], making the
possessors of it happy to the utmost extent of human happiness (276e4-
277a4, Jowett’s translation, modified).

Having got to this point, it is not difficult to recognize that the apparent
condemnation that the dialogue applies to writing is not, in fact,
completely condemnatory. Indeed, rather than directly condemning
writing, Plato is giving a warning, which, if it was in fact able to disquiet a
reader of the 5th century BCE, is today even more clearly prophetic, given
the hyper-technologized times we live in. Perhaps it never occurred before
that the true understanding of the meaning of phenomena –a meaning
made manifest through language– had run the risk of assuming the
artificial form of the gardens of Adonis. Plato is doing nothing more than
making us aware of the risk expressed by the Greeks: “You are more
sterile than the gardens of Adonis” (Zenobius, Cent. 1.49). Therefore,
today even more so than in the past, it is necessary to be on guard against
the new gardens of letters [en grámmasi kƝpous]: the writings of Adonis,
the readings of Adonis, the transcriptions of Adonis and –why not?– the
adaptations of Adonis. All of these –I believe– run the risk of turning into
hermeneutics of sterility and of transitoriness, forms of cultivating the
images and letters affected by an ephemeral sense of temporality –e.g., the
38 Chapter Two

attempt to acquire real “knowledge” through instantaneous capsules of

“information” in the Internet– which, just as with the seeds placed on the
roof of the temple of Adonis, give quick results, but these results are
superficial, since they flower and die within a single day. I repeat,
however, that it is not an issue of condemnation, but rather of learning to
discriminate between diverse forms of cultivating letters: some proceed
from the inner garden of the soul, where internal words and images grow
harmoniously according to the rhythm and the art that nature has provided
for all things living; others, in contrast, are nothing more than the inverse
of an artificial or mechanical garden, a garden that is seeded violently, just
as stage decorations representing a city are set up in one day and then are
dismantled the next.
Against the scepticism of Derrida19 it must be noted that Plato, in the
myth of writing, establishes clear criteria that permit him to discriminate
between an external writing understood as a phármakon, in the sense of a
poison incapable of preserving the memory of the original, and another
form of external writing also understood as a phármakon, but this time
understood in the sense of a remedy which, in some way, preserves the
vision of the original (or some part of it), and transmits that immortal seed
to us, by way of the external grapheme. That which is fundamental,
finally, appears to exist in the interconnection that must exist between the
external word and the internal word. The external word will be incapable
of transmitting a true form of knowledge (as opposed to mere data), if it is
not illuminated from within by a lógon zǀnta kai émpsychon, by a living
word filled with soul, inheritor of that primal form of knowledge preserved
in the memory of the ancients.

5. Conclusion
In conclusion, I would like, on the one hand, to direct the reader’s
attention to the distinct levels or strata of grounding presupposed by this
fabulous tale of the origins of writing, and, on the other hand, to seek to
synthesize those features that, in a Platonic reading of the art of writing,
could contribute to a hermeneutic of adaptation.

19
It is evident that the Derridean reading is sceptic about the category of truth, but
nonetheless his reading is not that of a cynic. If the Platonic forms are absolutely
transcendental, then the very idea of participation [méthexis] in those forms
becomes an aporia. In a certain sense, therefore, the gap, the différance, between
the sign and the original trace becomes visible. The Derridean reading is, to a
certain point, faithful to the letter of Plato (at least as presented in certain
dialogues), although it is not at all faithful to his spirit.
 Revisiting Plato 39

In the first place, Plato distinguishes three distinct levels in the myth of
Theuth that must be kept in mind:

(i) The primal past, prior to any form of logos, which would preserve a
form of ancestral wisdom (that of the ancients), wisdom that one can
only have a “vision” of, that is, an intellectual intuition of these forms
that is characterized by presence. It is a pre-historical time and,
therefore, is prior to all narrative or discursive forms of knowledge.
From a strictly philosophical perspective this dimension of the mythic
tale would be analogous to the contemplation (vision) of the pure
forms that the soul would have had prior to being born, or else when,
having lived philosophically, one ascends, once again, to the realm of
the ideas.20

(ii) The historic time of orality (akoƝn, “that which has been heard”),
and which is built upon that time that is prior to time, preserves traces
of that primal vision that would be transmitted from generation to
generation. It is the seed [spérma] or living memory (the internal word)
that reveals something of this grounding tale. Plato, nevertheless,
appears to hold that this oral transmission of the original story has been
partially veiled in the mythical past, given that only the ancients know
whether it is true or not: “I have heard a tradition [akoƝn] of the
ancients [tǀn protérǀn], whether true or not they only know [ísasin];
although if we had found the truth ourselves, do you think that we
should care much about the opinions of men? [tǀn anthrǀpínǀn
doxasmátǀn].” From the perspective of a philosophical or
epistemological understanding, this phase would correspond in
Platonic philosophy to “philosophical dialectics,” which, through
dialogue and conversation seeks to make the soul remember
[anámnesis] the pure forms that it contemplated before it was born.

(iii) The historic time of writing (phármakon), which, as a second veil,

constitutes the greatest danger for Plato: it appears to contain a certain
tendency to present itself autonomously as a mere external sign,
lacking organicity and internal life. As I noted in the previous section,
this third moment, that of external writing, can transform itself into a
remedy or poison according to the way it is interconnected and
intermingled with the internal word written in the soul (by way of
philosophical dialectic). From an epistemological perspective, this
third moment would correspond to the art of rhetoric, which is that
20
Cf. Phaedo, 74 a9 ff; Phaedrus, 249 b5 ff.
40 Chapter Two

which directs itself to the guiding of souls [psuchagǀgía] by the use of

words [dìa lógǀn]. Plato, indeed, holds that rhetoric –at least as it is
employed by orators– needs to be seriously reformed, so that when it
presents us with what is probable or plausible [eikós], it will do so
precisely in virtue of its having glimpsed –through the veil of the
written word– its own likeness to primal truth.

That said, in my opinion, what has been stated here is not lacking in
possible implications for a hermeneutics of adaptation.
Even when Platonic philosophy contains elements that can only be
read by a modern reader with the distance of a historian (e.g. the
metaphysics of the forms, the mythical aspects of the story), it is also a
fact that can be verified in the history of philosophy of the 20th century:
that a more secularized dialogue with the Athenian philosopher continues
to be a highly fecund possibility. The phenomenology of Husserl and,
later, the hermeneutics of Heidegger,21 as well as of Gadamer –who to a
large degree constructed his own thought through an open dialogue with
Plato22– along with Ricoeur23 and Derrida himself, are admirable examples
of this possibility. Even if, for reasons of space, I cannot do more here than
refer the reader to this rich panorama of reflection that arose in the twentieth
century, I would like to conclude by setting out certain provisional
conclusions, in line with the hermeneutics of truth of Heidegger, Gadamer
and Ricoeur.
The dialogues of his maturity (e.g. Phaedrus, c. 370 BCE) and others
that were written later, like the Timaeus, the Statesman and the Laws,

21
Cf. Francisco J. Gonzalez, Plato and Heidegger: A Question of Dialogue
(University Park, Pennsylvania: Penn State Press, 2009); see also the valuable
collection of articles in Cătălin Partenie and Tom Rockmore, eds., Heidegger and
Plato: Toward Dialogue (Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University Press, 2005);
and also Mark Wrathall, “Heidegger on Plato, Truth, and Unconcealment: The
1931–32 Lecture on The Essence of Truth,” Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal
of Philosophy 47, no. 5 (2004).
22
For a Gadamerian reading of Plato see Christopher Gill and François Renaud
(eds.), Hermeneutic Philosophy and Plato. Gadamer’s Response to the Philebus
(Sankt Augustin: Academia Verlag, 2010); François Renaud, Die Resokratisierung
Platons: Die platonische Hermeneutik Hans-Georg Gadamer (Sankt Augustin:
Academia Verlag, 1999); Renaud, François, “Gadamer, lecteur de Platon” in
Études Phénoménologiques 13, issue 26, (1997): 33-57.
23
Ricoeur became extremely interested in the metaphysical problems raised by
Plato and Aristotle. In this regard, see: Paul Ricoeur, Being, Essence and
Substance in Plato and Aristotle, trans. David Pellauer and John Starkey
(Cambridge: Polity Press, 2013).
 Revisiting Plato 41

express a relative scepticism that contrasts with the conviction that Plato
displayed in the Phaedo (c. 387 BCE) about the knowledge of the forms.
Indeed, in the Phaedo –the first dialogue where he systematizes his theory
of the forms– Plato appears to sustain a strong form of isomorphism
between words and the forms (or ideas) they represent.24 By way of
reminiscence the soul can in fact remember –apparently in a full manner–
the ideal form that it had forgotten. Nevertheless, beginning with the
Phaedrus and, later, in the Timaeus as well (and in other late dialogues25)
Plato’s recognition of the equivocity or ambiguity of words appears to
force him to rethink this initial confidence.26 Language, at least when it
speaks about the world that comes to be (i.e., the world of becoming), can
no longer be thought of as a mirror that brings the forms back to us in a
direct manner, that is, just as they are in themselves; rather –as the
Timaeus states27– at most it gives us a “tale which is probable [tòn eikóta

24
In this respect, see Nicholas P. White, Plato on Knowledge and Reality
(Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1976): 217 ff.
25
Cf. Cratylus, 428d ff; The Laws, 817b; The Statesman, 301e. See also Gregory
Vlastos, who argues against the pessimistic reading of J. Gould of this passage of
The Statesman. Cf., G. Vlastos, “Socratic Knowledge and Platonic ‘Pessimism’”,
The Philosophical Review 66, no. 2 (April 1957): 226-238.
26
This affirmation, which presupposes an increasing consciousness in Plato of the
aporetic character of acquiring knowledge of the forms by way of language (when
it refers to the coming-to-be of the world), will have to deal with the difficulty that
the dating of the Cratylus causes. If the Cratylus is a work of Plato’s youth, then
we will find ourselves confronted by a dialogue that clearly prefigures, in aporetic
fashion (and without conclusive results), the positions that he would fully develop
later in his life. Accepting the difficulty that the dating of this dialogue has given
rise to, I incline towards thinking that it is a middle or late dialogue. It is possible
that, as Mary Margaret MacKenzie has defended in “Putting the Cratylus in Its
Place” (The Classical Quarterly, New Series 36, no. 1 (1986): 124-150), it should
be placed next to the Theatetus.
27
“Now it is all-important that the beginning of everything should be according to
nature. And in speaking of the copy [eikónos] and the original [paradeígmatos] we
may assume that words are akin to the matter which they describe; when they
relate to the lasting and permanent and intelligible, they ought to be lasting and
unalterable, and, as far as their nature allows, irrefutable and immovable ínothing
less. But when they express only the copy or likeness and not the eternal things
themselves, they need only be likely [eikótas] and analogous to the real words. As
being [ousía] is to becoming [génesin], so is truth [alƝtheia] to belief [pístin]. If
then, Socrates, amid the many opinions about the gods and the generation of the
universe, we are not able to give notions which are altogether and in every respect
exact and consistent with one another, do not be surprised. Enough, if we adduce
probabilities as likely as any others; for we must remember that I who am the
42 Chapter Two

mࠎthon].” In other words, the Platonic forms, although they leave an

indelible mark or trace in the soul that has seen them, cannot be
recuperated with total clarity, or at least not in the phenomenal word of
becoming and images [eídǀlon]. Human language, therefore, would
exhibit a tension between two poles: the intellectual vision of the forms
(being and truth), on the one hand, and on the other, the attempt to follow
their traces starting from the phenomenal world of the plausible. In this
sense, analogically to what was expressed in the Phaedrus, knowledge or
the vision of this original wisdom that the ancients possessed is no longer
available to us in the form of a direct “vision.” This affirmation, however,
as we have seen, does not lead Plato towards a scepticism regarding the
knowledge of truth, but rather towards what we could call, in the light of
the myth of writing, a hermeneutics of memory and tradition (Gadamer
and Ricoeur), and perhaps, I think, towards a hermeneutics of
“adaptation.” Written language (linguistic or iconic) is not an opaque veil
that hides from us the original mark or seed [spérma], rather, it is like a
translucent veil which, even by way of its imperfection, communicates to
us something of the original form. Thus, any “adaptation,” if it is genuine,
would be, on the one hand, a movement (from the Latin ad-aptare,
“adjusting one thing to another”) which would be guided internally by a
living and animated logos [lógon zǀnta kai émpsychon], and not by a
concatenation of phonemes or graphemes, or by an iconography that is laid
out in an artificial or mechanical way (as occurs in the garden of Adonis).
On the other hand, it is undeniable that Plato never renounced his
affirmation of the epistemological and metaphysical necessity of a certain
intellectual vision of the forms [eidƝ], the grounds of language, although –
as I have noted– by the time of writing the Phaedrus and the Timaeus he
appears to have moderated what we might call an excessive optimism
regarding our finite capacity to remember them (or know them).28 If the
human being knows something of the universal forms –and Plato believes
so– she does so by means of the historical and cultural mediation of that
phármakon (oral and written; internal and external) which behaves like a
veil: by impeding any direct vision, it permits us nonetheless to glimpse,
albeit never in a full manner, the indelible trace of that primal presence.
In the light of what Plato has stated about these issues, I think it is

speaker, and you who are the judges, are only mortal men, and we ought to accept
the tale which is probable [tòn eikóta mࠎthon] and enquire no further.” Timaeus,
29b1 ff (Jowett’s translation).
28
In the same way Plato, by the time of writing the Parmenides, is clearly
conscious of the unresolvable aporias that flow from the theory of forms qua
transcendent entities.
 Revisiting Plato 43

possible to hold, at least as a working hypothesis, that adaptation would

consist in a certain movement of re-novation, that is, a movement towards
the re-cognizing of those original forms (those about which a work of art
speaks), which a creator achieves by way of the mediation of a double veil
(the internal logos and the external logos). These languages, when they are
harmoniously interconnected in accordance with the propitious time that
nature has provided (and not according to Adonis’s time of sterility),
communicate something of that immortal seed, which the prudent and
well-disposed farmer cultivates, as though it were a living being in the
garden of his soul.

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 CHAPTER THREE

ADAPTATION, RE-ADAPTATION, AND MYTH1

MARTA FRAGO
UNIVERSIDAD DE NAVARRA, SPAIN

1. Introduction
In our time the approaches to screen adaptation have multiplied, possibly
due to the influence of transmedia narrative.2 On the one hand, traditional
film adaptation continues and has even increased, incorporating films
based on other narrative works, on non-fictional stories including those
that are biographical in nature. Nowadays, more films are based on
adapted rather than original material. But the phenomenon of re-adaptation
and multi-adaptation is also becoming more and more common. We are
referring to stories that on being adapted for film, become the latest link in
a chain of earlier adaptations of the original material, made for different
fiction platforms, which do not necessarily have their roots in cinema or
television. So, apart from including remakes of earlier films which, in turn,
were film adaptations, or series which are re-shaped, re-adaptation also
includes examples of what may be called crossmedia routes. For example,
we have such films as Les Misérables, by Tom Hooper, or Annie, by Will

1
This chapter is part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso Internacional
de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, 9-10 October,
2013.
2
A contemporary practice is that of creating stories through different media. In
Henry Jenkins’ definition: “Transmedia storytelling (or transmedia narrative)
represents a process where integral elements of a fiction get dispersed
systematically across multiple delivery channels for the purpose of creating a
unified and coordinated entertainment experience. Ideally, each medium makes its
own unique contribution to the unfolding of the story.” Jenkins, Henry,
“Transmedia Storytelling 101.” In Confessions of an Aca-Fan.
http://henryjenkins.org/2007/03/transmedia_storytelling_101.html#sthash.f43Qwe
Mf.dpuf (accessed: August 18, 2014).
46 Chapter Three

Gluck, which adapt musicals that again were adaptations of literary

works/comic strips, and converge with other earlier adaptations. Recently,
the musicals Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Big Fish have
appeared, based on films with the same titles, which were in their turn
adapted from stories or novels. And why not mention The Wizarding
World of Harry Potter, Universal’s theme park in Orlando, which follows
the narrative structure of films adapted from J. K. Rowling’s popular saga,
or the BBC series Sherlock and Fox’s Sleepy Hollow, as example of
television programs which adapt elements from both celebrated
eponymous literary works and from previous film versions?
Re-adaptation is not new, as we can find numerous examples of
retelling in the past.3 What is new is the way the practice has exploded,
moving through not just one medium to another, but through several
media, and does so very swiftly. This and similar trends are a challenge for
adaptation studies4 because, having for years concentrated almost
exclusively on adapting literary material for the cinema, students of the
subject now find they do not possess the methodological tools needed to
deal adequately with these new realities.

2. Adaptation Studies at a Crossroads

In his article “Adaptation Studies at a Crossroads”, Thomas Leitch warned
about this as early as 2008, when he characterized adaptation studies as
being at a turning point:
Even though a growing number of films eligible for Academy Awards for
Best Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium borrow that
material from print journalism, franchise characters, television series,
comic books, video games and toys, academic studies of adaptation remain
stubbornly attached to literature as cinema’s natural progenitor.5

3
Linda Hutcheon exemplifies it with Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. The great
dramatist adapts “Arthur Brooke’s versification of Matteo Bandello’s adaptation of
Luigi da Porto’s version of Masuccio Salernitano’s story of two very young, star-
crossed Italian lovers”. She also explains the re-tellings of Percy Bysshe Shelley’s
poem “The Cenci” (written in 1818), and those from Gertrud Von le Forte’s novel
Die Letzte am Schafott (Trans. The Song at the Scaffold). Linda Hutcheon, A
Theory of Adaptation (New York: Routledge, 2006), 175-77.
4
A field of study that began in departments of literature and film studies in the 80s
and 90s, mainly in English-speaking universities.
5
Thomas Leitch, “Adaptation Studies at a Crossroads.” Adaptation 1, no. 1 (2008):
64.
 Adaptation, Re-adaptation, and Myth 47

In his opinion, the Academy members’ assumptions are a result of

studies of film adaptations being based on the traditional understandings of
such adaptation, found mainly in the literature departments of English
universities, sometimes with the cooperation of film studies or vice versa.
Consequently, from the start film-studies scholars were moving in the
same direction, concentrating on analysing adaptations from literature into
cinema, particularly from “upmarket” books, that is, high literature rather
than popular culture.6 Moreover, says Leitch, film scholars always shared
the predominant approaches in literary theory and rarely based their work
on the methodology of other disciplines.7
Another author, Linda Hutcheon, began the preface of her 2006 book,
A Theory of Adaptation, with these words: “If you think adaptation can be
understood by using novels and films alone, you’re wrong.”8 Hutcheon
warned of the reductionism found in adaptation studies and of the need to
re-think adaptation as an exercise in fitting anything anyplace “in all its
various media incarnations.”9 For her, adaptation applies more than just
moving “from telling to showing” when a novel or story becomes a film,
play, musical, radio-play, or ballet. She suggests other differences. For
example, she explains, there is the adaptation “from showing to showing”,
when the adaptation is from one visual medium to another, such as the
cinema, television, theatre, musicals, ballet and opera; and we must also
consider the move “from interactive to telling/showing” and examples,
too, of the reverse, in order to include those adaptations between the above
forms and the digital media with audience or user participation:
videogames, theme parks, virtual reality experiences, webs of interactive
storytelling, etc.10
Both Leitch and Hutcheon are concerned about the disconnection
between what is happening in the professional experience of those
engaged in film adaptation and what the academic studies have until now
been covering. They believe that, in general, the latter are clinging to
vertical models (book-to-film), insufficient to describe current practice.
6
More specifically, studies of adaptation tend to favor literature over film in two
ways. By organizing themselves around canonical authors, they establish a
presumptive criterion for each new adaptation. And by arranging adaptations as
spokes around the hub of such a strong authorial figure, they establish literature as
a proximate cause of adaptation that makes fidelity to the source text central to the
field”. Thomas Leitch, Film Adaptation and its Discontents (Baltimore: John
Hopkins University Press, 2007), 3.
7
Thomas Leitch, “Adaptation Studies at a Crossroads,” 63-65.
8
Hutcheon, A Theory of Adaptation, preface, xi.
9
Ibid., xi.
10
Ibid., 38-52.
48 Chapter Three

They exclude from their charge some recent studies which employ
conceptual and methodological tools either from intertextuality11 or
transtextuality,12 or from post-structuralism, using ideas from the works of
Derrida and Foucault.13 This type of studies, in their opinion, will be able
to escape from the approaches inherited from the literary departments built
on the pillars of the fidelity, canonicity and hierarchy of the source text
over the derived one. Hutcheon observes that thanks to them, it is now
clear that “to be second is not to be secondary or inferior; likewise, to be
first is not to be originary or authoritative”.14
Whatever the case, these authors believe it is important to open film
adaptation studies to other, non-traditional sources for adaptation into film.
The new approaches may be found in the work of writers and scholars
who, as they work in adaptation studies, are not yet well known in the
English-speaking cultural world. Leitch, for example, encourages research
into the concept of intermediality, which comes from the theory of
language, and is already being applied to both adaptation and transmedia
narrative.15 Other approaches, which Leitch does not cite, are found in the
Polysystem Theory, developed by the Israeli Itamar Evan-Zohar and
transferred from translation studies towards film adaptation by authors
such as Patrick Catrysse16, and also the notion of “transfictionality”, which
authors such as Saint-Gelais and Ryan develop based on narratology,
which are being applied mainly to transmedia narrative theory as well.17
What is certain, as Hutcheon and Leitch point out, is that we must
explore new methods which will allow for adaptation modes other than
book-to-film. It is clear that an inter-disciplinary method will be of
assistance in this task. However, a revision of the theory of adaptation

11
See Robert Stam, “Beyond Fidelity: The Dialogics of Adaptation”, in James
Naremore, ed., Film Adaptation (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2000),
54-76.
12
Authors are based on Gérard Genette’s, Palimpsestes: La littérature au second
degré (Paris, Seuil, 1982).
13
See Gordon E. Slethaug, Adaptation Theory and Criticism: Postmodern
Literature and Cinema in the USA (London: Bloomsbury, 2014).
14
Hutcheon, xiii.
15
See Regina Schober, “Adaptation as Connection. Transmediality Reconsidered”,
in Jorgen Bruhn, Anne Gjelsvik and Eirik Frisvold Hanssen, eds., Adaptation
Studies. New Challenges, New Directions (London: Bloomsbury, 2013), 89-112.
16
See Cattrysse, Patrick, Descriptive Adaptation Studies. Epistemological and
Methodological Issues (Antwerp: Garant, 2014).
17
See Richard Saint-Gelais, Fictions Transfuges. La transfictionnalité et ses
enjeux (Paris: Seuil, 2011), and Marie-Laure Ryan, “Transmedial Storytelling and
Transfictionality”, Poetics Today 34, no. 3 (2013), 362-88.
 Adaptation, Re-adaptation, and Myth 49

should not be carried out without first returning to examine its roots to see
whether some approaches belonging to the narrative tradition have been
omitted and might throw useful light on the question.

3. Adaptation Studies Looked at in Hindsight

Not wishing to be exhaustive, but rather to offer a road map, we shall next
present the different stages of adaptation studies as observable in the past,
emphasizing the paths which the authors followed, which, generally
speaking, have coincided with the predominant fashions in literary and
cinema theory at any given time. We shall also indicate the methodologies
they borrow at each stage in order to apply them to specific cases of
adaptation.

3.1. The Starting Point: Novels to Film

As we all know, Novels into Film, by George Bluestone, the first
monographic study of film adaptations, appeared in 1957, and is dedicated
to literary works adapted for the big screen.18 This book was extremely
influential for later studies and is the starting point for academic study on
adaptation. Its late appearance is surprising, as it was published sixty years
after the premiere of the first documented film adaptation. In 1899, George
Méliès had showed his audience at the Robert Houdin Theatre in Paris a 6-
minute film called Cendrillon (Cinderella), which was based on the
popular story by the Grimm Brothers. After this premiere, and up to 1957,
the date of Bluestone’s study, there had been a steady stream of hundreds
of films adapted from literary sources. During these early decades,
although reflections on film adaptation were produced, the phenomenon
was not studied in depth. Reviews of some adapted films can be found
together with opinions and allusions to the practice of adaptation from film
theorists and famous intellectual figures from the world of culture and art.
As Boyum has noted, no one liked film adaptation during the first few
decades of the cinema, except the film makers and the audiences who
loved them.19 On the one hand, the commentaries and criticism offered by
literary writers, thinkers and cultural critics maintained that adaptation of
magnificent literary works trivializes them and reduces them to mere

18
George Bluestone, Novels into Film (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1957).
19
Joy Gould Boyum, Double Exposure: Fiction into Films (New York: Plume,
1885), 15.
50 Chapter Three

entertainment.20 On the other, for most early cinema theorists21 adaptation

does damage in another way, for it is held to constitute an obstacle to the
development of film as an art, regarded as the symptom of cinematic art’s
immaturity, and reflecting the artistic ambiguity in which film is still
immersed. This feeling of animadversion towards film adaptations
compels Bluestone, in his study from 1957, to try to defend adaptation of
books into film as being as worthy a cinematographic practice as others,
and to discredit the idea that cinema maintains a parasitical existence in
relation to literature.22 In his formalistic reasoning Bluestone stresses the
differences between what is literary and what is cinematographic. The
artistic form of each of these narrative platforms is different, he claims.
Exact comparisons, then, are not appropriate. If a film changes the form of
a novel, then it is inevitably changing the content. And if the film maker is
exploring a novel, it is because he has found inspiring material on which to
construct something new and independent, because it assumes a different
artistic form.
Bluestone’s book, as the first full-scale study of film adaptation, points
the way for others to follow. His influence has been felt in many later
works. He focuses on novels in cinema and refuses to accept the idea that
film owes literal fidelity to a literary work. He underlines the
distinguishing features and the independence of each narrative platform –
book and film– and, in theory, refuses to privilege one over the other. This
last idea, however, is not fully consistent with his work as a whole,
because his examples lead us to believe that film (his examples are taken
from Hollywood cinema) cannot compete with the artistic levels achieved
by high literature.
It is to Bluestone that we owe the fact, on the one hand, that
subsequent studies of adaptation have been based mainly on the narrative
analysis, and, on the other, that latest studies should stress the form rather
than the narrative storyline and that they prefer to concentrate on the
process of adaptation rather than the adaptation itself.

20
Comments written by Virginia Woolf, Bernard Shaw, H. L. Meneen or Thomas
Mann have been collected in Harry M. Geduld, Film Makers on Film Making
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1969).
21
Vasel Lindsay, Louis Delluc, Rudolf Arheim and Béla Balázs, among others.
22
This famous remark belongs to Virginia Woolf.
 Adaptation, Re-adaptation, and Myth 51

3.2. Between Languages

During the twenty years that came after Bluestone’s pioneering work, new
scholarly works on adaptation added concepts and methodological tools
appropriated mainly from semiotics and structuralism.
The study of the signs and systems of meaning came to the cinema
principally thanks to Metz and Barthes. Most authors who study film
adaptation do what they can to describe cinematographic language and its
internal logic.23 Acceptance of the idea that bringing a novel to the big
screen is a difficult process has become widespread; it demands a special
skill which allows one to work between the two languages, of words and
of moving images, to find the signals or associative meanings that
accompany the verbal language and to transform or change them into
cinematographic ones. “Films are never read like books,”24 and so there is
no need to feel compelled to apply criteria of comparative equality
between a literary text and its film adaptation. As Brian McFarlane
explains, “The dissimilarities between novel and film are so great that it is
surprising how many films –and successful ones, too– have been derived
from novels.”25 Nevertheless, it is possible to compare the literary and
cinematographic languages as, within each of them –as Metz explained–
there are different codes (perceptive, referential, symbolic), which may be
studied in parallel.26 Additionally, the two languages are united in that
they can both create narrative texts. Precisely because they can both tell
stories, a film and a novel may be compared and their relations studied.
According to Umberto Eco, cinema and the novel are both arts of action,
capable of connecting a series of events on a basic structure.27 This route,
the comparison between narrative texts belonging to different languages is
the one mainly followed by adaptation studies over several decades.

23
Also to be mentioned are the works of Gerald Mast, Literature and Film; Robert
Richardson, Verbal and Visual languages; Morris Beja, Film and Literature; or
James Monaco, How to Read a Film.
24
Seymour Chatman, Coming to Terms: The Rhetoric of Narrative in Fiction and
Film (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990), 163.
25
Brian McFarlane, Words and Images: Australian Novels into Film (Melbourne:
Heinemann Publishers, 1983), 11.
26
See Christian Metz, Film Language: A Semiotics of the Cinema (New York:
Oxford University Press, 1974), 24.
27
Umberto Eco, La definizione dell'arte (Milano: Mursia, 1968), 194-200.
52 Chapter Three

3.3. Penchant towards Discourse

In the semiotic or structuralist-based study of narrative texts, or the
analysis of a story, a fundamental difference between story and discourse
is often made. While a story possesses such elements as fable, plot,
conflict, characters, time-space connections, etc., the word “discourse”
describes the way the story is told, and depends on the language used. It
includes such elements as the narrative voice, perspective, beginning and
ending, punctuation, description, the implicit reader, and symbolic
functions of the language, among the most important. The theorists both of
literature and of cinema have used the story/discourse dichotomy in their
fields, so adaptation studies also naturally embraced it. Among the studies
published, some focus more on the story. In particular they refer to the
influence of the studies of the Russian Formalist Vladimir Propp in his
Morphology of the Folktale, and the structuralist approach of Lévi-Strauss.
This means that they concentrate more on the plot (fable in its visible,
textual aspect), ignoring the abstract part of the fable, despite the fact that
this is the element which, as it does not depend on the language at all,
could be left intact in an adaptation. In contrast, the analyses focusing on
discourse, of which there were many more in the 80’s and 90’s, follow in
the wake of theorists such as Chatman, Genette, Gaudreault and Jost, and
Francesco Casetti. The authors’ starting point is that when a novel or other
literary work is made into a film, there are literary elements with an
enunciative function that are difficult to transform and are inevitably
distorted. These elements are those that depend most on language and have
the most effect in achieving a certain aesthetic. Thus, the studies focusing
on the discourse of an adaptation usually describe the changes and
differences between the original and final versions of the text regarding
the narrative and reflexive voices, perspective, focalization, etc. These
studies consider to what extent these aspects of the discourse have been
replaced by exclusively cinematographic devices and whether the use of
these devices is the result of a correspondence that permits an aesthetic
similarity to the source text.28

3.4. Reactions and New Approaches

In the 90’s, and as a result of the new intellectual developments which
questioned the intratextual excesses deriving from the structuralist

28
See Seymour Chatman, Coming to Terms; Brian McFarlane, Novel to Film: An
Introduction to the Theory of Adaptation; or Bruce Morrisette, Novel and Film:
Essays in Two Genres.
 Adaptation, Re-adaptation, and Myth 53

movement, adaptation studies appeared which were largely concerned

about issues outside the adapted text, and abandoned the strict comparison
of literary and audiovisual texts. As James Naremore clearly noted in the
year 2000, they seek to move from the text to the context, in an attempt to
leave the earlier fashions behind.29 Thus, they explore factors that
intervene in the adaptation process which, in their opinion, should be taken
into account. The perspective is still one-way: from literature to cinema.
There are three aspects to this. First, there is the system for the production
of the film: the studios’ impositions, budget limitations, the kind of public
desired, etc. Second, there is the passage of time: the suitability of the
adapted film to the social and cultural changes occurring between the
writing of the original literary work and the time when it is turned into
film. Third, there are influences: the identification of intertextualities and
allusions that may be included in an adapted film, together with the
literary, cinematographic and artistic references which the film maker
incorporates and accumulates in his style of film making.
In short, from the late 90’s on, adaptation studies have enjoyed a
period when many different approaches coexist: adaptation is studied from
an intertextual perspective, from cultural studies, theories on new
technologies, from deconstructionism, gender studies, the multi-cultural
and post-colonial perspective, etc., and, moreover, there has been a great
increase in the number of articles published on specific works of
adaptation from literature to the cinema. The two compilations edited by
Cartmell and Whelehan, From Text to Screen, Screen to Text (1999) and
The Cambridge Companion to Literature on Screen (2007), are notable
examples.

4. The Point of No Return

To get back to the original question: why, in 2008, did Leitch warn that
there are few perspectives open that allow for new means of adaptation?
Those who have read up to now will likely have worked one of the
answers out. Only one type of adaptation has been explored in depth, that
is, from literature to cinema. In addition, in most cases, this has been done
from the structuralist perspective, which has led to an excess of
comparative analysis between one text and the other. This methodology
demands in-depth knowledge of the different languages and their codes.
With this model it is easy to explain something which occurs in only one

29
James Naremore, Film Adaptation (New Jersey, Rutgers University Press,
2000), 7-9.
54 Chapter Three

adaptation exercise, from one medium to another, but it becomes more

complicated when we find the same work altered for different narrative
media. In this case, the analytical exercise may be both painstaking and
fruitless. But there is another problem. When making a comparative
analysis of texts, considering only the elements that shape them internally,
one must organize them hierarchically in some way, and mark one of them
as the source text. This is the origin of the debate on the “fidelity” which
the derived text owes to the original, a debate which will not be detailed
here, but which has been extensively covered in the academic literature. It
may be summarized as reflected in two main viewpoints: one that favours
the original work and considers that the adaptation, as a derived narrative,
should include at least the originals main characteristics; and the other,
which rejects any duty of fidelity, because it considers that each work (the
original and the adapted version) are independent and hierarchically equal.
The latter work merely considers the former as its generating impulse.
This second perspective is becoming more dominant in present-day
adaptation studies, due to the influence of both deconstructionism and
cross-textual approaches.
It must be understood that the question of fidelity becomes more
complicated when it is applied to cases of adaptation of the classics, and
also –we have to say– to examples of re-adaptation and multi-adaptation.
One example is the film version of Les Miseràbles by Tom Hooper30; it
may even seem strange to study it independently, without any reference –
or with a simple list of allusions– to the musical on which it is based and,
further back in time, to the Victor Hugo novel and its subsequent
adaptations. Then again, if we accept the requirement of fidelity, from
which of the earlier versions should it take the essential features? Which of
them should be considered the source or prototext? The earlier musical?
The original novel? Both? And fidelity to what extent? As we can see,
textual comparison does not provide a convincing answer to these
questions.
Both the issue of fidelity and hierarchy between texts and the spread of
adaptation to different media are matters that adaptation studies have
considered, having arrived along several reductionist routes in their
development. In the last few years, some of the new theoretical approaches
have attempted to deal with these multifarious modes of adaptation.
However, as shall now be explained, the application of the Aristotelian
concept of the “fable” (mythos) could be useful.

30
Les Misérables. Directed by Tom Hooper (UK: Universal Pictures, 2012).
 Adaptation, Re-adaptation, and Myth 55

5. The Fable-Myth: A Missing Link

The authors who, following the narrative analysis, came face-to-face with
the difference between fable (as myth) and plot (fable as syuzhet) could
have investigated the relation between them. However, they delved into
the study of the latter, leaving the concept of fable as myth in the
background. This concept, nonetheless, properly explained and brought up
to date, is one of the keys which allows us to comprehend “retelling” and
so, both adaptation and re-adaptation. It allows us to see the common core
that brings re-adaptations together, connecting them, and far from
establishing comparisons between the source text and later derivatives, it
encourages us to follow the interpretations that are possible due to the
abstract part (myth) of a first plot formulation (syuzhet).
In order to understand why this concept was left aside by the authors
who followed the structuralist current, the difference must be explained.
Fable (as mythos) is a basic skeleton that comes before artistic, abstract
organization and is independent of all languages; the plot, on the contrary,
is the artistically organized fable. In its embryonic form, it involves a basic
order in the emergence and concatenation of the facts. As it grows more
complicated, it becomes more dependent on the specific narrative media in
which it takes shape. Both the fable and the plot –in their most basic state–
can move from one medium to another. Eco explains this by saying that
the fable of The Odyssey can be recounted with the same plot by means of
linguistic paraphrase, a film, or a comic book, etc.31 Because the plot, in
contrast with the fable as myth, is structured with a certain logic which is
seen in the text, it becomes an element of interest for the authors who
follow structuralist thought. Fable in its abstract aspect proved to be too
elusive an element for a methodology that depends on language.
It is by using narrative studies, and especially by using hermeneutics,
that certain arguments can be found to understand fable as myth. This does
not mean isolating this element as being independent of the plot, because it
is interrelated to it. In his Poetics, Aristotle calls it pragmaton systasis
(arrangement of the facts or composition of the plot) in what is almost
complete similarity to the mimesis praxeos (imitation of an action).32 We
must, then, understand that although we gain access to the myth from the
narrative fiction itself, the myth deictically indicates what is extra-
linguistic, at an ontological level which is above the construct of the
fiction and has to do with the individual’s experience of the world and his

31
Umberto Eco, Six Walks in the Fictional Woods (Cambridge: Harvard University
Press, 1994), 35.
32
Aristotle, Poetics, 50a4-5 and 50b17-19.
56 Chapter Three

life experience, personal as well as communal and universal. Paul Ricoeur

said that the recipient of the fiction is transported through the myth from
the historical time in which it is set to what he calls fundamental time, that
is, to a sacred space.33 The existence of the fable-myth in narrative
explains why the great fictional works communicate something
fundamental which is common to very different recipients, in different
places and cultural contexts, or in different periods. We must not presume
that this communication occurs in a univocal, unidirectional way. No
receptive act exists without its personal and cinematographic nuance. As
George Steiner states, “Receptivities are as individual as snowflakes,”34
and as García Noblejas underlines, “Fiction refers to the world in which
the reader or spectator lives, in as far as it is poetically allegoric and
symbolic of their life in it.”35 However, the individuality of each reception
does not eliminate the possible communication with what is most basic
and common to people’s reality and life. Thomas Pavel explains this by
indicating that classic works of fiction, in the end, rotate around existential
concerns, such as “birth, love and death, success and failure, achievement
and loss of power, the sacred and the profane, etc.”36

6. Re-Adaptation and Myth

To return to the phenomenon of re-adaptation, no serious adapter working
on the reformulation of a fictional work, stripping it and dressing it up
again, would refuse to regard the fable as myth, at least subconsciously.
Authors like Vanoye, Boyum and Sanders hold that anyone who adapts is
reinterpreting the work, in the exercise of reading and borrowing some of
its elements.37 Within this task of assimilation affinity and empathy with it
intervene at some stage. Not merely in its material part but, as George
Steiner points out, in his general discussion the process of the reception of
art, by leaving marks which seem to be of a different order from the

33
Paul Ricoeur, “Mythe – L’interprétation philosophique”, in Encyclopædia
Universalis (online), http://www.universalis.fr/encyclopedie/mythe-l-interpret
ation-philosophique/ (accessed August 21, 2014).
34
George Steiner, Real Presences (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press,
1991), 191.
35
Juan José García-Noblejas, Comunicación y mundos posibles (Pamplona: Eunsa,
1996), 224. Translation: Ann Hannigan.
36
Thomas Pavel, Univers de la fiction (Paris: Seuil, 1988), 186.
37
See Joy Gould Boyum, Double Exposure: Fiction into Films; Francis Vanoye,
Scénarios modèles, modèles de scénarios (Paris: A. Collin, 2005); and Julie
Sanders, Adaptation and Appropriation (London: Routledge, 2005).
 Adaptation, Re-adaptation, and Myth 57

mechanisms of association and recall, and go beyond the paraphrase.38 In

short, a serious adapter inevitably connects with the myth, in a sub-
conscious dialogue, and the myth becomes the principal object of his/her
reinterpretation, which will end up by being visible in another work.39
It must be admitted that not all narratives exhibit the same amount of
fable-myth. In general, the re-adaptation processes deal with narratives
that are particularly connected to original stories and, in this sense, they
are more universal.40 If we admit this, in the cases of re-adaptation, the
fable as myth becomes the basic reference-point for each new work, even
if they are used in different media at different times.
The use of the fable-myth perspective in critical studies on adaptation
and re-adaptation would allow work with vertical adaptations (from one
medium to another) and horizontal ones (taking the different versions from
different media), without the need for hierarchical ranking. It would also
allow reference to what is shared and not merely to the process of change
into a different work, one more fitting with different times and cultural
circumstances. To return to the example of Les Misérables, reflection on
the fable-myth makes it easier to connect Hooper’s film with Victor
Hugo’s novel, as it does with the earlier musical and with other cinema
adaptations. There are recognizable elements belonging to the fable-myth
in each of them: the gift as the origin of a chain of inner transformations of
the characters in a succession of concentric circles, or the difficult balance
between justice and mercy represented in the opposition between the two
main characters, to mention two of the points. These matters can easily be
translated between different narrative media and can even work in
different genres. Later they will take on diverse forms; some versions will
be more subject than others to the enunciative and formal elements of the
novel; each adaptation will, in turn, produce its own nuances and
borrowings as added by the adapter as the particular recipient of the work.
Each version will also combine artistic influences and allusions to other
works. And clearly, each version will have a number of external factors
intervening in the process, whether this be the production mode, possible
commercial demands, or the cultural and social tendencies prevailing in
the audience at the time, etc. All of these elements are apt to be studied
and analysed in each particular adaptation. What reflection on the fable-
myth contributes is the possibility of referring to a DNA which should be

38
Steiner, 179-182.
39
See Marta Frago, “Reflexiones sobre la adaptación cinematográfica desde una
perspectiva iconológica.”, Comunicación y Sociedad 18, no. 2 (2005), 71-73.
40
As long as they are not subject to excessive market requirements.
58 Chapter Three

inscribed in any work that calls itself an adaptation and uses the title Les
Misérables.
One might think that the fable-myth is a fixed, solid idea, but this is not
so. It cannot be objectified or identified with a specific element: a
character, a plot, or an object. Precisely because it is abstract and multi-
character, although it is constructed around a single poetic action in the
work,41 each of us grasps it in a particular way and associate it with our
own experience, emphasising one aspect over another and linking it with
our beliefs, cultural and social viewpoints, etc. Fable as myth is not an
inviolable sacrosanct object but rather an area which allows for dialogue
from one’s own subjectivity, a dialogue about a reality that exists, not only
in our minds, and demands deference. Going back to the example used
here, in his version of the story of Les Misérables, Tom Hooper may have
emphasized some aspects more than others, but if he had completely
omitted or inverted aspects of the fable-myth in the work, his film would
have taken on an autonomy so great as to have made its status as an
adapted work disappear. Hooper would have told us a different story that
would warrant a different title, based on a different model.
This last point leads us to a final reflection, which has to do with the
issue of fidelity mentioned previously in this chapter. As the fable-myth is
inseparable from its sensitive expression in the plot, it is clear that within
every chain of adaptations there is always an original form that allows it to
exist, an initial work which made the right string vibrate and so gave off
the correct sound. This does not mean that it is better than the later ones,
nor does it demand a formal similarity, as the fealty of a vassal is not
involved. On the contrary, it warrants courteous treatment, taken as the
epitome of common sense, the ceremonial welcome never forgotten by the
perfect host.42 Courtesy simply implies acknowledgement that there was a
first version and, therefore, recognition of the effort of the adapter to
replicate the original sound that was so captivating. Deference, to sum up,
means to simply apply new ways to dress up the original myth.

41
Aristotle, Poetics, 59a17-21.
42
Steiner, 149-155.
 Adaptation, Re-adaptation, and Myth 59

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Fiction and Film. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990.
Eco, Umberto. La definizione dell'arte. Milano: Mursia, 1968.
—. Six Walks in the Fictional Woods. Cambridge: Harvard University
Press, 1994.
Frago, Marta. “Reflexiones sobre la adaptación cinematográfica desde una
perspectiva iconológica.” Comunicación y Sociedad 18, no. 2 (2005):
49-81.
García-Noblejas, Juan José. Comunicación y mundos posibles. Pamplona:
Eunsa, 1996.
Geduld, Harry M. Film Makers on Film Making. Bloomington: Indiana
University Press, 1969.
Genette, Gérard. Palimpsestes: La littérature au second degré. Paris:
Seuil, 1982.
Hutcheon, Linda. A Theory of Adaptation. New York: Routledge, 2006.
Jenkins, Henry. “Transmedia Storytelling 101.” In Confessions of an Aca-
Fan,http://henryjenkins.org/2007/03/transmedia_storytelling_101.html
(Accessed: Aug. 18, 2014).
Leitch, Thomas. “Adaptation Studies at a Crossroads.” Adaptation 1, no. 1
(2008): 63-77.
—. Film Adaptation and Its Discontents. Baltimore: John Hopkins
University Press, 2007.
Les Misérables. Directed by Tom Hooper. 2012, UK: Universal Pictures,
2012.
Mast, Gerald. “Literature and Film.” In Interrelations of Literature, edited
by Jean Pierre Barricelli and Joseph Gibaldi. New York: MLA, 1982.
60 Chapter Three

McFarlane, Brian. Words and Images: Australian Novels into Film.

Melbourne: Heinemann Publishers, 1983.
—. Novel to Film: Introduction to the Theory of Adaptation. Oxford:
Clarendon Press, OUP, 1996.
Metz, Christian. Film Language: A Semiotics of the Cinema. New York:
Oxford University Press, 1974.
Monaco, James. How to Read a Film. New York: Oxford University Press,
1977.
Morrisette, Bruce. Novel and Film: Essays in Two Genres. Chicago:
Chicago University Press, 1985.
Naremore, James. Film Adaptation. New Jersey: Rutgers University Press,
2000.
Pavel, Thomas. Univers de la fiction. Paris: Seuil, 1988.
Richardson, Robert. “Verbal and Visual Languages.” In Literature and
Film. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1969.
Ricoeur, Paul. “Mythe – L’interprétation philosophique.” In Encyclopædia
Universalis, http://www.universalis.fr/encyclopedie/mythe-l-interpretat
ion-philosophique/ (accessed Aug. 21, 2014).
Ryan, Marie-Laure. “Transmedial Storytelling and Transfictionality.”
Poetics Today 34, no. 3 (2013): 362-88.
Saint-Gelais, Richard. Fictions Transfuges: La Transfictionnalité et ses
enjeux. Paris: Seuil, 2011.
Sanders, Julie. Adaptation and Appropriation. The New Critical Idiom.
London: Routledge, 2005.
Schober, Regina. “Adaptation as Connection. Transmediality Reconsidered.”
In Adaptation Studies, New Challenges, New Directions, edited by
Jorgen Bruhn, Anne Gjelsvik and Eirik Frisvold Hanssen, London:
Bloomsbury, 2013: 89- 112.
Slethaug, Gordon E. Adaptation Theory and Criticism: Postmodern
Literature and Cinema in the USA. London: Bloomsbury, 2014.
Stam, Robert. “Beyond Fidelity: The Dialogics of Adaptation.” In Film
Adaptation, edited by James Naremore. New Brunswick: Rutgers
University Press, 2000: 54-76.
Steiner, George. Real Presences. Chicago: The University of Chicago
Press, 1991.
Vanoye, Francis. Scénarios modèles, modèles de scénarios. Paris: A.
Collin, 2005.
 PART II:

FROM STAGE TO SCREEN:

THE PROBLEMS OF THEATRICAL
ADAPTATION TO FILM
 CHAPTER FOUR

FROM THEATRE TO FILM:

THE CASE OF ANCIENT GREEK TRAGEDY1

ELENI VARMAZI
BAHÇEùEHIR UNIVERSITY, TURKEY

1. Introduction: Tragedy and the Tragic Myth

Tragedy is one out of the three kinds of drama of Ancient Greece, the
other two being comedy and satyr plays. Tragedy borrows its themes from
popular myths of the time, which are seen from a serious point of view
with serious characters; the same myth could also be presented from a
funnier point of view in a satyr play. While it was theoretically possible
for any dramatist to compose both kinds of dramas, certain writers, who
dealt with the grotesque, were the ones who wrote the comedies. Comedy
was the third dramatic form in the theatre of classical Greece and it was
characterized by a blend of political satire, sexual innuendo and scatology.
Tragedy was born from the combination of its elements –the epic, the
lyric and the orchestral– which existed long ago before tragedy. The
dithyramb is considered today the essential form of tragedy. It was taught
at the theatre, which had a circular orchestra with an altar at the centre
dedicated to Dionysus, for whom the dithyrambs, a kind of choric hymn,
were written in order to glorify and pay respect to. A chorus, led by a
single singer, sang it. Tragedy was born, by the insertion of dialogue
between the choral parts of the dithyramb, and was performed at the
theatres during theatrical contests. Tragedy has slowly evolved as a
theatrical form. At the beginning, tragedy was closely connected to
Dionysian religion, in terms of time, place and actor’s costumes but the

1
This chapter is part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso Internacional
de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, 9-10 October,
2013.
 From Theatre to Film: The Case of Ancient Greek Tragedy 63

content of tragedies very quickly became disengaged from Dionysus and

started borrowing its themes from popular myths.2
Tragedy’s form was not achieved quickly. Its evolution over time is
evident if we examine only the plays of the three great tragedians in their
corresponding chronological order. We will be able to see that the choral
parts in Aeschylus’ plays have become longer than those in the plays of
Sophocles and those in Sophocles’ plays are still longer than those of
Euripides. However, there are certain rules, which were respected by all
tragedians out of which the most important is probably the unity of space,
time and plot.
Aeschylus is credited with inventing the trilogy, a series of three tragic
plays, which deal with the same myth. They were performed in a sequence
during the course of a single day. At the end, after the last in the sequence
of tragedies, a satyr play would be staged in order to lift up the mood of
the audience. Three tragedians were chosen who would present their four
plays in three continuous days at the Athenian theatre during a religious
festival. Those tragic poets were competing with each other for the victory
and were ranked by a panel of judges. It is true that the Greek myths, with
which the tragedies dealt, are filled with horror and they touch the deepest
kinds of human relationships. Two important families dominate the myths
that became the stuff of Greek tragedy: The Atrides and the Labdacides.
The myth of the Atrides family starts with Atreas and Thyestes,
brothers who plotted together to kill a third brother. After this joint murder
they turned against each other. Atreas killed Thyestes’ children and served
them to him during a feast. This horror committed by Atreas then follows
his children: Agamemnon and Menelaus. Agamemnon sacrifices his
daughter Iphigenia and is later murdered by his wife Clytemnestra, and
then her own son Orestes kills her. Within two generations we are
presented with the most monstrous crimes: murder of brother by brother,
of husband by wife, of wife by husband, of parents by children and of
children by parents. The Atrides family occupies Aeschylus’ trilogy
Oresteia, a single tragedy, Electra, by Sophocles, and four tragedies by
Euripides: Orestes, Electra, Iphigenia at Aulis and Iphigenia at Tauris.
The family of the Labdacides did not fare any better in myth, or on the
stage of classical antiquity. The father of Oedipus, the young Laius, was
involved in murders; the plays in which these murders are mentioned, such
as the Antiope by Euripides, have been lost. When Laius becomes king,
the oracle threatens him by telling him that his son will kill him. So, when
Oedipus is born his father wants to make him disappear, but this is in vain.
2
Albin Lesky, Greek Tragedy, trans. H. A. Frankfort (London: Ernest Benn,
1965), 43.
64 Chapter Four

Through a series of mistakes, but errors willed by destiny, Oedipus kills

his father, marries his mother and has children who can now be considered
to be, horrifyingly, both his children and also his brothers and sisters. The
character of Oedipus shocks all the casual relationships within the
institution of the family. His sons kill each other because of the
malediction of their father, and his daughter Antigone is killed by her
uncle Creon whose son had been in love with her and who then commits
suicide.
Psychoanalysis supports the idea that tragic myths deal with fundamental
emotions. Freud’s concentrated attention to what he identified as the Oedipus
complex is only one example of the significance that psychoanalysis gives to
myths. Jung also made use of the Greek myths in constructing his theory
of archetypes and talked about the human relationships that remain
diachronic; that is, that persist through time, for example, the archetype of
the mother, which has numerous illustrations in ancient Greek myths and
takes many different forms, from Mother Nature to Mother Goddess. Jung
argues that the archetypes in myths express the subconscious of the society
that produces them; in other words, what he called the collective
subconscious.
According to Guy de Romilly, we can understand that Greek tragedies
take their power from the evocation of the miseries and the disasters that
touch very deeply the human sensibility. This is what distinguishes Greek
tragedy from the French, which is more reserved and more modest.3 But
for her, “Tragedy is not only the myth.” It is the work of poets who
willingly transformed the myth and inserted their own meaning. They did
that according to certain schemas and interests.4
Guy Rachet, on the other hand, gives importance to the battle between
the mortal and the immortal:

We repeat all the time that the essence of Greek tragedy lays in the vain
combat which leads the man, a weak and temporal creature, against
Destiny, the destiny that dominates him. The Fatality (Ananke) together
with the inflexible Destiny (Moira) reveals the profound source of drama,
and their power against the human mediocrity constitutes the essence of the
tragic.5

3
Guy de Romilly, La Tragédie Grecque (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France,
1970), 159-60.
4
Ibid., 161.
5
Guy Rachet, La Tragédie Grecque. Origine-Histoire- Développement (Paris:
Payot, 1973), 15.
 From Theatre to Film: The Case of Ancient Greek Tragedy 65

The structuralist approach concludes that myths are reservoirs of

articulate thought on the level of the collective. They represent the thought
of people about themselves and their condition. Moreover, the words of a
myth, especially when set down in writing, appear to have an “objective”
existence irrespective of the attitudes and approaches of narrator, listeners,
and observers.6
Jean-Pierre Vernant also follows the structuralist approach and believes
that the solution of the dramas always expresses “the triumph of the
collective values imposed by the new democratic city-state.”7 Tragedy
represents for him three aspects that are equally important: from the point
of view of the institution of tragic competitions it can be seen as a social
phenomenon; it represents a new literary genre as an aesthetic creation;
and introducing the concepts of the tragic consciousness and the tragic
man it represents a psychological mutation.8
It is particularly true, when we have to examine Greek myths that the
social structure of the era, which the myth represents, turns out to be very
important. The tragedians chose myths, which deal mostly with the human
conditions and left aside the divine myths, restricting the role of the Gods
in the plays to the role of the dei ex machina. This is what entitles us to
call these plays tragedies; it is men, not gods, who act and choose and
suffer. Furthermore, Greek mythology is anthropomorphic and concentrates
its attention on murder and sexual passion leading to misconduct. In Greek
culture the human problems dominate, with little of those elements that
might be called magical, or supernatural. Greek culture had a certain
complexity; it dealt with a currency system and articulated its social and
religious values in myth, cult, and law. It was therefore different from
other primitive cultures whose myths have been examined and which dealt
more with the natural environment and less with the human society.
Vickers supports the idea that Greek mythology is easier to understand
because it is a “Western” mythology. Many of the cultural attitudes that
Western World shares today derive from Greek mathematics, philosophy,
science and literature. Since the Greeks reached their advanced cultural
state without losing contact with their myths, those tales kept reflecting the
current preoccupations of society, from family economics to international
law. Greek mythology, thus, is not foreign to us.9

6
Edmund Leach, ed., The Structural Study of Myth and Totemism (Edinburgh:
Tavistock Publications, 1967), 32.
7
Jean-Pierre Vernant, Tragedy and Myth in Ancient Greece, trans. Janet Lloyd
(Sussex: Harvest Press, 1981
8
Ibid., ix.
9
Brian Vickers, Towards Greek Tragedy (London: Longman, 1973), 202.
66 Chapter Four

In the light of what has been discussed so far, it is fair to say that
ancient Greek tragedies can be viewed as adaptations of popular myth,
rooted in the human world.

2. The Film Adaptations: Cacoyannis’ Trilogy

Up until the 1960s ancient Greek tragedy was presented on film or filmed
for television as a performance on theatrical stages, the only
cinematographic elements being the changes in the camera angles and the
camera movements.
Michael Cacoyannis was the first one who really attempted to adapt
Greek tragedy to the cinema, filming not in a theatre, but on real locations.
He was a director deeply influenced by Italian neorealism and he wanted
and managed to avoid any kind of use of studio sets. However, he was also
a director who kept close to the original text.
Between 1961 and 1977, he directed a trilogy based on three tragedies
by Euripides: Electra, The Trojan Women and Iphigenia at Aulis. The first
two films bore the same title as the tragedies and the third was entitled
simply Iphigenia. Electra was considered to be the most successful of the
three films. It was an amazing adaptation of such an old text, which
traditionally had been performed in theatre following theatrical conventions.
Electra uses the Greek countryside as its setting and the original palace
of Mycenae became the setting of the palace. In the film, Cacoyannis, as
far as the dialogue is concerned, kept the original text of the tragedy
(translated, of course, into Modern Greek) changing only the text of the
chorus. That chorus consists of peasant women, who support Electra’s
feelings and sing Greek songs written by Mikis Theodorakis but which,
nevertheless, are partially based on the original texts of the chorus and
partially on the political situation in modern Greece. The members of the
chorus are also the only characters in the film who wear contemporary
traditional costumes; the rest of the actors wear ancient Greek costumes.
Many accused Cacoyannis of producing a version of the play by
Euripides that borrowed from another play on the same theme, the Electra
written by Sophocles, one that omitted aspects of Electra’s character,
toning down her original harshness. In that sense Cacoyannis was going
back to a more heroic form of the tragedy, instead of following the form
that Euripides had given to it in his version. Many believed that the play
loses its original force through those transformations.10

10
Kenneth MacKinnon, Greek Tragedy into Film (Cranbury, N.J.: Associated
University Presses, 1986), 77-79.
 From Theatre to Film: The Case of Ancient Greek Tragedy 67

On the other hand, others thought that by making those changes

Cacoyannis’s film becomes more powerful, because it shows the absurdity
of crime on a family level, something that he will demonstrate later, on a
larger scale, in Trojan Women. According to Marianne McDonald, “His
film is true to the spirit of the Euripidean play, although he alters the
details and ‘whitens’ the characters of Electra and Orestes. Nevertheless,
both he and Euripides deplore the senseless cycle of violence that revenge
entails.”11
One thing on which everybody agreed was the fact that Electra is a
film that, while absorbing elements from the play, is also, by employing
the expressive language of cinema, successfully adapting into film a text
that derives from another art form.12 Electra is a film “remarkable for its
skilful use of the Greek landscape, its imaginative handling of the chorus,
its evocation of the unchanging realities of life in a Greek village, and,
above all, its faithful recreation against this rich background of Euripides
tormented and murderous heroine.”13
The other two films of the trilogy have not been as successful as
Electra. The Trojan Women was shot in 1971 in English. It is much more
static than Electra, much more faithful to the original text, as if the screen
were transformed into a stage where actors enter and exit, and without
many of the contemporary elements that enriched Cacoyannis’s Electra,
although the director chose to make this film out of contemporary
concerns. The Colonels had seized power in Greece and the Vietnam War
was in progress, factors that made the subject of The Trojan Women very
relevant and compelling at the time. Besides, many of the victims of the
Vietnam War were women and the feminist movement had started to gain
power both in U.S.A. and in Europe. According to Kenneth MacKinnon,
“Critics of the film sensed that there was an attempt to explain its making
in terms of contemporary relevance, or –a less controversial way of
suggesting the same thing– timelessness.”14
Cacoyannis, in this film too, preferred actual locations instead of
studios and he chose to shoot the film at the deserted walls of Atienza, in
Spain. The characters of Andromache and Cassandra are softened and the

11
Marianne McDonald, Euripides in Cinema: The Heart Made Visible
(Philadelphia: Centrum Philadelphia, 1983), 261.
12
“Cacoyannis is said not only to have kept the spirit of Euripides’ play and put it
into film terms, but, rather boldly, to have improved it.” See Pantelis Michelakis,
Greek Tragedy on Screen (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 61.
13
Bernard Knox, Word and Action (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press,
1979), 352.
14
MacKinnon, 81.
68 Chapter Four

character of Helen is hardened because Cacoyannis chooses to emphasize

the fact that she is a putana and a hypocrite. In order to do that he inserted
a scene that is not to be found anywhere in the original text, in which
Helen is using water in order to bath herself, while the same water had
already been refused to the Trojan Women when, suffering from the
unbearable heat, they were begging for a sip. Another scene that is not
from the original text is that in which Helen fakes an attempt to commit
suicide, demonstrating thereby her own insincerity, and her efforts to
physically seduce Menelaus.
Unlike the film, in the play the quarrel between Hecuba and Helen is
much more balanced, so that no one can be quite sure whose version of
events is the true one. But Cacoyannis makes sure to show that Hecuba,
though losing the battle, is right, and that Helen, who is wrong, wins. He
declares that the cause of the war was material gain, something that is not
expressed in the play.
Many elements in the Euripidean prologue are supplied, in the film, in
a voice-over and not everything in the original prologue is included.
Omitted, for example, is the fact that Athena and Poseidon decide that for
the Greeks who destroyed Troy, their destiny is to die.
Hecuba’s character functions as the voice of reason. She is able to
rationalize everything and thereby wins the sympathy of the audience for
herself and the Trojan women. Therefore the compassion for the Trojan
women is enlarged, and, as a corollary, the dislike for Helen is increased.
The film finishes with the text: “Resistance to the oppression of man
by man” and, according to MacKinnon, “The suffering of woman and
child by man has seldom been presented to more unrelieved and appalling
effect than in Cacoyannis’s film”.15
Iphigenia (1977) received more or less the same criticism. Because of
the uncertainties surrounding the original text (it is assumed that the text
was compiled by others after the death of Euripides, from drafts he left) it
was a risky task for Cacoyannis to undertake that project. But he was
familiar with the text because he had directed the tragedy for a theatrical
production in New York in 1968. Cacoyannis made a number of changes.
Apart from the scenes that he inserted, designed to explain the plot, and to
make the film easier to follow than the ancient text of the play, he also
made changes to some of the characters. The best example of this is what
Cacoyannis did to the character of Achilles. In his version, Achilles is not
the heroic Homeric personality but, rather, a handsome young man,
confused and warm, humorous, and relieved by the film’s director of the

15
Ibid., 85.
 From Theatre to Film: The Case of Ancient Greek Tragedy 69

need to deliver long-winded verse monologues, as he does in the original

play.
Iphigenia manages to overhear, quite by accident, the reason why she
has been brought to Aulis, and she tries to escape in the forest. Greek
soldiers bring her back. Her attempted escape is depicted in parallel action,
on the screen, with the argument between Agamemnon and Clytemnestra,
when the latter tries to convince him not to kill their daughter. The film
follows the text of the tragedy from then on, up until just before the end,
where there is a significant change, which is probably the best innovative
element of the film. While Iphigenia climbs the steps of the altar, willing
to be sacrificed as a sign of devotion to Greece, a sudden wind starts up.
Neither the priests nor the soldiers stop the preparations for her sacrifice,
despite the rising wind. Just before this scene and as the whole army is
loudly clamouring for her sacrifice, Calchas and Odysseus say to each
other that they will have to hurry because the wind starts blowing. This
part of the script shows the preposterousness of the sacrifice. Iphigenia
herself also feels the strong wind and, turning around to see her father, as
she is standing before the altar, she is suddenly grabbed by Calchas. When
Agamemnon runs to save her, he arrives at the altar too late. We do not see
Iphigenia’s body, for according also to the tragic rules, murder is never
portrayed on stage, but we see the pain in Agamemnon’s face.
Irene Papas, who portrayed Clytemnestra in Iphigenia and was also
involved in the other two films, said after its making:

It wouldn’t have been made if I thought there was no relevance. I believe

that ideas are immortal and that the problems of the human race are still the
same...we still go to war, we still fight for money, we are still politically
minded, and with more than any other century I think the twentieth century
is closer to the bone of the Greek problems: the problems of death and
survival...Greek drama dealt with genuine crises and the problems that are
vital to human beings. And now in this century with the threat of the
nuclear war, and Vietnam just ended it is just the same.16

In “Word and Action”, the classical scholar Bernard Knox writes that
Cacoyannis succeeds in this film to make members of the audience
identify first with the wronged mother and the child, and then with the
weak royal father. According to him, it is the duty and the privilege of the
camera to extend the dramatic frontier beyond the three walls of the
modern stage and the one wall of the ancient stage, and Cacoyannis

16
Ibid., 87.
70 Chapter Four

managed to present the myth with a great deal of action that the original
audience, in the time of Euripides, did not see.17
Like Euripides, Cacoyannis in all three of these films demonstrates that
the heroes are also the victims of violence, revenge and greed. According
to MacKinnon,

Whatever the attractions of his vision, Cacoyannis has, in choosing Greek

tragedy as vehicle for it, re-heroized the world of Euripides and suggested
to the non-specialist viewer and even to the unwary specialist the
ossification of a dramatic mode which was in reality undergoing its most
radical and disturbing alteration at the hands of a playwright who was in
his own time recognized to be challenging religious, moral and dramatic
orthodoxies at every turn.18

3. Pasolini’s Meta-Myth
Pier Paolo Pasolini directed two films based on ancient Greek tragedies.
The first one was produced in 1967 and is based on Oedipus Rex by
Sophocles (the tragedy, which is considered exemplary by Aristotle, in
embodying the way tragedy should be structured, and how to present both
the peripeteia, or reversal of fortune and the anagnorisis, or recognition
scene.19). The second was produced in 1970 and is based on Medea by
Euripides. The titles of the films are Oedipus Rex and Medea.
Pasolini also sets Oedipus Rex not on a stage, indoor or outdoor, but in
real locations. The film was shot in Italy and Morocco. Pasolini uses Italy
for the opening and the ending of the film and he uses the desert of
Morocco for the two middle parts of the film as a stand-in for Ancient
Greece. But he does something more. He sets these four parts of the film
in different time periods. The prologue of the film is set in the thirties in
Italy; the main two parts are set in an a-historical space where he tells the
story of Oedipus, from babyhood to his marriage to his mother Jocasta.
The third part is the actual play of Sophocles, devoted to Oedipus when he
is king of Thebes, and finally, the last part, or epilogue, is set in the Italy
of the sixties, where Oedipus wanders around blinded. This last part,
according to Pasolini, corresponds to Sophocles’ tragedy Oedipus at
Colonus.

17
Knox, 352.
18
MacKinnon, 94.
19
Aristotle, Poetics, trans. Leon Goldman (Florida: University Presses of Florida,
1981), 19.
 From Theatre to Film: The Case of Ancient Greek Tragedy 71

It is clear that Pasolini has moved from a close interpretation of the

text of the play by Sophocles to an interpretation of the myth surrounding
Oedipus’ character. His film is not, as in Cacoyannis’s version, a
cinematic interpretation, or an adaptation of a tragedy into film but it is,
rather, a version of a tragic myth, which incorporates a tragic play related
to that myth. For the part of the film referring to the tragedy, Pasolini
stayed close to the text by Sophocles and he included most of the points of
tragic irony that the play includes. However, Oedipus Rex is much more
than Sophocles’ tragedy.
Many critics believe that Pasolini tried to analyse the myth of Oedipus
as a human being from the period of pre-rational society, something that
he repeats later in Medea. The explanation which is closer to Pasolini’s
statements on the subject has been that the film functions as a rigorous
reading of the levels of meaning that the myth itself generates from one
particular reading: that of Sophocles, and then from the various readings of
this initial Sophoclean reading, provided by many others: Aristotle, Freud,
Marx, and so on. 20
Pasolini was concerned with the examination of the myth, part of
which is now the play by Sophocles. His film is about the meta-myth. He
takes his character, and sets him in a space outside of history or, as
Pasolini calls it, in meta-history: “Well, the myth is a product, so to speak
a human history, but then having become a myth it has become absolute, it
is no longer typical of this or that period of history, it’s typical, let’s say,
of all history. Perhaps I was wrong to say it is a-historical, it is meta-
historical.”21
In order to show the meta-historical elements of the myth he uses
transitions in time and, in different societies, over space; he uses costumes,
settings and music from different cultures. He uses Romanian folk songs
because “They are extremely ambiguous: they are half-way between Slav,
Greek and Arab songs, they are indefinable: it is unlikely that anyone who
didn’t have a specialized knowledge could locate them; they are a bit out
of history. As I wanted to make Oedipus a myth, I wanted music which
was a-historical, a-temporal […].”22
The critics were disturbed because they were expecting a film along
the lines of Sophocles’ play. They were puzzled by the fact that Pasolini
did not keep the majestic language of Sophocles’ play, nor the heroic
struggles of the characters with the gods. Instead he created an unintellectual

20
MacKinnon, 132.
21
Pier Paolo Pasolini, Pasolini on Pasolini (Bloomington & London: Indiana
University Press, 1969), 127.
22
Ibid., 126.
72 Chapter Four

hero and an environment that reflects absolutely nothing of the impression

we have about the Athens of the fifth century B.C. John R. Taylor writes:
“The force of the intellectual notion íinsisting on the universality of the
myth by situating outside history, beyond any specific frameworkí can be
appreciated intellectually, but it is not sufficiently felt, and the film
remains, the prologue and the coda apart, a clever but empty exercise in
style.”23
The analysts of the film were challenged by many aspects of the
production, such as, for example, the fact that the film insinuates that
Oedipus and Jocasta keep committing incest after having discovered their
blood relation. It would probably be more helpful to see Pasolini’s film
through the Freudian prism. At the beginning of the film the father is
portrayed as a kind of intruder in the relationship between the mother and
the son. Jocasta’s enigmatic smiles let us conclude before the end of the
film that she knows the truth (that Oedipus is her son), but does not reveal
it. Pasolini himself says that he tried to interpret the myth like a dream: “I
wanted to re-create the myth under the aspect of a dream: I wanted all the
central part of the film (which is almost the whole movie) to be a kind of
dream, and this explains the choice of costumes and settings, the general
rhythm of the work. I wanted it to be a kind of aestheticizing dream.”24
A Marxist perspective can also bring elements that complement the
film. There is an absence of bourgeois morality and the myth is located in
sub-proletarian society; MacKinnon states that Pasolini, “[…] lays
increasing stress on the need to restore an epic and mythological dimension
to life, a sense of awe and reverence to the world: a sense which, he
believes, the peasantry will sustain, though the bourgeoisie has done all in
its power to destroy it.”25 Pasolini, however, kept from the Sophoclean
character his most basic feature: Oedipus’s drive to know and to explain,
while, at the same time, he refuses to learn and to acknowledge the truth.
In his film Medea, Pasolini again is not dealing only with the ancient
play but with the whole tragic myth. Colchis in Medea is Cappadocia in
Turkey and Corinth is represented by two cities: Aleppo in Syria and Pisa
in Italy. The costumes here, as in Oedipus Rex, represent a large variety of
ethnographies, periods and styles. The music is also as ambiguous and
diverse as the cast.
For Pasolini Medea is a study of ethnography and anthropology and
the history of religions, juxtaposing the pre-rational, primitive Medea with

23
John Russell Taylor, Directors and Directions (New York: Hill & Wang, 1975),
56.
24
Pasolini, 122.
25
MacKinnon, 46.
 From Theatre to Film: The Case of Ancient Greek Tragedy 73

the rational Jason. The polarities that are in conflict are many: ideal/real,
tribalism/individualism, Dionysiac/Apollonian, Oriental/Greek, passion/reason,
and they are exemplified not only by the two main characters of the film,
Medea and Jason, but also by their countries, Colchis and Corinth. In this
film, as well as in Oedipus Rex, Pasolini has eliminated the chorus
completely; in his previous film the chorus was not replaced. In Medea the
character of the Centaur is responsible for a commentary and states many
of Pasolini’s ideas about the myth.
Pasolini is obviously not interested in making a faithful version of the
play, but instead wants to convey the myth in its universality or, in other
words, to convey it beyond any particular history and culture. The film has
been criticized because of the process by which Pasolini conveyed the
myth “though intellectually defensible, seems in practice disturbing and
arbitrary.”26 The fact is that Medea loses a lot of the richness that Oedipus
Rex had because there is no modern parallel drawn and the autobiographic
elements are missing.
According to MacKinnon, both films are offering the history of human
consciousness, which in Pasolini’s view is a series of radical transformations.
Oedipus Rex portrays primitive thought and Medea concerns a later stage
of human consciousness, when mythological thought encounters the
modern.27

4. Dassin’s Modern Myth

Jules Dassin directed two films based on ancient Greek tragedies. The first
one was produced in 1961. The film is Phaedra and is based on the
tragedy Hippolytus by Euripides. The second is A Dream of Passion,
produced in 1978, a loose adaptation of the myth of Medea.
Dassin transferred the story of Phaedra from ancient Greece to the
international business society of the sixties. The setting of the film is the
capitalist “kingdom” of Thanos Kyrilis/Theseus, Phaedra’s husband, who
rules over everyone around him. As Marianne McDonald comments, “the
gods are no longer Olympian but wealthy Greek ship owners. The fatal
horses have become horsepower; the lethal chariot, an Aston-Martin sports
car.”28
In Euripides’s tragedy Phaedra dies in the middle of the play; in the
film she remains the tragic main character until the end. Seneca and
Racine also treated the myth of Hippolytus. In Seneca’s Phaedra he
26
Taylor, 62.
27
MacKinnon, 149.
28
McDonald, 90.
74 Chapter Four

depicts Phaedra’s love for Theseus as being unfulfilled; instead, his son
attracts her. The second wrote Phèdre, and added a young princess whom
Hippolytus falls in love with, thus providing an excuse for Phaedra’s
jealousy.
Dassin’s Phaedra incorporates elements introduced both by Seneca
and Racine. First, he depicts Thanos as being too much involved with his
business and introduces Herse as the potential wife for his son Alexis. In
other words, Dassin’s Phaedra is an interpretation of the myth with all its
previous readings taken into account, including the reading of the ancient
tragedy. It would make no sense to ignore the fact that during the past
2,500 years there have been many additions to the myth, based on new
perceptions. Dassin, however, stayed fairly faithful to Euripides, to the
playwright who in all of his plays criticized the upper class, as well as the
gods and the “heroes.” Dassin chose to adapt the tragedy by presenting a
contemporary “fall of the mighty” who, in this case, were represented by
the Greek ship owners. He starkly draws the line that separates the social
classes. In one of the scenes, lower-class people dressed in black look at
the fireworks being shot off to celebrate a new ship, and intone: “They [the
rich ship owners] are powerful. They speak many languages and they
celebrate with fire in the sky.”
Dassin altered and preserved the myth. The first thing that he changed
is to render both Phaedra and Alexis/Hippolytus less innocent than as they
are depicted in the play. Phaedra is a slave of her own passion, the passion
that motivates her as, in the original play, does the character of Aphrodite;
she seduces Alexis, though he is quite willing to be her partner; then she
rejects him and returns to her husband. In the film, Phaedra has become a
middle-aged woman, a sophisticated seducer of men, except for her
husband, who has no time for her. This is the only justification that Dassin
gives for Phaedra’s actions. Phaedra is passionate towards Alexis but
nevertheless when he asks her to go with him, she refuses. It is not out of
considerations of morality; on the contrary, it is usual in her social class
for older women to seduce younger men. It is because it is too late for her
to reject the lifestyle that she has been used to. In the tragedy Phaedra
wishes to discredit Hippolytus in order to save her own dignity. But in the
film this is not the case; she just wants to have Hippolytus/ Alexis for
herself and to prevent his marriage to another woman.29
It is unsurprising that in a modern version of the play the Olympian
gods would be replaced with a more symbolic cinematic language. During
the film, Dassin gives different representations for the two rival gods of
Aphrodite and Artemis in the original play. One opposing pair is fire and
29
Ibid., 102.
 From Theatre to Film: The Case of Ancient Greek Tragedy 75

water, which are present, for example, in the fireworks for the celebration
of the ship in visual opposition to the Thames river where Phaedra throws
her ring, and also in the love scene between Phaedra and Alexis, which is a
series of shots from the fireplace, to the rain on the windows, fire to water.
Another symbolic pairing is that of the dark and the bright, which is made
easier by the fact that the film is shot in black and white and has great
lighting contrast. The same contrast is also used in the art direction and
even in the costumes. For example, Phaedra is dressed in white when she
enters Thanos’ office, a stark contrast to the lower-class woman waiting
for the news about their relatives who had been on the ship that had sunk –
they are dressed entirely in black.
The film was criticized as a melodrama that has little to do with the
Greek tragedy on which Dassin claimed to have based his film. Melina
Mercouri, who acts the part of Phaedra in the film, says: “Our judgment of
the film was that we had failed. It was an honest attempt, but finally it
became more a bourgeois drama than a tragedy.”30 Needless to say, Jules
Dassin just kept the core, the spine of the tragedy, and everything else was
transmuted to fit the modern period in which the film is set. Dassin did the
same in his other film too, in which he duplicates, in his own way, the
story of the myth of Medea.
In A Dream of Passion, a Greek actress who has a career in Hollywood
returns to Greece to appear as Medea in a theatrical production of the play.
There are a lot of arguments between the actress, Maya, and the director of
the play, as their interpretations of the myth take different directions. The
director believes that the play is about the fall of the mighty; whether
Maya in the rehearsals proposes a very feminist performance of the
character of Medea, a woman who sees herself oppressed by chauvinist
society. She, Maya, is searching for contemporary elements and modern
context. Maya agrees for press coverage reasons to meet a woman, which
the Greek newspapers had named “the Medea of Glyfada”. Her name is
Brenda Collins and she is an American in a Greek prison who, when her
husband left her for another Greek woman, murdered her three children.
Maya identifies more and more with Brenda and her performances in
the rehearsals increasingly reflect that identification. After Brenda’s
narration of the ritual that accompanied her murder of her children, Maya
remains deeply affected. In a parallel action we see Maya performing the
role of Medea at Delphi and Brenda’s remembering and re-enactment of
the murder of her children. Maya and Brenda Medea and her modern
equivalent, appear to change place. Dassin has eliminated the characters of
30
Melina Mercouri, I Was Born Greek (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1971),
158.
76 Chapter Four

the nurse and of the tutor (Pasolini had also done the same thing in his
Medea), who in the original play supply a commentary about the character
of Medea. He relies instead, for such information to be supplied to the
audience, on the relationship between the actress who plays Medea, and
the real-life modern Media because he is interested in exploring the
interaction between the myth and the contemporary.
From a cinematic point of view the film explores the contemporaneity
of the tragic myth of Medea and, at the same time, makes us hark back to
recorded theatrical performances of the play, because much of the film
consists of rehearsals on stage of the play of Medea, which are not far
from filmed theatrical performances. A Dream of Passion “illustrates how
films can activate a number of different methods of adaptation that film
criticism has often felt tempted to keep apart”.31
As an idea and in its content, the film is also rich because the
timelessness of the myth is made clear through the juxtaposition of the two
women. The most interesting thing is that we cannot distinguish which one
represents the modern Medea and which one the ancient, because they
intermingle and overlap, through the attempts of Maya to identify herself
and her theatrical character, Medea, with Brenda.
A Dream of Passion is a much more mature attempt of dealing with the
myth compared to the treatment in Dassin’s film Phaedra. According to
MacDonald, “Dassin has boldly created a new myth on the foundation of
the old and exploits the new dramatic potential of the cinema. His art
warrants a detailed study”.32

5. Epilogue
Tragedies are rich and powerful texts, which have not lost their application
to our time, but can be interpreted in different ways that can be valid now.
In other words, they are diachronic texts; they are texts with a capacity to
incorporate into an ancient text, new concepts according to the era in
which they are being re-examined and re-presented. Intertextuality is
inevitable in such cases, when the texts, which are being adapted, are so
old and have been subject, in theory and practice, to so much examination.
Tragedies have survived into the modern world as texts, not as the full
performances that they once were in classical antiquity, but strangely, the
very impossibility of recovering the orchestral and musical accompaniments
to ancient Greek tragedies has provided an opening for new aesthetic and

31
Michelakis, 65.
32
McDonald, 52.
 From Theatre to Film: The Case of Ancient Greek Tragedy 77

semiotic interpretations to be applied, given that the texts themselves,

without those accompaniments, demand something to replace precisely
what has been lost. It is also the power of the Greek tragic myths that give
their timeless character to tragedies, since they deal in depth with the
human condition. This is no doubt the reason why Euripides is more
frequently adapted than the other tragedians because he is more interested
in the human, and less concerned with the deities and supernatural
elements.
For example, in 2000 the Mexican director Arturo Ripstein directed a
film set in contemporary Mexico City, Such Is Life, in which the opening
titles claim he adapts Seneca’s Medea, which is itself an adaptation
(although the word did not exist in the time of Seneca) of Euripides’s
Medea. The film takes place in one of the seediest neighbourhoods of
Mexico City. A woman is being evicted from her house by her landlord;
she is being abandoned by her husband for her landlord’s daughter, a
woman much younger than herself. And on top of that, her husband
threatens that he will take their children away from her. Becoming
desperate and furious, with her mother’s help, she takes her revenge by
killing her own children. Although the content is based on an ancient play,
the film uses an innovative method of cinematography, with all the scenes
being shot in one take with a handheld digital camera.
When it comes to the relation between Greek tragedy and its cinematic
adaptations the questions raised usually are connected with such notions as
authenticity or fidelity.33 It is encouraging, however, that the assumption
of the inferiority of an adaptation to the original work is slowly fading.
Instead of exhausting the theoretical discussions in subject matters with
such terms as “superiority” or “inferiority”, it would be more interesting to
ask rather different questions about adaptation such as: “What makes a
text adaptable? Why some texts are frequently adapted and others are
never chosen? Where does the power of these texts derive from and how
do they motivate their own adaptations?” Answering such questions would
take a long time and would probably raise a more productive dialogue.

Bibliography
Aristotle. Poetics. Translated by Leon Golden. Florida: University Presses
of Florida, 1981.
De Romilly, Guy. La Tragedie Grecque. Paris: Presses Universitaires de
France, 1970.

33
Michelakis, 57.
78 Chapter Four

Knox, Bernard. Word and Action. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University

Press, 1979.
Leach, Edmund, ed. The Structural Study of Myth and Totemism.
Edinburgh: Tavistock Publications, 1967.
Lesky, Albin. Greek Tragedy. Translated by H.A. Frankfort. London:
Ernest Benn, 1965.
MacKinnon, Kenneth. Greek Tragedy into Film. Cranbury, N.J.:
Associated University Presses, 1986.
McDonald, Marianne. Euripides in Cinema: The Heart Made Visible.
Philadelphia: Centrum Philadelphia, 1983.
Mercouri, Melina. I Was Born Greek. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday,
1971.
Michelakis, Pantelis. Greek Tragedy on Screen. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2013.
Pasolini, Pier Paolo. Pasolini on Pasolini. Bloomington & London:
Indiana University Press, 1969.
Rachet, Guy. La Tragedie Grecque. Origine-Histoire-Development. Paris:
Payot, 1973.
Taylor, John Russell. Directors and Directions. New York: Hill & Wang,
1975.
Vernant, Jean-Pierre. Tragedy and Myth in Ancient Greece. Translated by
Janet Lloyd. Sussex: Harvest Press, 1981.
Vickers, Brian. Towards Greek Tragedy. London: Longman, 1973.
 CHAPTER FIVE

THE FILM INDUSTRY WOOS SHAKESPEARE:

THEATRICAL VERSUS CINEMATOGRAPHIC
SPACE IN THE ADAPTATIONS OF HAMLET
AND HENRY V BY KENNETH BRANAGH1

PAULA BALDWIN LIND

UNIVERSIDAD DE LOS ANDES, CHILE

The play-as-text can be performed in a space,

but the play-as-event belongs to that space, and
makes the space perform as much as it makes
actors perform. To eliminate the dichotomy of
play and space is no easy task, however.2

Elizabethan dramatists worked and played with the notion of space when
writing their scripts and at the moment of performance so as to create a
sense of place and space on page and stage. They probably had in mind the
specific characteristics of theatre companies, the type of audience, and the
constraints and resources of the stages where their plays were represented.
Even though Shakespeare and his playwright-contemporaries shared a set
of generic conventions, the ways in which play and space were related in
performance varied not only from one playwright to the other, but also
from play to play, from season to season, and, certainly, from stage to
stage. Therefore, as the epigraph by David Wiles indicates, the illusion of
space created in a play-as-event is unique –in its relationship to the

1
This chapter is part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso Internacional
de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, 9-10 October
2013.
2
David Wiles, A Short History of Western Performance Space (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2003), 1.
80 Chapter Five

particular space where it is performed– and unrepeatable. It goes further

then to posit that when adapting a Shakespearean text to the big screen, a
film director faces the challenge of adapting a story with its plot and
conflicts, yet one that carries with it a spatial performance dimension that
is almost impossible to reproduce, as well as Elizabethan theatrical
practices and a cultural background that he/she needs to examine and
embrace before starting the process of transference from theatrical script to
visual medium.
Despite the fact that the main raw material for adapting a play to the
screen is ready, as the film director accounts for both the story and its
written script, the complexities of adaptation from theatre to film are
manifold and open up the debate, firstly, on whether it is possible to adapt
a Shakespearean play or not, and secondly, if it is done, how to do it better
in terms of fidelity to the text and, particularly, in aiming to reproduce its
inherent spatial performance dimension, which is essential for its meaning,
as I will argue along this chapter.
It becomes obvious that in order to be able to discuss these issues and
give a possible answer to the questions already raised, it becomes
necessary to delimit the notions of theatrical space, Shakespearean theatre
and Shakespearean script, so as to determine whether the examples of
Kenneth Branagh’s adaptations of Hamlet and Henry V are successful in
their use and transference of theatrical space to cinema.

1. What Are We Talking about when Talking

about Space?
In his insightful analysis of the poetics of space, Gaston Bachelard, the
French philosopher, argues that any space can be “read”; it means
something because it can become a world in itself when it is experienced,
thus, it is never an inert box.3 In a similar approach to the relationship
between space and experience, Michel de Certeau makes an interesting
distinction between place and space, suggesting that a place is “the order
(of whatever kind) in accord with which elements are distributed in
relationships of coexistence.”4 A place usually indicates a stable location
whereas, as the author argues, a space “is composed of intersections of
mobile elements. It is in a sense actuated by the ensemble of movements

3
Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space. The Classic Look at How we Experience
Intimate Places (New York: 1994), 37-47.
4
Michel de Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life (Berkeley, Los Angeles, and
London: University of California Press, 1984), 117.
 The Film Industry Woos Shakespeare 81

deployed within it.”5 Space is created and delimited not only by its
physical boundaries, but also through the different ways in which it is
experienced. Consequently, de Certeau concludes that a space is a
“practiced place”6; in other words, a place that people have already
experienced or, better yet, in which they have already lived multiple and
diverse experiences.
Regardless of the fact that his phenomenology is not directly related to
literature, another French philosopher, Henri Lefebvre, contributes to the
study of space, as he sets out the basic notions of what spaces are and how
they are given cultural meaning. His notion of space is that of a relative
construct/concept that can be built through subjective experiences. Among
other things, Lefebvre analyses three dimensions or aspects of space:
“perceived space”: space perceived through the social encounters of
everyday life; “conceived space”, more conventional, used by cartographers,
city planners, etc.; and “lived space”, created by the imagination and
maintained by the Arts and Literature7. The latter can be equivalent to de
Certeau’s “practiced space” and can also illustrate the way in which
theatrical space was understood and recreated by early modern playwrights
in England. It seems as though the space in a play comes to life when
actors represent it and the audience decodes it. The practice of movements,
voice and gestures that acting conveys, as well as stage properties, and the
audience’s interpretation of all these elements, transfigures set locations or
places of a play into “lived spaces”, be they cities, battlefields, islands, or
small closets in a lady’s chamber.
Such scholars as Andrew Gurr and Mariko Ichikawa agree on the fact
that “Elizabethan staging was symbolic rather than realistic. Audiences
had to work at visualizing the spectacles the words described.”8 In the
same line, the famous English director, Peter Brook, adds that the
Elizabethan stage “was a neutral open platform – just a place with some
doors – and so it enabled the dramatist effortlessly to whip the spectator
through an unlimited succession of illusions, covering, if he chose, the
entire physical world.”9 This “empty space”, which Brook equates to the
early modern stage is, according to him, what offered dramatists “one of

5
Ibid., 117.
6
Ibid.
7
Henri Lefebvre, The Production of Space (Oxford, UK and Cambridge, MA:
Blackwell, 1991), 10-11.
8
Andrew Gurr and Mariko Ichikawa. Staging in Shakespeare’s Theatres (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2000), 1.
9
Peter Brook, The Empty Space (New York: Touchstone, 1996), 86.
82 Chapter Five

its greatest freedoms.”10 Rather than a spatial restriction, bareness becomes

an opportunity to express with words what cannot be seen onstage.
Brook also describes the theatre as “a very special place. It is like a
magnifying glass, and also like a reducing lens […]”11, a notion that has
been developed further by Stanley Vincent Longman in his thought-
provoking chapter about theatrical space. The scholar states that the
Elizabethan stage is, at the same time, a confined and a fixed space, as
well as a fluid one because within its physical limits, it expands and
contracts depending on the focus given to different actions. The fictional
world is all there, encapsulated by the stage, but this does not prevent the
same fictional world from extending beyond the confines of the stage. The
fluid stage, argues Longman, “deliberately shatters them [space limitations],
so that the time and place of the action are in constant flux. We are now
here, now there. The fluid stage is essentially a platea, a generalized acting
area. The principle behind the platea is the collaboration of the audience in
ascribing an imaginary place to the acting area.”12 It is as if the theatrical
exerted a kind of mediation between the space of the stage and the space
that is represented, which results in an imagined or virtual space.13
According to Longman, “the charm of the fluid stage derives from its
playing upon our imagination. The stage, the actors, the properties do not
disguise themselves, but simultaneously, they conjure up in our
imagination a whole other world as we watch [,]”14 so that theatrical space
impinges on the audience’s collective consciousness and creates a sense of
place and space.
Even though each Elizabethan theatrical company possessed a
repository of properties such as stools and beds for Othello, chests for The
Merchant of Venice, and trunks for Cymbeline, to mention but a few
examples, staging was kept basic and minimalistic, so much so that the
stage was almost bare; words evoked the images. Indeed, Gurr points out
that the concept of audience, from the Latin audire (to hear), is the most
appropriate term for the London theatre public from the sixteenth century,
10
Ibid., 86.
11
Ibid., 96.
12
Stanley Vincent Longman, “Fixed, floating and fluid stages”, in Themes in
Drama 9: The Theatrical Space, ed. James Redmond (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1987), 157, as cited in Baldwin, 191.
13
Ideas on Elizabethan stage space were developed by the author in her doctoral
thesis before the publication of this chapter. Cf. Paula Baldwin Lind, “Looking for
Privacy in Shakespeare: Woman’s Place and Space in a Selection of Plays and
Early Modern Texts” (PhD unpublished thesis, The Shakespeare Institute,
University of Birmingham, 2015), 191.
14
Ibid., 157, as cited in Baldwin, 191.
 The Film Industry Woos Shakespeare 83

as it focuses on the fact that plays were written for them to be heard rather
than seen.15 He also adds that for Shakespeare’s time, the alternative term
“spectator”, from the Latin spectare (to see or watch), did not fully
represent the characteristics of the public attending such performances at
the Globe or other theatres in the city. Therefore, in order to adapt
Shakespeare one must necessarily know how to listen.
If the theatre/film director does not understand the dynamics of the
Elizabethan theatrical space, any play from the period will hardly be well
recreated and adapted. On the contrary, I would say that it is in this aspect
where one of Hollywood’s failed attempts to conquer Shakespeare lies, as
film directors tend to make the mistake of filling the screen with images
that offer no room for the public/audience to imagine and interpret the
script, an integral aspect of Shakespearean plays. Moreover, due to the fact
that theatrical space and cinematographic space operate in two
ontologically different media, a film director should consider that when
adapting a piece of drama by Shakespeare he should take into account its
very specific conditions of representation. This is not to say that he/she
needs to reproduce those conditions in the film version, but that it is
fundamental to keep the game between play and space ascribed to Wiles
that was mentioned at the beginning of this chapter. In other words, while
a theatrical performance puts words into action in order to tell a story and
to give a sense of place and space, a film records images to tell that same
story, thus employing a different narrative system in which the
performance is not live and there is no direct connection with the
audience. The adaptation from drama to film involves, as Sarah Hatchuel
argues, “a shift from one enunciative system to another. Given its verbal
nature, theatrical enunciation is generally considered to be more able to
‘tell’, whereas screen enunciation is usually thought to be more able to
‘show’ through the semiotic diversity of images and sounds it can
convey.”16 If the film director leaves no room for the interaction between
play and space; that is to say, for the audience to imagine and conjure up
images which make reference to locations and spaces, then he misses one
element that is considerably meaningful for the interpretation of a
Shakespearean script: not everything is shown, but imagined.

15
Gurr and Ichikawa, 8.
16
Sarah Hatchuel, “Leading the Gaze: From Showing to Telling in Kenneth
Branagh’s Henry V and Hamlet”, Early Modern Literary Studies 6.1 (May, 2000),
n.3: 1-22 <URL: http://purl.oclc.org/emls/06-1/hatchbra.htm>.
84 Chapter Five

2. Some Characteristics of Early Modern Stages

and Shakespearean Plays in Relation to Space
Scholars such as Rex Gibson argue that “Shakespeare wrote his plays to be
performed, to be brought to life on stage and before an audience [,]”17 a
statement that David Scott Kastan reinforces when he explains that
Shakespeare “wrote his plays for the theatre and not for a reading public;
they were scripts to be acted and not plays to be read.”18 Given this, it
might seem as though adapting a Shakespearean drama is an easy task.
Technically speaking, it would be a matter of placing different cameras
onstage and shooting the performance from different angles, but the
process of adapting a Shakespearean play is much more complex because,
as Gabriel Egan suggests, Shakespeare could have written his scripts for
specific stages.19
Research carried out by Andrew Gurr, Mariko Ichikawa, and Stephen
Mullaney20, to mention but a few scholars, shows that the construction of
several and diverse theatre halls characterized part of the cultural
development during the early modern period in England. By 1600 there
were more than fourteen theatres inside and outside the walls of the City
of London.21 Shakespeare’s plays were performed in public theatres,
usually the Globe, during the summer, and in private playhouses –mainly
the Blackfriars– in winter22, apart from some performances in court
venues. According to Egan, The Winter’s Tale and Cymbeline23 could have
been composed for the stage of the Blackfriars, which he and Gurr
describe as a room where the playing space was a rectangle 66 feet by 46
feet (20 m x 14 m). Even though the stage ran across the full width of one

17
Rex Gibson, Teaching Shakespeare (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1998), 7.
18
David Scott Kastan, Shakespeare and the Book (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2001), 6.
19
Gabriel Egan, “Blackfriars”, in The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare, ed.
Michael Dobson and Stanley Wells (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 48.
20
Stephen Mullaney, The Place of the Stage: License, Play, and Power in
Renaissance England (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1988).
21
Andrew Gurr, Playgoing in Shakespeare’s London, 3rd ed. (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2004), 14-17.
22
Tiffany Stern, “Text, Playhouse and London”, in Making Shakespeare: From
Stage to Page (London: Routledge, 2004), 29.
23
These plays were also performed at the Globe, probably with some technical
adaptations. Egan indicates that the Chamberlain’s Men and later the King’s Men
used the Globe for their performances between 1599 and 1608; Cf. Egan, 165.
 The Film Industry Woos Shakespeare 85

of the short sides, its usable width would have been reduced to less than 30
feet (9 m) because there were spectators’ boxes at the sides.24
Each of these theatres had its own specific architectural characteristics:
a round or polygonal building in the case of the Globe, and smaller
structures with curved galleries round the rectilinear auditorium in the
Blackfriars.25 The Globe did not only have an open roof (as the new Globe
does today), but was also a bigger space; consequently, it could house
more playgoers who could either remain standing in the yard forming a U
shape around the stage or pay more and be seated in one of the galleries
arranged in three different levels. While at the Blackfriars, the audience
was mostly in front of the stage26 and entirely seated to see a play in
candlelight, the open-air Globe offered daylight performances. Even
though there are very few records of most of the practices of these
playhouses íapart from the information provided by Phillip Henslowe in
his diary27, accounts written by witnesses to some of the performances,
and from a few comments the characters make in the playsí it can be
inferred from them that play and space formed an organic unity in
Shakespearean drama. As a consequence, playhouse size, shape, and
design should have mattered to Shakespeare, not only during the
performance of his plays, but also in the creative process, as he knew the
possibilities that London stages offered to him.
According to Tiffany Stern, “from 1609 onwards, Shakespeare’s plays
seem to have been written with the indoors Blackfriars theatre in mind
[;]”28 nevertheless, rather than becoming a restriction, this relationship
between play and particular space means, on the one hand, that
Shakespeare could have composed a play for a specific space; on the
other, that the open and flexible nature of his scripts made them prone to
be adapted for performance in a different place, as Stern suggests when
she explains that a play that worked “within a small artificially lit theatre

24
Egan, 48; Gurr, 32.
25
Gurr, 14-26: amphitheatre playhouses or public theatres; 26-38: hall playhouses
or private theatres.
26
Tiffany Stern suggests that although the Blackfriars was in a rectilinear room,
the theatre seems to have retained the properties of a round theatre with curved
galleries. See Stern, 29.
27
W.W. Greg, ed., Henslowe’s Diary (London: A. H. Bullen, 1904),
https://archive.org/details/cu31924026121305 (accessed July, 2014). Henslowe’s
diary is a valuable source of information on the theatrical history of the
Elizabethan period and the staging of plays at that time. It records, among other
things, payments to writers, box office takings, and purchase of costumes and of
stage properties.
28
Stern, 29.
86 Chapter Five

[could have been] adapted to work outdoors on a large naturally lit

stage.”29 The reverse process is not so clear, as it is unlikely that plays,
which included major battles, for example, could have been performed in
an enclosed small playhouse.30
Adaptation íboth textual31 and performativeí was a feature of
Shakespearean drama in its very origins. Shakespeare’s presence as
author, actor, and director during rehearsals could have facilitated this
process, as he could provide all of the instructions needed for his company
(first, the Lord Chamberlain’s Men and, from 1603, the King’s Men)
regarding the meaning of words in the script, the rhythm and tone to
express them, as well as the directions for movements –entrances and
exits– onstage. However, theatre and film directors willing to adapt a
Shakespearean script will be faced with the difficulty of not finding much
of this information, at least not explicitly, in the text. Examples of the
process of adaptation of a Shakespearean script can be observed in two of
the many plays that the British actor and film director Kenneth Branagh
has adapted to the big screen: Hamlet and Henry V.
In the famous nunnery scene (3.1.90-160)32 when Hamlet meets
Ophelia and they break their engagement, neither the text from the First
Folio of 1623, nor the versions from the first and second Quartos –of 1603
and 1604 respectively– provide stage directions that signal how the space
for that specific scene should be organized or how the characters should
move within it. Even prior to that encounter and until Hamlet sees Ophelia
by the end of the “to be or not to be” soliloquy, the only stage direction is:
Enter Hamlet. A very similar situation occurs in highly dramatic moments
such as the eve of Saint Crispin’s day when Henry V delivers his patriotic
and heartfelt speech to his soldiers (4.3.18-67).33 Both texts –Quarto 1
from 1600 and the First Folio– only indicate the entrance of the king:
Enter the King. In neither case do we find a detailed description of the
space where the actions take place. As readers, and probably as the
Elizabethan playgoers attending the theatre, our spatial imagination is
likely to conjure up a semi-private space as the setting for the young

29
Ibid.
30
Ibid., 30.
31
Given the focus of this chapter, I’m not going to develop here the evidence on
textual adaptations or revisions of Shakespeare’s plays by Shakespeare himself
and, after his death, by a large number of editors.
32
William Shakespeare, Hamlet, eds. Ann Thompson and Neil Taylor, The Arden
Shakespeare, Third Series (London: Thomson, 2006; repr. 2007).
33
William Shakespeare, King Henry V, ed. T. W. Craik, The Arden Shakespeare,
Third Series (London: Thomson, 1995; repr. 2002).
 The Film Industry Woos Shakespeare 87

couple in the tragedy of Hamlet or to envision a battlefield attested with

English soldiers as the background for the speech of the king in Henry V,
William Shakespeare’s history play.
The accurate and detailed research on stage directions in Shakespeare’s
plays carried out by Alan Dessen and others34 has shown that “the major
role of these signals is traffic control ígetting actors and properties on and
off the stageí so that the most widely used term by far is enter. […] When
one moves beyond enter-exit and traffic control, problems increase
exponentially, for readers regularly encounter silence when they most
want specifics about the onstage action […].”35 In fact, as Dessen also
points out in relation to space description, a large majority of the extant
stage directions do not describe locations, but usually only specify the
place where the entrance of a character or property is to be made (above;
below; at several doors; in a prison, shop, or study).36 Because
Shakespeare wrote his plays to be performed by his acting company, stage
directions are very scant in the first printed versions; moreover, very often
these indications of location and/or descriptions of places are embedded in
the dialogues; thus, they usually become sites of contested interpretation
as their presence or absence does not only touch authorial cruxes, but also
may influence the way in which directors set up a scene.
According to Mariko Ichikawa, “stage directions are instructions
written for actors and backstage people”37; therefore, they should be
entirely functional in theatrical terms. In order to explain this, the scholar

34
Alan C. Dessen and Leslie Thomson, A Dictionary of Stage Directions in
English Drama 1580-1642 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), Alan
C. Dessen, Recovering Shakespeare’s Theatrical Vocabulary (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1995), Alan C. Dessen, “Staging Space and Place in
English Renaissance Drama” (unpublished conference given at the Shakespeare
Association of America, San Diego, 2007), 1, cited by kind permission of the
author. Most of the material from this conference has been included in “Stage
Directions and the Theatre Historian”, in A Handbook on Early Modern Theatre,
ed. Richard Dutton (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011); Alan C. Dessen,
“The Body of Stage Directions,” Shakespeare Studies 29 (2001): 27-35, Ann
Pasternak Slater, Shakespeare the Director (Sussex: The Harvester Press, 1982),
Andrew Gurr and Mariko Ichikawa, Staging in Shakespeare’s Theatres, Oxford
Shakespeare Topics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000); Tiffany Stern,
Making Shakespeare: From Stage to Page, Accents on Shakespeare (London and
New York: Routledge, 2004).
35
Alan C. Dessen, “Staging Space and Place in English Renaissance Drama”, 1.
36
Ibid., 1.
37
Mariko Ichikawa, The Shakespearean Stage Space (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2013), 17.
88 Chapter Five

resorts to Richard Hosley’s seminal article on the use and function of the
gallery above the stage in Elizabethan drama in which he clearly
distinguishes two kinds of stage directions: those that “usually refer not to
dramatic fiction but rather to theatrical structure or equipment: upon the
stage, at another door […]”, which he calls “theatrical”; and those
indications that “conversely, are ‘fictional’ in that they usually refer […]
to dramatic fiction: upon the walls, before the gates […].”38 The latter are
more literary and dramatic and, as the critic points out, may “occasionally
furnish clues to the stage for which they were written.”39 However, in
reference to actions, stage directions can be both theatrical and fictional, a
fact that, on the one hand, complicates the work of theatre and film
directors alike when taking adaptation decisions, and, on the other,
provides them with an open and malleable text.
In the case of Shakespeare, what this dual nature of stage directions
makes clear is that, as Lukas Erne argues, “Shakespeare directs his stage
directions partly at his fellow actors by locating the action within their
theatrical structure and partly at his readers ‘facing a page.’”40 Therefore,
these visual codes mediate stage action and help readers to imagine spaces,
and thereby better visualise the performance of a specific script. Their
explicit or implicit presence guides the reader, the actor, and the director,
whether onstage or during film shooting. Moreover, according to Tim
Fitzpatrick, “early modern playwrights, actors, and audiences shared a
sophisticated sense of space and place in performance”41; that is to say,
that staging conventions were well known not only to the playwrights, but
also to the actors and to the audience.
However, this is only one of the difficulties faced by directors when
endeavouring to adapt a Shakespearean script to film. To an extent, their
job becomes similar to that of modern editors who need to insert stage
directions into the text in order to make it more legible, as well as fill the
gap of the Elizabethan empty and flexible space of representation with
screen images. Evidently, the idea is not to recreate the same space, but to
capture the relationship between play and space, between theatrical space
and the illusion or representation of space, that is, I think, inherent to

38
Richard Hosley, “The Gallery over the Stage in the Public Playhouse of
Shakespeare’s Time”, Shakespeare Quarterly 8, no.1 (1957), 16-17.
39
Ibid., 17.
40
Lukas Erne, “Editing Stage Action”, in Shakespeare’s Modern Collaborators
(New York: Continuum Books, 2008), 83.
41
Tim Fitzpatrick, Playwright, Space and Place in Early Modern Performance:
Shakespeare and Company. Studies in Performance and Early Modern Drama
(Surrey: Ashgate, 2011), 247.
 The Film Industry Woos Shakespeare 89

Shakespearean drama. In addition to this spatial issue, texts such as

Hamlet add complexity to the process because the story is very long and
includes soliloquys expressing the characters’ inner feelings and thoughts
–especially by the young prince– in a vertiginous succession of actions
within a plot in which conflicts are not resolved until the end. Therefore,
with Shakespeare, the adaptation work will always imply a choice, as
DeWitt Bodeen argues in his influential article: “adapting literary works to
film is, without a doubt, a creative undertaking, but the task requires a kind
of selective interpretation, along with the ability to recreate and sustain an
established mood.”42 In other words, the adaptation of a Shakespearean
script does not only imply editing and often cutting the text, but also
editing stage action –with its associate space– for the film production.

3. Case Studies
In order to test the Shakespearean categories previously discussed in
relation to space, I have chosen as case studies two adaptations by
Kenneth Branagh: Henry V (1989) and Hamlet (1996). Because of the
length of each of the plays, I will focus my analysis in a selection of
moments/scenes with their equivalent versions in the films, as I think they
illustrate the overall argument of the chapter: that in order to succeed in
the adaptation of Shakespeare to film it is essential to keep the relationship
between play and space in the sense I have described in the previous
sections.
In Hamlet, the ghost’s first encounter with Hamlet is crucial. The
deceased father reveals the truth about his murder and Claudio’s betrayal
to the young prince. This, in turn, will trigger all of Hamlet’s conflicts and
shall move the action up until the end of the play. In Shakespeare’s text,
the stage direction reads: “Enter GHOST” (1.4), then Horatio announces
that it is coming and Hamlet becomes horrified. In the following scene,
they finally meet face to face and the Ghost starts unfolding the real story
of his death after vividly describing his situation: “My hour is almost
come / When I to sulph’rous and tormenting flames / Must render up
myself […]” (1.5.3-4). Even though, to an extent, in the previous scene
Hamlet has foreseen and imagined the appearance of the spirit using
similar terrible images when he asks: “Be thou a spirit of health or goblin
damn’d, / Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell […]”
42
DeWitt Bodeen, “The Adapting Art”, Films in Review 14, no.6 (June-July 1963),
349, as cited in Brian McFarlane, “Conrad, Griffith, and ‘Seeing’”, in Novel to
Film: An Introduction to the Theory of Adaptation (Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1996), 7.
90 Chapter Five

(1.4.40-41), the same scene in Branagh’s adaptation44 is almost surreal and

filled with special effects. A ghost with bulging eyes, voiceover in the
background, fumes coming from the ground, and lightning in the middle
of a forest. It is as if the director decided to incorporate every possible
image from the scene in a few minutes, leaving almost no room for
imagination. In fact, critics such as Michael A. Anderegg consider that
Branagh “does not want anything to remain unexplained or mysterious,
and his penchant for effect can be ludicrous: the earth cracking open […]
is only one instance of his reach for the obvious.”45 Taking into account
other productions by Branagh, Samuel Crowl reinterprets Pauline Kael’s
review of Henry V, especially her idea of flamboyant realism, a style that
she describes as a combination of extravagance, “with a cool, intelligent
understanding of his Shakespearean material.”46 According to Crowl, the
British director is an exuberant realist whose distinctive trademark is to
make visually inviting films that quickly establish a vivid atmosphere. I
would add that another feature of Branagh’s filmography, specifically in
the case of Hamlet, is the symbolic aura that is present throughout the
whole film; in other words, the amount of symbols he uses to fill spaces.
As I have mentioned before, Shakespeare does not provide a stage
direction with a description of the place where Hamlet’s meeting with
Ophelia takes place in the nunnery scene (3.1.90-160), but rather indicates
the prince’s entrance at the beginning of it before the “To be or not to be”
soliloquy. After their greeting, Ophelia immediately returns Hamlet his
remembrances and he starts questioning her about her honour and honesty.
As readers, or as part of the audience, we may imagine a room in Elsinore
castle where the couple is alone or in relative privacy. We may also
conjure up the spaces they mention during their exchanges: the nunnery
Hamlet wants her to go to (“Get thee to a nunnery”, 3.1.120), Polonius’s
home, as Ophelia declares in reply to Hamlet’s question (“At home, my
lord”, 3.1.130), and more abstract spaces such as earth and heaven, which
Hamlet opposes as two alternative destinations for those who, like him,
have committed offences: “What should such fellows as I do crawling
between earth and heaven?” (3.1.126-27).

44
William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, DVD, Directed by Kenneth Branagh. UK:
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Castle Rock Entertainment, 1996, 35:12-39:04.
45
Michael A. Anderegg, “Branagh and the Souls of Ken”, in Cinematic
Shakespeare (USA: Rowman & Littlefield, 2004), 119.
46
Pauline Kael, Movie Love (New York, 1991), 216, as cited in Samuel Crowl,
“Flamboyant Realist: Kenneth Branagh”, in The Cambridge Companion to
Shakespeare on Film, ed. Russell Jackson (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2000), 223.
 The Film Industry Woos Shakespeare 91

In Branagh’s version, this scene47, as Crowl observes, sparkles with all

the lights on; “its key physical image is a series of mirrored doors which
line the walls of Claudius’s court.”48 First, staring at himself in front of the
mirrors, Hamlet (Kenneth Branagh) looks at his reflection, as if trying to
unveil his inner dark and weary soul through outer light. Then, he
approaches Ophelia (Kate Winslet) who is standing some distance away
and quite violently questions her about beauty and honesty, literally
crushing her face against the mirrors so as to find out truth. In addition to
the mirrors, the glittering lamps and the white and black chequered marble
floor fill the space in such a way that there’s no place for the imagination
to work out the spatial features of such place.
Why does Branagh fill the room with objects, sounds and lights?
Clearly, his spatial option is symbolic. Mirrors, in this case, are not
introduced as mere decoration, but constitute the director’s interpretation
of a specific space for this scene, which is coherent with the symbolism
present in the whole film. According to Michael Ferber, “[t]he symbolism
of mirrors depends not only on what things cause the reflection ínature,
God, a book, dramaí but also on what one sees in them íoneself, the truth,
the ideal, illusion.”49 Hamlet, indeed, is not only confirming the truth he
has been revealed by his father’s ghost, but also wants Ophelia, the ideal
beloved, to tell him the truth about herself and her father’s plans. The
mirror, as J. E. Cirlot points out, “has been thought of as ambivalent. It is a
surface which reproduces images and in a way contains and absorbs
them.”50 Branagh’s Hamlet plays with the contradiction he seems to find
between the notions of beauty and honesty. He creates a symbolic space to
frame this scene and the rest of the scenes in the film and in so doing, he
keeps the dynamics between play and space. Nevertheless, in his
recreation or rewriting of the Shakespearean script, he leaves little work
for the imagination to conjure up a sense of place and space, which is so
characteristically Shakespearean. It is evident that a theatrical adaptation
to film, among a number of other elements, involves spatial changes –
obviously, the film’s audience will not see the same than Elizabethan
Londoners saw onstage– but the British director’s visual interpretation of
Hamlet can become over-elaborated at times. If, as Linda Hutcheon and
Siobhan O’Flynn suggest, adaptation is a double process of

47
William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, 01:32:26-01:38:45.
48
Crowl, 227.
49
Michael Ferber, A Dictionary of Literary Symbols, 2nd ed. (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2007), 126.
50
J. E. Cirlot, A Dictionary of Symbols, trans. Jack Sage, 2nd ed. (London:
Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1971), 211.
92 Chapter Five

reinterpretation and recreation51, then, Branagh has achieved his goal, but
he has sometimes left aside the work of spectators, as he seems to show
everything within the fixed margins of the screen.
Let us briefly examine the case of Henry V. The film had an
unexpected success and opened the doors towards other adaptations of
Shakespeare’s plays. As with Hamlet’s character, Branagh played the role
of the king and managed to transmit the idea of Henry as England’s hero, a
feature that is sometimes ambiguous in Shakespeare’s play. As Crowl
explains, “his Henry V is faulted for presenting an emotional and
sympathetic portrait of the king in the film’s anti-war landscape […].”52 In
the fourth act of the play, Henry delivers his patriotic speech to his soldiers
before the battle of Agincourt against the French. He brings along words
filled with images that allude to future situations that have an impact on
the soldiers’ inner world, a space that could not be seen on the Elizabethan
stage unless characters expressed their thoughts and feelings through a
soliloquy or monologue.

[…]
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers.
For he today that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition.
And gentlemen in England now abed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.
(4.3.60-67)53

Henry V is empathic. Despite being the king, he seems to be one more

soldier about to die in battle. He encourages his countrymen to fight for
England and promises them that their names will remain in the memory of
generation after generation; their prize will be everlasting honour.
Shakespeare’s audiences could not see the camp, but knew that the English
would fight against the enemy the following day and could feel the
atmosphere.
Branagh got it right here54 because instead of moving the camera
across the English camp for us to see it, he focuses on abstract spaces or,

51
Linda Hutcheon and Siobhan O’Flynn, A Theory of Adaptation, 2nd ed. (Oxford:
Routledge, 2012), 8.
52
Crowl, 236.
53
William Shakespeare, King Henry V, The Arden Shakespeare, Third Series, ed.
T.W. Craik (London: Thomson Learning, 2002).
 The Film Industry Woos Shakespeare 93

in Lefebvre’s terms, lived spaces created by the imagination. Taking Lorne

Buchman’s idea of the action/reaction structure proper to film, Hatchuel
argues that the close-ups of the various reactions of the soldiers to their
king emphasise the different points of view and create “a space unknown
in the theatre: the spectator has the opportunity not only to look through
the eyes of the characters”55, but also, in Buchman’s words, to “travel the
intimate space between those eyes.”56
There are other good decisions, I think, in Branagh’s spatial choices in
Henry V. In the film, the scene when the king is left alone with Katherine
(and Alice) to convince her to marry him is set in an almost empty room in
the French castle57. There is first a general plane that shows a central table,
a tapestry at the back, chairs, and a window at one side through which
some light comes into the place. However, almost immediately, the camera
zooms in, giving way to characters’ close-ups in a shift that inevitably
immerses us in the dialogue between the king and the future queen.
Likewise in Shakespeare’s history play, in Branagh’s film language
creates the atmosphere: a combination of wooing, political interests, and
comic exchanges. No one could deny that Branagh is extremely faithful to
Shakespeare’s language; he understands it and knows its exact meaning,
so much so that critics such as Crowl argue that “Branagh’s Shakespeare
films are unique in their attention to language […] with signature moments
in each film establishing its tone, atmosphere, camera style and
interpretive approach […].”58 Moreover, he is able to reproduce the
humorous effect of listening to Katherine trying to pronounce English
properly: “Pardonnez-moi, I cannot tell vat is ‘like me’” (5.2.108-9, bold
letters are mine), and to Henry cleverly arranging words to convince her of
his love: “An angel is like you, Kate, and you are like an angel” (5.2.110-
11). But what might this whole episode have to do with the representation
of spaces, apart from the room where the action takes place?
Spaces in Shakespeare go beyond the physicality of place; in de
Certeau’s and Lefebvre’s perspective, they would be experienced/practised
and lived spaces. Both in the play and in the film, Henry’s attitude is that
of a conqueror. He does not only woo Katherine like a man, but he wants
to conquer her as if she were a territory that he, the king, must win for

54
William Shakespeare’s Henry V, DVD, directed by Kenneth Branagh (UK:
Universal Pictures, 2002), 01:31:17-01:33:03.
55
Hatchuel, n. 4.
56
Lorne Buchman, Still in Movement: Shakespeare on Screen (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1991), 25, as cited in Hatchuel, n.4.
57
William Shakespeare’s Henry V, 02:02:40-0:2.10:07.
58
Crowl, 228.
94 Chapter Five

England. Therefore, he develops different language strategies to break

down the walls of her heart and be able to establish his settlement there. In
a symbolic way, not only Shakespeare, but also Branagh represent through
words the physical union in marriage as symbolizing the political union of
England and France.

4. Conclusion
Undoubtedly, Branagh is extremely careful to reproduce the Shakespearean
text in his adaptations to the big screen; however, a “good” Shakespearean
film is not only achieved by its fidelity to the text, but also, rather, through
the understanding of the Shakespearean poetics of space. Both the
dramatic and the cinematographic script tell a story, which in the case of
Hamlet and Henry V, the British director completely reproduces; yet the
difference lies in that Shakespearean plays imitate reality by means of
words and cinema does the same through images. This might seem
obvious, but it is often complex.
According to Judit Pieldner, in cinema scenes flow at great speed59;
both in a film and in a performed scene from one of Shakespeare’s plays,
we can easily and abruptly be transported from a battlefield to a discussion
in a palace hall and vice versa. However, the difference is that in cinema
there is no physical interaction between the actors and the audience as we
find in the English early modern theatre. In fact, Hatchuel argues that
“while the architecture of Elizabethan theatres allowed the spectators to
see the action from different angles, cinema offers a single frontal
viewpoint, and, through editing and camera moves, mandates how the
action will be seen.”60 On screen we merely see a perspective of space and
this very same perspective has already been framed by one spectator,
namely, the film director; therefore, our experience of space is mediated:
we see what the director has indicated that the camera should show, so
much so, that one might say that theatre and cinema imply different modes
of reception and perception of space.61
There is a great difference between hearing ías sixteenth-century
Londoners didí, and seeing, as modern spectators do. The Elizabethan
“lived”, “experienced” and “shared” space is not the same as the space we

59
Judit Pieldner, “Space Construction in Adaptations of Hamlet”, Acta
Universitatis Sapientiae - Philologica 4, no. 1 (2012): 43-58.
http://www.acta.sapientia.ro/acta-philo/C4-1/Philo41-4.pdf (accessed June 1,
2014).
60
Hatchuel, nn. 4-5.
61
Pieldner, 46.
 The Film Industry Woos Shakespeare 95

watch on screen. The demands for the Shakespearean audience to imagine

public/private, present/past, real/imaginary spaces, and the work of the
spectators watching Shakespearean film adaptations stand at two very
different levels. The former had to decode language in order to imagine
spaces, whereas the latter must watch images so as to understand where
the action is taking place. If the director adapting Shakespeare does not
take into account the particular configuration of space within the plays, the
film version runs the risk of being saturated with images that try to fill
every empty space instead of leaving some to be filled by the imagination.
Branagh manages to use space in a symbolic way, but he sometimes
exceeds in the juxtaposition of images in the Shakespearean text. With
Shakespearean adaptations, the work of the director is always a challenge,
as he needs to rewrite the story and recreate it beyond the mere filming of
a theatrical performance. Other than transmitting the story and its
conflicts, the work of the director consists of representing certain notion of
space by precisely filling an indeterminate space with images and symbols
that do not prevent the natural flexibility and flow of the Elizabethan
stage, a feature that Peter Brook considers one of its greatest liberties, as
we have mentioned before.62 If the film industry wants to woo
Shakespeare and finally conquer him for the big screen, film directors
must make of space their ally rather than their rival; they should know and
understand Shakespearean poetics of space. In other words, they should let
the film version develop in a fluid space, thus allowing it –in Brook’s
words– “to sing, live and breathe in an empty space.”63

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Gurr, Andrew, and Mariko Ichikawa. Staging in Shakespeare’s Theatres.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.
 The Film Industry Woos Shakespeare 97

Hatchuel, Sarah. “Leading the Gaze: From Showing to Telling in Kenneth

Branagh’s Henry V and Hamlet”, Early Modern Literary Studies 6.1
(May, 2000): 1-22
<URL: http://purl.oclc.org/emls/06-1/hatchbra.htm>.
Hosley, Richard. “The Gallery over the Stage in the Public Playhouse of
Shakespeare’s Time”, Shakespeare Quarterly 8, no.1 (1957): 15-31.
Hutcheon, Linda, and Siobhan O’Flynn. A Theory of Adaptation, 2nd ed.
Oxford: Routledge, 2012.
Ichikawa, Mariko. The Shakespearean Stage Space. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2013.
Jackson, Russell. The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Film. 2nd
ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.
Kael, Pauline. Movie Love. New York, 1991.
Kastan, David Scott. Shakespeare and the Book. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2001.
Lefebvre, Henri. The Production of Space, trans. Donald Nicholson-Smith.
Oxford, U.K. & Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1991.
Longman, Stanley Vincent. “Fixed, floating and fluid stages.” In Themes
in Drama 9: The Theatrical Space, edited by James Redmond, 151-
160. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987.
McFarlane, Brian. “Conrad, Griffith, and ‘Seeing’.” In Novel to Film: An
Introduction to the Theory of Adaptation, 3-10. Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1996.
Mullaney, Stephen. The Place of the Stage: License, Play, and Power in
Renaissance England. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press,
1988.
Pasternak Slater, Ann. Shakespeare the Director. Sussex: The Harvester
Press, 1982.
Pieldner, Judit. “Space Construction in Adaptations of Hamlet.” Acta
Universitatis Sapientiae - Philologica 4, no. 1 (2012): 43-58.
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June 1, 2014).
Seger, Linda. El Arte de la Adaptación. Cómo convertir hechos y ficciones
en películas. Madrid: Rialp S.A, 1993.
Shakespeare, William. King Henry V, edited by T.W. Craik. The Arden
Shakespeare, Third Series. London: Thomson Learning, 2002.
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98 Chapter Five

Wiles, David. A Short History of Western Performance Space. Cambridge:

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UK: Universal Pictures, 2002.
 CHAPTER SIX

DUET FOR ONE:

WHEN LESS IS MORE

MONICA MAFFÍA
UNIVERSIDAD DEL SALVADOR, ARGENTINA

1. Introduction
In this chapter we will explore the problem of transposition of theatrical
material to the screen which, in turn, raises the question of whether one
can succeed in such a move from one medium to another at all. We will
appeal to the theory of intermediality, a concept that, according to the
Spanish playwright and scholar Guillermo Heras, is “the biggest
contemporary theoretical contribution”1 to the subject of adaptation “[l]ed
by Jürgen Müller, Joachim Paech, Franz-Josef Albersmeier, Jörg Helbig and
Karl Prümm, this intermedial is mainly a German debate with a focus on
inter-relationships and crossover movements between the arts and
media.”2 Yet this German notion that integrates the aesthetics of arts and
media studies in the newly coined term “intermediality” was further
developed by Patrice Pavis, who defined it as the “integration of aesthetic
concepts from different communications media into a new context […] a
means of communication encompasses the structures and possibilities of
another means of communication.”3
We will focus mainly on Duet for One, a film by Andrei Konchalovsky
released in 1986, which is based on a play of the same title by Tom

1
Guillermo Heras, “Mestizajes y contaminaciones de lenguaje cinematográfico
con el teatral”, Del teatro al cine y la televisión en la segunda mitad del siglo XX,
ed., José Romera (Madrid: Visor, 2002), 25-35.
2
Freda Chapple and Chiel Kattenbeltm, eds., Intermediality in Theatre and
Performance (Amsterdam & New York: Edition Rodopi, B.V. 2006), 13.
3
Patrice Pavis, El análisis de los espectáculos: Teatro, mimo, danza, cine (Madrid:
Paidós Ibérica, 2000), 37.
100 Chapter Six

Kempinski –an English contemporary playwright– who also contributed to

its adaptation for the screen.
The play –first produced in London in 1980– deals with the story of a
superb violinist who at the highest point of her career is struck by a
disabling illness that confines her to a wheelchair. Following her
husband’s suggestion, she makes an appointment with a psychiatrist to see
whether he could help her dealing with the symptoms of depression, as she
sees her world falling apart before her eyes.
Duet for One is structured as a series of six sessions at the psychiatrist’s
consulting room, so the main area of interest is the psychological realm,
where her pretending to cope with the situation and her initial contempt for
her therapist are laid bare by the acute perception of Dr. Feldmann. He
skilfully manages to uncover the truth deeply hidden under layers of
denial, as her despair and suicidal thoughts alternate with bursts of anger.
Since translation, reception, and performance have been discussed in
most critical approaches to theatre and film adaptation, I would like to add
that Duet for One is a play I know very well. I have translated it into
Spanish, produced it for the Argentinian stage, and took part in it myself
both as an actress and as a director. This, I think, provides a good basis to
start the discussion of its process of adaptation.

2. The Play: Embodying the Protagonist

Duet for One is inspired by the real case of virtuoso cello player
Jacqueline du Pré, who contracted multiple sclerosis when she was in her
late twenties. Her husband was the celebrated Argentine pianist and
conductor Daniel Barenboim. Perhaps my interest on this play was
prompted by my deep admiration for her musicality and richness of sound.
This is a personal digression, but on seeing her onstage in a wheelchair in
one of her last public appearances at the Royal Albert Hall, I remember
experiencing a sense of loss that was important to recall when I later
played the role of Stephanie. Daniel Barenboim helped her through to the
stage and then stepped up to the conductor’s podium to lead the orchestra.
She was not there as cellist, but as the narrator in Peter and the Wolf.4 It
caught my attention that she had the score on her lap instead of using a
music stand but most of all, the way in which she turned over the pages to
read the score, and the abrupt movement of her hand.
By that time I was deeply immersed in classical music and knew quite
a number of musicians, mostly pianists, so after the concert I approached

4
Sergei Prokofiev, Peter and the Wolf, Op. 67.
 Duet for One: When Less is More 101

Daniel Barenboim, who was surrounded by a group of friends, to say hello

and congratulate him for the exquisite concert. As I drew nearer I saw
Jaqueline du Pré in her wheelchair a little apart from the group. There was
something uninviting about her that discouraged me from getting any
closer and I realised that no one else talked to her.
Years later, I understood a few more things about that experience as I
spoke to a neurologist while rehearsing the role of Stephanie and learned
about the progressive deterioration of the nervous system which is typical
of that disease and results in a lack of muscular response because the
optical nerve is affected; therefore, those who suffer this illness often go
blind. Only then I realised that at that concert she was not reading at all
and the fact that she distanced herself from the group of enthusiasts from
the audience had to do with psychological factors associated with her
condition.
To help me further understand the character I was portraying, I spoke
to patients affected with multiple sclerosis, asked their permission to
attend their self-help group meetings at the Hospital Francés (French
Hospital, Buenos Aires) and managed, I think, to come to some insight
into the inner thoughts of Stephanie thanks to these other patients, sharing
their experiences in overcoming daily obstacles, and their fears about
facing death, for there is no cure for that illness yet. It was also an
opportunity to observe the ways they contrived to mask their limitations of
movement, and this was so revealing both for me as an actress and for
them as patients that, when they came to the opening night and recognized
themselves in the character’s struggle to come to terms with her terminal
disease, they asked me to continue attending their meetings because, not
being a doctor, nor a patient, nor even the relative of a patient, they still
thought they had something to gain from my experience that was valuable
to them, as theirs was to me.

3. Adapting
But let us go back to the topic of “adaptation”. The very first act of
adaptation in Duet for One consisted in the portrayal of a real character
and her circumstances turned into fiction. Names were altered, but not
completely changed, in the sense that they keep a certain connection with
the real ones. Thus, “Stephanie” maintained the three syllables and
Frenchness of “Jacqueline” and a violin, another string instrument,
replaced the original cello. The husband’s fictional surname, Liebermann,
only mentioned at the beginning of the play, retained the stress on the first
of three syllables, and the first name –David– is also a disyllabic word
102 Chapter Six

with Biblical echoes to result in a complete name concolourous with that

of the real-life husband, Daniel Barenboim. In both cases, the actual one
and the fictional, the husband is a talented pianist and director, except that
in the play, David is also a famous composer of atonal music.
Much has been written about adapting from the stage or from a novel
to the screen, and whether the adaptation is a free version, or the recording
of a theatrical performance or the re-creation of a theatrical performance,
like Ingmar Bergman’s TV version of The Magic Flute by Mozart. But
then this opera, had been haunting Bergman for years, as Hour of the Wolf,
his marvellous yet somewhat underrated 1968 black-and-white film
shows.
There is a 10-minute scene with all the tension of psychological
thriller, in which Johan and Alma Borg (Max von Sydow and Liv
Ullmann) attend a social dinner where they feel very uncomfortable. The
host invites guests to another room for a brief puppet show he will offer at
a candle-lit teatrino. At his command: “Music!”, a fragment of Act I,
scene 3 of Mozart’s opera, The Magic Flute, is heard.5 This opera within a
puppet show within a film is a master class of intermediality, well before
the actual word was coined.
The puppet show lasts for just a few seconds but casts a spell on the
guests and on us. The camera lingers on Alma’s face. But immediately, the
host explains that Tamino, the hero of the Magic Flute, is surrounded with
darkness outside of the Temple of Wisdom at this point. Tamino expresses
his fears in the line: “O ew’ge Nacht! Wann wirst du schwinden? Wann
wird das Licht mein Auge finden?”6
Bergman’s multi-layered artistic viewpoint underscores that scene as
linked to Mozart’s personal anguish at being terminally ill. As an unseen
chorus answers from darkness: “Bald, Jüngling, oder nie!”7, Bergman asks
himself whether that voice is Mozart’s own answering to his own, private,
previous question, or is it that he actually received an answer from
elsewhere?8
More recently, the very theatrical adaptations of Polanski’s latest films:
Carnage (2011), an adaptation of a play by Yasmina Reza, and his 2013
award winning film, Venus in Fur, which is an adaptation of an award-
winning play that, in turn, is also an adaptation of a novel by the American

5
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Emanuel Schikaneder, Die Zauberflöte, (N.Y.:
Dover Publications, 1985), 82.
6
NT: “Oh, eternal night, when shall you pass”.
7
NT: “Soon, soon, fair youth, or never”.
8
Ingmar Bergman, Linterna Mágica (Buenos Aires: Tusquets, 1988), 231.
 Duet for One: When Less is More 103

playwright, David Ives, was itself inspired by Leopold von Sacher-

Masoch’s novel Venus in Furs.
Both films –apart from the overwhelmingly beautiful visuals– rely on
dialogue. What is said is as important as what is seen. Thus, Polanski’s
genius makes the most of the technical sophistication and complexities of
the film language with the limits of the single plane of the theatrical stage,
with an intermedial treatment of the style taking advantage of theatre’s
mechanisms but applied to film language. It is his view which balances the
aesthetic conventions of both genres to enhance performance: his, as
fabricator of the film, and that, too, of the actors.

4. The Film
Let us now concentrate on the film version of Duet for One and compare it
with the original play to explore how it works and whether it actually
works. The film begins with a frenetic sequence of high angle shots which
allow for a general overview as seen from the top deck of a sightseeing
double-decker bus that goes around London, passing Hyde Park Corner,
the statue of Eros at Piccadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square with the National
Gallery, and Nelson’s Column, Westminster Abbey, the Albert Hall and,
of course, the theatres and restaurants in the main streets packed with
people going this way and that.
While the impersonal voice of a tourist guide directs the attention of
visitors to the main attractions of central London, scrambled noises are
heard, boisterous activity, brass band music, a hubbub of traffic noises, the
sound of boots marching in the military parade of the Changing of the
Guard, and the clattering hooves of horses. We can read the opening
credits with the name of the actors as text superimposed on those images.
Yet, the production credits appear on a black screen with the quiet,
unhurried sound of an intense, introspective violin solo that makes us –the
audience– feel relieved after that exhausting, hectic tour of Central
London.
The titles work as a statement that contrasts that marvellous synthesis
of the inner, complex, intellectual world of the analytical thinker with
which we may assume that the director and script writers identify
themselves, with the pandemonium in the life of an exquisite violinist who
has been struck by multiple sclerosis. The peace and quiet of every title
card after each section of hectic, feverish activity is welcomed by the
viewer and so, very subtly the director manipulates the audience’s
emotional perception of the film from the very beginning.
104 Chapter Six

The camera focuses on a poster affixed to a bus stop announcing a

violin concert by Stephanie Anderson, a beautiful, famous musician. Then
we have a sudden cut to a close up of Julie Andrews in the leading role
looking upwards towards the psychiatrist, which serves as the starting
point of the story. The mature Max von Sydow, to whom we referred
previously in the discussion of Ingmar Bergman’s Hour of the Wolf, is
very well cast here as Dr. Feldmann. He would have also been the perfect
actor for the theatrical role.
In an Audio-Visual Script Writing course that I attended, those of us
who were playwrights, found it more difficult to write a script than those
who attempted to write it for the first time, even though writing for the
theatre is a much deeper métier. Someone with a lifelong career in the
industry like Tony Richardson said: “my theatrical background did create
problems when I had to translate from the theatre into film. In fact I do not
think it a good idea at all. It is much better to work from original material
because this is the only way that the idea can be understood in the
cinematic form.”9 The point is that the screen script has to dispense with
poetry or the irony of philosophical views. These could be added to the
dialogue but would not help to organize the script. It requires a technical
approach to writing, thinking in terms of moving visual presentation. The
screen script describes what we factually are to see on the screen, so much
so that film director and writer Wolf Rilla has stated that regarding literary
contents in a film-script “you cannot see what someone is thinking. One
has to find a visual way of putting it.”10 In fact, Duet for One is a play
about thinking; so transposing it to the screen was an almost impossible
task. The image of a relaxed, sweetly smiling woman who politely
answers the questions her therapist poses, which we see at the beginning
of the film, is miles away from, even diametrically opposed to, the tense
beginning of the play: the dramatic entrance of Stephanie in a wheelchair.
She moves around the place trying to control the situation by attacking
first, almost taking over the consulting room, with the challenging
behaviour and embittered remarks with which she responds to every
intervention of the psychiatrist. At one moment she gets up from her
wheelchair and walks about to show that although she can walk, she is
very unstable and as she falls Dr. Feldmann “jumps up to help her”. So she
explains, “That’s what makes me feel a bit low, see?”11

9
Terence St. John Marner, Directing Motion Pictures (N.Y: A.S. Barnes & Co,
1979), 46.
10
Ibid., 43.
11
Tom Kempinski, Duet For One (London: Samuel French, 1981), 4.
 Duet for One: When Less is More 105

We have quoted the stage direction in inverted commas to emphasize

the playwright’s intention of having a very experienced psychiatrist, in
control of the situation, sitting at his desk and taking notes; then, he
suddenly has to stand up from a sitting position to help his patient, as if
she were trying to compensate her being confined to a wheelchair by being
in continuous motion.
Yet in the film, the pace of these dramatis personae has been inverted:
she is sitting in a comfortable chair while he seems to be nervous about
interviewing his much admired, notable violinist, wife of a successful
pianist, a celebrity couple in the world of the most exquisite classical and
contemporary music.
The semantics of mood and body language show him standing with his
hands in his pockets behind his desk, and only sitting when she mentions
her illness, only to continue asking his questions behind his desk. Yet, he
remains in that sitting position for only 43 seconds as he stands up to
confess: “Ms Anderson, I have been an admirer of yours for many years”
and goes to search for one of her LPs in a shelf full of records. So, he is
using her therapeutic time to show her his collection and to express his
praise. But only 25 seconds later he will go back to his desk in
conversational tone when he learns about her husband’s activities as a
composer, not with the sympathetic critical detachment of a professional
therapist, but with the devotional enthusiasm of a fan. This is quite
different from “that air of comforting wisdom” required by the original
play script. Since Tom Kempinski himself is –together with Jeremy Lipp
and Andrei Konchalovsky– one of the authors of the screenplay, we can
see that he had to make quite a few concessions.
This is an important issue, since most performing arts are organized
around the question of pacing, for the simple reason that they are
presented before an audience. When comparing the difficulties of adapting
a film from a novel or from the stage, most directors agree that they have
an easier time with adapting a novel to the screen, thus stating that the
novel “is more closely related to the cinematic form [,]”12 as they can
focus on the concept of rhythm and time flow within its structure.
According to them, the obstacles that the theatrical material presents are
almost unsolvable; for example, a play depends mostly on dialogue, it has
an ephemeral nature, and the point of view of the theatre spectator is more
static, to mention but a few of the difficulties involved in this process.
If the director decides to give the characters an inner rhythm that is
different from the original, the pacing of the resulting scene will be altered
12
Marner, 44.
106 Chapter Six

as well, and, as a consequence, a slow dissociation from the original play

will begin. Starting with that change of pace, in turn conveyed into
sequences, the director could end up providing a brand new concept of the
play from which the film will be constructed, and what was supposed to be
an adaptation could finally be shaped into a new form that the script writer
himself might not recognize and if he did, he would disown it.
The personality of these characters is entirely different from that of the
original play. To underline this idea, the situation described above which
belongs to the first scene, is transported to the second scene, in a much
lighter key, so that when Stephanie stands up, she does so not to
demonstrate that her legs are unreliable, but to show that she can walk, and
elicits the applause of Dr. Feldmann. To remind the audience of her
condition, however, the lady holds a cup of tea on her hand, so that when
she falls, the tea-cup falls to the ground, and all the tea spills onto the tidy
floor of the consulting room. Her reaction in the script is a fit of laughter
through which she says: “it doesn’t matter”.
Another difference of approach between the theatre and the film
version is the position of the furniture in the consulting room. The film
design for the room departs from the original layout in the play where
Tom Kempinski conveys the thoughtful care of the therapist for his patient
by pointing out that “a desk, with a swivel armchair before it, is so placed
that Feldmann never talks to his patients over the desk, but sits sideways
to it”. Yet in the film version, the first scene is entirely played with the
desk as a barrier between doctor and patient.
In the original text, the therapist extracts vital information from casual
comments of his patient and carefully leads her to talk about what matters,
whereas the film version reduces the depth of the dialogue by means of a
direct question. For example, when the therapist is filling in a form with
her personal data:

STEPHANIE: I’m thirty-three years old, though David assures me I don’t

look a day over thirty-four.
FELDMANN: Thirty-three, yes.
STEPHANIE: I have no children, fortunately, and I spend my day… Do
you want all this now, right away?
FELDMANN TURNS TO FACE STEPHANIE.
FELDMANN: Why do you regard it as fortunate that you have no
children?
STEPHANIE: Ah. The chance remark that reveals so much.
FELDMANN CONTINUES TO REGARD HER QUESTIONINGLY.
Well, I suppose it’s fortunate because of this (SHE
INDICATES HERSELF IN THE WHEELCHAIR). This. Me.
 Duet for One: When Less is More 107

FELDMANN: I am sorry. I do not quite understand. Do you mean that

you feel it would distress your children to see you in a
wheelchair?
STEPHANIE: Yes, I suppose it would… Well, that’s not exactly why I
said that… Well I suppose it would distress them to see me
like this if they’d known me, you know, walking about
properly, I suppose… Though some children might just
take it naturally, I suppose… I’m sorry. I don’t really know
exactly why I said that. It just came out, I think. It’s been
one of the things I’ve just sort of naturally thought, I
suppose. I really don’t know exactly why I think it –
thought it. Maybe it’s not fortunate, really. Sorry. This is
all a bit muddled. I don’t know why properly, really.
FELDMANN: I understand (HE MAKES A FINAL NOTE). Now, Mrs
Liebermann…
STEPHANIE: Miss Abrahams. I use my maiden name.

The richness of that dialogue, the doubts and fears of Stephanie that are
revealed in it as well as what is implied in her sharp correction, informing
him that she would rather be addressed by her maiden name, is reduced to
a basic declaration:

FELDMANN: Any children?

STEPHANIE: Uh, no, we never have time.

To put something into words takes time and although the visuals are
the most important means of expression in films, they are not dissociated
from the act of speaking. On the contrary, they allow the reduction of the
text drastically, thus to spend that time in the visual display of those
situations that are referred to in the therapeutic sessions in the play. In the
case of Stephanie, it means facing the fear of losing her husband from the
musical, as well as from the sexual point of view, the fear of failing in her
career and most important, of losing her life. In the case of Dr. Feldmann
the challenge is getting his patient to realise that although she cannot
change facts, she needs to overcome the fear of discovering her inner truth,
so as to be able to find the purpose of life in life itself and through that
realization, to achieve happiness.
There is a marvellous speech in the theatre version of the play that Dr.
Feldmann delivers following Stephanie’s obstinate silence and her display
of symptoms of suicidal thoughts. Dr. Feldmann intends to imbue her with
enthusiasm, to discover the beauty of life itself. He engages in a bravura
piece, a long wide-ranging monologue that shows primitive man
struggling against the forces of nature, then reflects on the mind of God
108 Chapter Six

and how a child learns to play, to finally describe other activities of life,
thus trying to focus his patient’s mind on discovering other purposes that
could improve her quality of life. It was disappointing to see such a tour de
force reduced to a coughing old man falling asleep as he swivels in his
chair once and again with a mug of coffee in his hand, wrapping his scarf
warmly about himself, and –worst of all– interrupting her introspective
silence to ask if she prefers to end the session earlier when it is obvious
that it is he who would rather stop there and would rather go back to sleep.
To make things worse, as she begins to talk, he absentmindedly engages in
clipping articles from a newspaper and throwing the rest to the floor while
joking about forms of suicide. The theatrical text was supposed to be
adapted for the screen, not mutilated for it.
Then, there is a melodramatic scene where Stephanie is celebrating her
birthday. Together with a young violinist –her favourite student– they
play, before a few guests at her home, a movement of a concerto for two
violins that they had been rehearsing for a public performance. But
Stephanie’s fingering with her left hand is inadequate to the needs of the
score. No one seems to notice. To add a soap opera turn to the story, her
student has an emotional outburst, her response to their both pretending
that nothing untoward has happened.
This is followed by a public performance of the same concerto and
what could have been an opportunity to develop a rich, intermedial
treatment of the scene turns out to be, alas, the same incident that we have
just seen, but with soap opera banality. She stops playing before the
audience. And in a violent scene of dubious taste, her husband –who had
sitting in the orchestra– jumps up onstage at the same time that someone
else brings a wheelchair and they force her to sit down, tying her wrists to
the armchair and quickly whisking her offstage. But then we learn that this
scene, this variant, is only a bad dream. We are supposed not to feel
cheated, but relieved.
Another doubtful addition to the original, now in the film script, is a
take where she is at her toilette, refreshing her face, in order to forget the
nightmare, when her legs give out and she falls. Then there is a sudden cut
to the poster that announces that the concert has been cancelled. None of
this was in the original script. Those decisions about the script resulted in
fundamental changes that re-write the original argument, change the tone
of the film, and make a difference in how the film will be received. The
scene at her toilette is incomprehensible. Why is Konchalovsky so
insistent on these changes? Why so many takes of cups and mugs of tea?
Most of the rich, meaningful questions that arise during the six sessions
 Duet for One: When Less is More 109

with the psychiatrist are omitted in the film version. And to make matters
worse, the script is impoverished by these additions.
The quarrel between husband and wife that ends up with the
wheelchair rolling down the hill on its own and David running after to
fetch it –it has now become a symbol of the end of their marriage,
counterbalanced by the final scene in which the psychiatrist can be seen
pushing that same chair, now empty, walking arm in arm with Stephanie–
has more to do with the basic happy and formulaic ending that Hollywood
television shows demand than to the thought-provoking, sharp twist at the
end that Tom Kempinski crafted for the theatrical play.
And since we are focusing on the wheelchair, why is Stephanie using a
manual wheelchair in the film version, instead of the electric-powered one
detailed in the stage directions of the original script? One possible answer
is to make her effort visibly harder, so as to elicit an emotional response in
the audience. Who wouldn’t be moved to tears at the pitiful sight of a
sophisticated professional violinist who before her illness had extracted
the most inspired musical passages from her violin through that delicate
movement of her highly-trained fingers, and after her illness struck, ended
up gracelessly striving to propel herself on a wheelchair? Yet the
motorized wheelchair produces quite a different reaction. There is a sense
of independence and even of power. The joystick controller offers the
possibility of changing speed and direction, action compared to changing
the gear in a car. The original theatrical version of Stephanie’s fierce
attack on the psychiatrist can be compared with the frame of mind of a
reckless driver not just unconcerned about the consequences of dangerous
driving but purposely driving into something.
Recalling again that production of fifteen years ago when I produced
the play for the Argentinian stage, I attached so much importance to that
detail that the opening of the play had to be delayed almost a year because
there were no such electric wheelchairs in the country and it was
unthinkable to import one from the States as prices were unaffordable,
almost the same as a small car... Finally, a local wheelchairs manufacturer
proposed an exchange of publicity in the hand program for the famous
battery powered chair. But they kept us in waiting until the arrival of the
components imported from the U.K. and then a little more until the parts
could be placed in assembly in Argentina. It was quite an odyssey.

5. Conclusion
I do not think this adaptation has been a happy one. It is a pity that with
such a superb cast and with the original production based on a powerful
110 Chapter Six

script, the director has reversed the “less is more” adage, and instead
presents us with a “more is less” expansion of the text, from its original
compact structure, into a number of uninteresting episodes which result in
an anodyne film that appears to trivialize the conflict itself, takes away the
dangerous psychological abyss into which Stephanie had fallen, weakened
the iron determination of the psychiatrist to help his patient from the
suicidal path she was taking and leaves us, the audience, largely bereft of
what the theatre audience had experienced with the original version.
Finally, a note on the title: Duet for One. A “duet” is a musical term
applied to compositions where two singers or players are needed. It refers
mostly to singers or piano players and derives from the Italian word “due”,
meaning two. The word was first used in fifteenth century for certain parts
of the Mass sung by two singers, that is, those parts that called for two
voices. So, beginning with the very title, the author implies that two voices
are needed for “one”. But for one what? What or who is that “one” that
should receive the attention of two? From the very beginning we see two
people, and in fact, during the whole play there will be only just those two,
the psychiatrist and his patient. Assuming that the duet consists of
Stephanie, the patient, and Feldmann, the doctor, then, we could allow
ourselves to imagine that the “one” could be either of them. They could
either be working together to help Stephanie cope with the painful and
unexpected turn in her life, or they could, with equal justice, be working in
tandem so the psychiatrist could successfully meet the challenge that her
case poses.
There is also a third possibility for this duet, and that is that the “one”
is their common project of unmasking the truth behind her: Stephanie’s
silences. Another duet is the musical one, piano and violin, to which she
devoted her life but which ended abruptly because of her disease. Last, and
not least, there is the real life duet of Stephanie and her husband, the
couple that seems on the verge of collapse. We still have two more
versions of a duet that echo the title, and will be reverberating throughout
the whole play: Stephanie’s oscillation between life and death and, on the
other hand, the doctor’s dilemma of trying to rescue her knowing that what
was most precious to her, her musical life, will never return. The marital
knot proved not to be a Gordian one; at the beginning of the film,
Stephanie’s husband is already cheating on her, and soon goes off with his
secretary. None of these versions of “duet” that are contained in the title
apply to the film version, because the Stephanie/Dr. Feldmann pair, her
struggle, and his guidance have been transformed, reduced to a few
meetings between a wishy-washy psychiatrist who cannot keep calm and a
patient who has not hit bottom, quite different from the original play. She
 Duet for One: When Less is More 111

arrives at the consulting room as if she had just emerged from the gates of
hell with signs of self-neglect, dirty and dishevelled, appearing only after
she had missed two prior appointments, saying she is wearing the same
underwear she had been wearing a fortnight before, having discarded her
violin, and telling a demeaning story about having had sex with a filthy
collector of scrap. If all this has been omitted from the film, why the film
is still called Duet for One?
On consulting Directing Motion Pictures13, the canonical book on
professional motion picture technique by Terence St. John Marner, who
collected material from such directors as Joseph Losey, T. Richardson, John
Schlesinger, Jerzy Skolimowski, and others, we find that the overall
conclusion is that it is so problematic to transpose theatrical ideas into film
that one is better off starting a film script from scratch. The example we have
been discussing suggests that this melancholy conclusion may well be right.

Bibliography
Bergman, Ingmar. Linterna Mágica. Buenos Aires: Tusquets Editores,
1988.
Chapple, Freda, and Chiel Kattenbeltm, eds. Intermediality in Theatre and
Performance. Amsterdam & New York: Edition Rodopi, B.V., 2006.
Duet for One. DVD. Directed by Andrei Konchalovsky. USA: Golan-
Globus Productions, 1986.
Kempinski, Tom. Duet for One. London: Samuel French, 1981.
Lavandier, Yves. La dramaturgia: Los mecanismos del relato: Cine,
teatro, ópera, radio, televisión, cómic. Pamplona: EIUNSA, Colección
Letras de Cine, 2010.
Marner, Terence St. John. Directing Motion Pictures. 4th ed. New York:
A.S. Barnes & Co., 1979.
Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, and Emanuel Schikaneder. Die Zauberflöte.
New York: Dover, 1985.
Pavis, Patrice. El análisis de los espectáculos: Teatro, mimo, danza, cine.
Madrid: Paidós Ibérica, 2000.
Romera, José, ed. Del teatro al cine y la televisión en la segunda mitad del
siglo XX. Madrid: Visor, 2002.

13
See Marner, Directing Motion Pictures.
 PART III:

FROM WRITTEN TO VISUAL NARRATIVE:

THE STORY BEHIND THE SCREEN
 CHAPTER SEVEN

IMPOSSIBLE JOURNEYS AND POSSIBLE

ADAPTATIONS IN THE WORKS
OF JULES VERNE1

ÁNGEL PÉREZ MARTÍNEZ

UNIVERSIDAD DEL PACÍFICO, PERÚ

1. The Relevance of Verne’s Arguments

Jules Verne has a tendency to present extreme landscapes in his works. In
most cases, voyages through these landscapes depend on future
technological and scientific advances. Many of the sights imagined by the
French writer were too sophisticated to be recreated adequately when
cinematography was in its infancy. Nevertheless, during the first years of
cinema, Verne’s storylines provided motivation and inspiration for film
makers, but thirty-five years would have to go from the publication of De
la Terre à la Lune until, in 1902, Georges Méliès tried to bring to the
screen some of the ideas that Verne described in that work. Since then, and
to this very day, Verne’s novels continue to capture the interest of
producers, screenwriters, and directors, despite the fact that his subject
matter has lost its predictive power. Thus the question I ask here is why
Verne’s works are still relevant?
If in Aristotle’s Poetics, we find the idea of imitation and, in later
writings, the idea of the creation of possible worlds, it is always on the
basis of the emulation of what is real and of a reflection of the
mythological. This is what we think of when we remember the images of
The Odyssey that Auerbach so appropriately described in Mimesis. But
when we refer to the authors of science fiction, we are going a little bit
further because we are also suggesting new type of myths; myths that are

1
This chapter is part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso Internacional
de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, 9-10 October,
2013.
 Impossible Voyages and Possible Adaptations in Jules Verne 115

not nourished by the past but rather by a possible future, in a space for
myths that are yet to arise, which would suggest a fictional oxymoron.
The work of Jules Verne gives us an excuse to reflect on what appear
at first to be narrative questions but which are, in fact, related to the
poetics of travel literature. The perimeters of this genre appear to be very
broad and properly include all accounts related to journeys but, in the case
of accounts that intersect with the theme of travel literature, as is the case
with Verne’s work, interest can be more than theoretical. In my view, the
classic authors of all times can contribute to the genre of travel literature
by making available singular ideas on how to approach a journey. Below, I
discuss suggestions related to this topic that can be found in the works of
Verne.
If we review Verne’s storylines, one of the first issues that jump out at
us is that within them, man faces what is an apparent impossibility. This
circumstance has nuances that are worth analysing. One initial perception
is that these impossibilities are determined in time. They are things that are
difficult to achieve in the nineteenth century: traveling 20 thousand
leagues under the ocean, flying to the moon, going around the world in
eighty days, diving into the depths of earth in search of its centre, going
beyond the solar system on board a comet. It also becomes clear that these
impossibilities have another common characteristic: confrontation with
nature.
The impossibilities which Verne’s characters encounter are logical,
neither irrational, nor metaphysical. They are very different from fighting
magical beings such as Homeric monsters or living out the fantastic
scenarios of Tolkien’s Middle Earth. Verne’s impossibilities, in many of
his storylines, are actions that cannot be achieved through the mere
physical capabilities of man: flying, traveling to the bottom of the ocean,
going to space… all of these are natural impossibilities, given the state of
science and technology at the time of his writing, but not irrational, and
this is one of the verisimilitudes of Verne. French society of the time
received the works of the author from Nantes as fantastic predictions about
the riches of science. We should remember that Verne was a witness to
such discoveries as matches, trains, streetcars, electricity, telegraphs,
telephones, and automobiles. Thus, overcoming the impossible through
scientific advances was a recurrent theme in his society.2

2
“À cette époque, on ne voyageait que peu ou pas. C’était le temps des réverbères,
des sous- pieds, de la garde nationale et du briquet fumade. Oui! j’ai vu naître les
allumettes phosphoriques, les faux-cols, les manchettes, le papier à lettre, les
timbres-poste, le pantalon à jambe libre, le paletot, le gibus, la bottine, le système
métrique, les bateaux à vapeur de la Loire, dits « inexplosibles » parce qu’ils
116 Chapter Seven

One of the first answers as to how Verne overcomes literary

impossibilities is that he does it through science and technology. Certainly,
his interest in writing the first literary scientific encyclopaedia is an
unequivocal sign of this. Thanks to a series of discoveries or advances
people were able to overcome the limits imposed by nature: a balloon to
abandon the comet Galia in Héctor Servadac, the submarine Nautilus,
mobilis in mobile, in Vingt mille lieus sous les mers, a cannon to travel to
the moon in De la Terre à la Lune. Technology is, thus, a medium by
which to face the unachievable and make it possible in a rational manner.
The basis of these accomplishments can be found in science and
technology. Nevertheless, technology is not the only means of overcoming
the impossible in the works of Verne.

2. About Vernian Journeys and their Exterior

and Interior Possibilities
The work of Jules Verne has been defined as a kind of narrative scientific
encyclopaedia. This was, in my view, one of his ulterior motives, but
perhaps it was the consequence of traveling “further than the circumstances
of his time permitted.” In order to construct credibility, Verne already

sautaient un peu moins que les autres, les omnibus, les chemins de fer, les
tramways, le gaz, l’électricité, le télégraphe, le téléphone, le phonographe! Je suis
de la génération comprise entre ces deux génies, Stéphenson et Edison! Et j’assiste
maintenant à ces étonnantes découvertes, à la tête desquelles marche l’Amérique,
avec ses hôtels mouvants, ses machines à tartines, ses trottoirs mobiles, ses
journaux en pâte « feuilletée » imprimés à l’encre de chocolat, qu’on lit d’abord et
qu’on mange ensuite!» (“At that time, there was little or no traveling. It was a time
of street-lamps, foot-straps, the National Guard and cigarette-lighters. Yes! I
witnessed the birth of phosphorous matches, detachable collars, cuffs, letter paper,
postage stamps, short trousers, overcoats, opera hats, laced-up boots, the metric
system, steamboats on the Loire, called expired “inexplodable” because they
exploded frequently less than the others, the bus, the railways, the tramways, gas,
electricity, the telegraph, the telephone, the phonograph! “I am of the generation
between these two geniuses, Stephenson and Edison! And now I attend these
amazing discoveries, which America comes with its hotels moving, its machines
sandwiches, its moving sidewalks, its newspapers “layered” printed in chocolate
ink on digestible pastry, so that they may be eaten as soon as they are read”). This
unpublished text, unknown to those Verne experts with which I am familiar, was
given the title Souvenirs d’enfance et de jeunesse by Verne himself. It is made up
of eight pages numbered by the author. The manuscript was acquired at a public
sale in London in 1931 by the Martin Bodmer Foundation (Bodmer Library)
located in Cologny, near Geneva, Switzerland.
 Impossible Voyages and Possible Adaptations in Jules Verne 117

suggested contradictions in the titles of some of his works: Cinq semaines

en ballon (1863), Voyage au centre de la Terre (1864-1865), De la Terre à
la Lune (1865), Vingt mille lieus sous les mers (1865-1867). Verne used
technology but his vision of it was not naïve. In order to understand the
dimension of overcoming the impossible, we need to look for more
answers in Verne’s works. There is an element that sums up all the actions
presented in his storylines –I refer to the journey, since all the impossibilities
of Verne’s works are generally discussed precisely in relation to journeys.
This was already foreshadowed in the famous generic title under which his
works were published in Magasin d’education et de recreation: Voyages
extraordinaires (extraordinary voyages). Adventures populate the works
of this French writer. Verne makes us travel around the entire world in the
hands of his protagonists: from the descriptive tale of Africa in Cinq
semaines en ballon, his first published work, followed by other voyages
such as that of Dick Sand, who captains the Pilgrim from New Zealand to
San Francisco, with an accidental stop on the Atlantic coast of Africa in
Un capitaine de quinze ans; Captain Hatteras’s trip to the North Pole or
the journey in Les Enfants du capitaine Grant to South America, Australia
and the Pacific Ocean; to southern Africa in Aventures de trois Russes et
de trois Anglais dans l’Afrique australe; around the world with Phileas
Fogg in Le Tour du monde en quatre-vingts jours, or accompanied by
Michel Strogoff on a journey from Moscow to Irkutsk.
These are journeys that we could call “natural” since they follow an
ordinary though extrapolated logic, but later there are other
“extraordinary” journeys: to the centre of the earth, to the bottom of the
oceans, the trip to the moon or around it and the cosmic journey of
Servadac. Here Verne breaks through the natural logic of human
peregrination in order to attempt heroic achievements beyond the limits of
space and time. But, in addition to this rupture with the ordinary course of
human trajectory, he also creates interior journeys, which are undertaken
by his travellers, i.e., his characters.
Verne’s journeys are marked by external and internal discoveries. They
are voyages of adventure in the Homeric style. Man confronting nature
and in danger of succumbing to it is a recurrent image in many of his
works. Another characteristic of Verne’s journeys is that these take place
without their protagonists seeking them out, as in Les Enfants du capitaine
Grant, in Deux ans de vacances or in Vingt mille lieus sous les mers. In
other works, the adventure is taken on as a challenge or a mission as in
Michel Strogoff, Le Tour du monde en quatre-vingts jours or Un capitaine
de quinze ans. Verne’s adventure is a risky situation, which normally
occurs unexpectedly, and in which man’s capacity to overcome adversity
118 Chapter Seven

is put to the test. We can say that in Verne, adventure has an anthropological
and social aspect. Normally, the protagonist is the one who has to face the
dangers, using his talents and thereby saving other human beings.
Consequently, we can also affirm that many of Verne’s works are
authentic voyages of initiation.
The impossible –as mentioned at the beginning– is immersed in the
Vernian voyage. The impossible adventures of Jules Verne are an
extraordinary framework for analysing human capacities and asking
philosophical questions. Just in themselves, they are a simile of life itself.
While in our contemporary world, we may lack opportunities for
adventures and more adventurers, cinema provides the possibility of
dreaming about situations that are far away and dependent on future
technological advances.
We have noted that the first solution to overcoming the impossible is
technology but there is a question that remains, related to anthropological
issues. Who are the protagonists of Verne’s writings? Many of them are
ordinary people, some as precocious as Dick Sand, the 14-year-old
captain. The development of the protagonists during the adventures
converts them into authentic heroes. But this process of maturation is
based on an ethical and a moral platform that the French author himself
does not cease to point out. His nineteenth century portraits with their
physiological and psychological nuances provide evidence of this, as is the
case with this portrait of Hector Servadac:

Hector Servadac avait trente ans. Orphelin, sans famille, presque sans
fortune, ambitieux de gloire sinon d’argent, quelque peu cerveau brûlé,
plein de cet esprit naturel toujours prêt à l’attaque comme à la riposte, cœur
généreux, courage à toute épreuve, visiblement le protégé du Dieu des
batailles, auquel il n’épargnait pas les transes, pas hâbleur pour un enfant
de l’Entre-deux-Mers qu’avait allaité pendant vingt mois une vigoureuse
vigneronne du Médoc, véritable descendant de ces héros qui fleurirent aux
époques de prouesses guerrières, tel était, au moral, le capitaine Servadac,
l’un de ces aimables garçons que la nature semble prédestiner aux choses
extraordinaires, et qui ont eu pour marraines à leur berceau la fée des
aventures et la fée des bonnes chances […].3

3
“Hector Servadac was thirty years of age, an orphan without lineage and almost
without means. Thirsting for glory rather than for gold, slightly scatter-brained, but
warm-hearted, generous, and brave, he was eminently fitted to be the protege of
the god of battles. For the first year and a half of his existence he had been the
foster-child of the sturdy wife of a vine-dresser of Medoc ía lineal descendant of
the heroes of ancient prowess; in a word, he was one of those individuals whom
 Impossible Voyages and Possible Adaptations in Jules Verne 119

Il faut convenir que le capitaine Servadac –il l’avouait volontiers– n’était

pas plus savant qu’il ne fallait. «Nous ne sabotons pas, nous autres», disent
les officiers d’artillerie, entendant par là qu’ils ne boudent jamais à la
besogne. Hector Servadac, lui, «sabotait» volontiers, étant aussi
naturellement flâneur que détestable poète ; mais, avec sa facilité à tout
apprendre, à tout s’assimiler, il avait pu sortir de l’école dans un bon rang
et entrer dans l’état-major. Il dessinait bien, d’ailleurs; il montait
admirablement à cheval, et l’indomptable sauteur du manège de Saint-Cyr,
le successeur du fameux Oncle Tom, avait trouvé en lui son maître. Ses
états de service mentionnaient qu’il avait été plusieurs fois porté à l’ordre
du jour, et ce n’était que justice.4

Today, this type of descriptive detail may seem somewhat strange for
us, but it has to be kept in mind that such descriptions are related to
assumptions that come from the sciences, or pseudo-sciences, then in
fashion, such as phrenology. Verne’s capacity to create attractive images
of people should also be noted, as is evident in this description of the
courier Michel Strogoff:

Michel Strogoff était haut de taille, vigoureux, épaules larges, poitrine

vaste. Sa tête puissante présentait les beaux caractères de la race
caucasique. Ses membres, bien attachés, étaient autant de leviers, disposés
mécaniquement pour le meilleur accomplissement des ouvrages de force.
Ce beau et solide garçon, bien campé, bien planté, n’eût pas été facile à
déplacer malgré lui, car, lorsqu’il avait posé ses deux pieds sur le sol, il
semblait qu’ils s’y fussent enracinés. Sur sa tête, carrée du haut, large de
front, se crêpelait une chevelure abondante, qui s’échappait en boucles,
quand il la coiffait de la casquette moscovite. Lorsque sa face,
ordinairement pâle, venait à se modifier, c’était uniquement sous un

nature seems to have predestined for remarkable things, and around whose cradle
have hovered the fairy god-mothers of adventure and good luck […].”
4
Jules Verne, Hector Servadac. Québec: La Bibliothèque électronique du Québec,
24-25, http://beq.ebooksgratuits.com/vents/Verne-Servadac.pdf
“It must be admitted that Captain Servadac íhe willingly avowed ití was not wiser
than was necessary. “We do not whip tops ourselves,” said the artillery officers,
meaning by that that they never grumbled at work. Hector Servadac “whipped top”
willingly, being naturally as much an idler as a detestable poet; but, with his
facility for learning everything and comparing all things, he had been able to leave
school in a high rank and enter the staff. He drew well; besides, he mounted a
horse admirably, and the untameable leaper of the Saint-Cyr riding-school, the
successor of the famous “Uncle Tom,” had found in him his master. His records
mentioned that he had several times carried the order of the day, and this was only
justice.”
120 Chapter Seven

battement plus rapide du cœur, sous l’influence d’une circulation plus vive
qui lui envoyait la rougeur artérielle. Ses yeux étaient d’un bleu foncé,
avec un regard droit, franc, inaltérable, et ils brillaient sous une arcade dont
les muscles sourciliers, contractés faiblement, témoignaient d’un courage
élevé, «ce courage sans colère des héros», suivant l’expression des
physiologistes. Son nez puissant, large de narines, dominait une bouche
symétrique avec les lèvres un peu saillantes de l’être généreux et bon.”5

These men and women, whose physical appearance reveals an intense

interior life, tend to be situated in places where they are challenged by
impossibility, and where Verne’s portraits of them are confirmed. The
traces of Homer’s epic and of classicism are evident. This is clear, for
example, in the description of Dick Sand, which demonstrates the author’s
ability to describe the exterior manifestations of the inner life as well as to
exploit his own knowledge of classical literature.

Souvent on cite ces trois mots d’un vers inachevé de Virgile: Audaces
fortuna juvat...mais on les cite incorrectement. Le poète a dit: Audentes
fortuna juvat...6
C’est aux oseurs, non aux audacieux, que sourit presque toujours la
fortune. L’audacieux peut être irréfléchi. L’oseur pense d’abord, agit
ensuite. Là est la nuance.7
Dick Sand était audens. À quinze ans, il savait déjà prendre un parti, et
exécuter jusqu’au bout ce qu’avait décidé son esprit résolu. Son air, à la
fois vif et sérieux, attirait l’attention. Il ne se dissipait pas en paroles ou en

5
Jules Verne, Michel Strogoff. Québec: La Bibliothèque électronique du Québec,
41-42, http://beq.ebooksgratuits.com/vents/Verne-Strogoff.pdf,5 “Michel Strogoff
was a tall, vigorous, broad-shouldered, deep-chested man. His powerful head
possessed the fine features of the Caucasian race. His well-knit frame seemed built
for the performance of feats of strength. It would have been a difficult task to move
such a man against his will, for when his feet were once planted on the ground, it
was as if they had taken root. As he doffed his Muscovite cap, locks of thick curly
hair fell over his broad, massive forehead. When his ordinarily pale face became at
all flushed, it arose solely from a more rapid action of the heart. His eyes, of a deep
blue, looked with clear, frank, firm gaze. The slightly-contracted eyebrows
indicated lofty heroism í“the hero’s cool courage,” according to the definition of
the physiologist. He possessed a fine nose, with large nostrils; and a well-shaped
mouth, with the slightly-projecting lips which denote a generous and noble heart.”
6
“These three words from an unfinished verse of Virgil are often cited: “Audaces
fortuna juvat”... but they are quoted incorrectly. The poet said: “Audentes fortuna
juvat ...”
7
“It is on the darers, not on the audacious, that Fortune almost always smiled. The
audacious may be unguarded. The darer thinks first, acts afterwards. There is the
difference!”
 Impossible Voyages and Possible Adaptations in Jules Verne 121

gestes, comme le font ordinairement les garçons de son âge. De bonne

heure, à une époque de la vie où on ne discute guère les problèmes de
l’existence, il avait envisagé en face sa condition misérable, et il s’était
promis de « se faire » lui-même.”8&9

Beyond more or less superficial matters, it is clear that many of Verne’s

protagonists possess a series of qualities that indicate that they are virtuous
women and men.
Now, I would like to recall something that I pointed out at the
beginning: the works of Verne are marked by the surmounting of the
impossible and this surmounting is not magical, but rational and
technological –and this is a significant aspect– the Vernian protagonist
chooses an ethical action. Many of Verne’s characters are capable of
carrying out their missions thanks to their moral character. Not all of
Verne’s characters possess a superhuman appearance as does Michel
Strogoff –we recall the portrait of Héctor Servadac cited above and his
lack of interest in work or how Professor Otto Lindenbrok, of Voyage au
centre de la Terre, was so impatient that he would stretch the leaves of his
plants every morning so that they would grow more quickly, or the
unforgettable Phileas Fogg, with his seemingly British phlegmatic
character. Not all of Verne’s heroes are irreproachable, but they all reflect
on their faces their inner life. Consider the intransigent Captain Nemo:

J’ajouterai que cet homme était fier, que son regard ferme et calme
semblait refléter de hautes pensées, et que de tout cet ensemble, de
l'homogénéité des expressions dans les gestes du corps et du visage,
suivant l’observation des physionomistes, résultait une indiscutable
franchise.”10

8
Jules Verne, Un capitaine de quinze ans. Québec: La Bibliothèque électronique
du Québec, 30-31, http://beq.ebooksgratuits.com/vents/Verne-quinze.pdf
9
“Dick Sand was audens. At fifteen he already knew how to take part, and to carry
out to the end whatever his resolute spirit had decided upon. His manner, at once
spirited and serious, attracted attention. He did not squander himself in words and
gestures, as boys of his age generally do. Early, at a period of life when they
seldom discuss the problems of existence, he had looked his miserable condition in
the face, and he had promised “to make” himself.”
10
Jules Verne, Vingt mille lieues sous les mers. Edition NoPapers, 2000, 29,
http://www.citesciences.fr/archives/francais/ala_cite/expositions/jules_verne/livres
/livres/20000lieux.pdf, “I judged that this man could be trusted, for his close looks
and his calm seemed to reflect deep thoughts, and that the homogeneity of
expressions in the gestures of the body and face, following an observation of his
physiognomy, resulted an inscrutable frankness.”
122 Chapter Seven

Many of characters take advantage of technology. The novels of Verne

are not only a demonstration of the power of science, but they also show
that it can be used for both good and evil.
During the second half of the nineteenth century, France received
Verne’s literary production, his technological prophecies, and his
encyclopaedic knowledge with approval. The intellectual ambience could
not have been more propitious. Confidence in science was so high that the
works of Verne were seen not only as fantastic stories, but as real
anticipations of a promising future. We can say that his works were
plausible in a literary sense. They were not only inventions of an
unfettered imagination, as Cervantes would have said, but credible stories
within an enlightened framework. Reason, which had been the protagonist
of the history of the world for several centuries, indicated that science and
technology were a route to universal happiness.
If Verne lived today and wrote anticipating future marvellous advances
to be possible, by technology, how would his works be received? I think
that, in part, Verne’s ideas are very current, as indicated above; on the
other hand, they have lost popularity because many of his stories described
what is now not only possible, but accepted with a shrug. The artificial
satellite of Les cinq cents millions de la Bégum no longer seems strange to
us, nor does flying by air around the world or the videophone imagined in
La Journée d’un journaliste américain en 2889. Vernian impossibility has
disappeared. Despite the fact that there are other stories written by him
that still capture our imagination, such as Voyage au centre de la Terre or
Une ville flottante, it is true that Verne’s work, in the sense of its being
anticipatory, has lost its topicality for a very simple reason: his predictions
have become part of everyday life.

3. Conclusion
During the twentieth century, science fiction literature continued to have
enormous currency, and writers of futuristic science fiction in the manner
of Jules Verne, such as Isaac Asimov and Ray Bradbury, also became cult
authors. It is probable, therefore, that if Verne were writing today, his
possibilities and impossibilities would be equally captivating. Some might
say that his protagonists are too idealistic, too far from the modern
tradition of the anti-hero. But Verne’s view of technology was not naïve. I
would like to end with one last reflection about what still gives Jules
Verne’s work topicality and, to some extent, continues to influence
cinematographic adaptations of literary works of science fiction.
Some years ago, for most educated people Verne was a proponent of a
 Impossible Voyages and Possible Adaptations in Jules Verne 123

technological mentality, a promoter of positivism and of progress. But

Verne was conscious that the amoral use of technology could lead to
catastrophic consequences for humanity. In one of his last works, Robur-
le-Conquérant, Verne tells the story of a crazy scientist who tries to
destroy the world.
The discovery of a text by Verne, a little less than 20 years ago, also
provides food for thought on this issue. Pierre-Jules Hetzel was Verne’s
publisher until 1863; he was famous in Parisian intellectual circles.
Founder of the already mentioned Magasin d’education et de recreation,
he was a promoter of scientific ideas and technological mentality. As
Verne’s publisher, he had the right to comment on his works and on more
than one occasion, he advised Verne to change endings that were too
pessimistic. He even refused to publish one of Verne’s works: Paris au
XXe siècle, which was thought to have disappeared until it was discovered
in a padlocked trunk by the great-great-grandson of Jules Verne in 1989.
This work deserves discussion.
Some Verne experts have suggested that the pessimism of Paris au
XXe siècle does not fit with Verne’s previous visions of technology. To
my mind the story of Michel Jérôme Dufrénoy, a student of literature,
follows the same anthropological line as his previous stories: the enormous
energy of technology can enhance or overwhelm human beings. In the
story, set in 1960, Michel received a prize from the National Corporation
of Institutional Credit, a kind of Ministry of Technology, in a society in
which the humanities are practically banished. Despite the award, the
young man cannot find a job. Encouraged by his stepfather, he starts a job
in a bank doing bookkeeping on a large register. Michel meets Lucy
Richelot, the daughter of a professor of rhetoric at the university, with
whom he falls in love. He is fired from his job and starts to work in Le
Grand Entrepôt Dramatique. This Entrepôt produces commercial theatre of
a very low quality and dedicates itself to entertaining a public that hungers
for diversion. The young poet ends up leaving this work to dedicate
himself to writing, but he fails in his efforts to have his works published
over and over again. It is at this time that an unexpected cold wave hits
Paris, generated by a change in the climate, and the city falls apart. Lucy
and her father are evicted from their house and wander around the city.
And Michel cannot find them. The poorest people begin to die and the city
starts to feel the pinch of hunger. The end of the novel could not be sadder:
Michel arrives at the cemetery and faints on the tomb of Alfred de Musset,
one of his favourite poets. This Vernian work comes very close to a
contemporary dystopia, which plays once again with the idea of possibility
and impossibility, but in this case, science does not rescue humans from
124 Chapter Seven

that dystopia, but helps explain it. As already noted above, the storyline of
Paris au XXe siècle supports the thesis that I have developed. If, for Verne,
the ethical use of technology is capable of overcoming impossibilities; when
it is used badly, it can lead a modern society to disaster.
The predictions in Paris au XXe siècle are not far from reality. In the
opinion of Verne, it is necessary to take another look at the fine arts to be
able to enjoy the dimensions of existence that are fading from our lives.
Painting, music, letters, and humanistic reflections need to have a more
appropriate place in our society. Such ideas constitute another example of
the sociological and psychological profundity of Verne’s work.
The possibilities of technical re-creation are not enough. The utilization
of special effects in cinematographic production must bring with it an
understanding of the meaning of the text itself, in this case, the emotive
nature of the adventure. The re-creations and adaptations of Verne’s works,
although they continue to be made and will continue to be, do not solely
depend on technological and scientific advances. Jules Verne’s approach, in
fact, brings him closer to modern science fiction: the psychological
description of his characters and the exercise of logical possibilities that are
very far from reality motivate Verne. In fact, he is an author whose work
sometimes also comes close to depicting a dystopia, a depiction that is
accompanied by cultural criticism of that entirely conceivable future.
The relevance of the re-creation of Vernian storylines in films is based
on their human rather than on their technological content. Thanks to this,
Verne continues to be an author who attracts the world of cinema, even
when many of what once were his fantastical projections into the future
have become realities.

Bibliography
Alburquerque, Luis. “Of travels and Travellers: History of a Literary
Genre”. In East and West. Exploring Cultural Manifestations. New
Delhi/Mumbai: Somaiya Publications, 2010.
Aristotle. Poetics. London: Dent, 1963.
Auerbach, Erich. Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western
Thought. USA: Princeton University Press, 2013.
Gallagher, Edward J., Judith A. Mistichelli and John A. Van Eerde. Jules
Verne. Hector Servadac. La Bibliothèque électronique du Québec,
http://beq.ebooksgratuits.com/vents/Verne-Servadac.pdf
Verne, Jules. Michel Strogoff. La Bibliothèque électronique du Québec,
http://beq.ebooksgratuits.com/vents/Verne-Strogoff.pdf
Verne, Jules. Paris au XXe Siècle. Paris: Hachette, 1994.
 Impossible Voyages and Possible Adaptations in Jules Verne 125

Verne: A Primary and Secondary Bibliography. Boston: G.K. Hall & Co.,
1980.
 CHAPTER EIGHT

COPPOLA’S APOCALYPSE NOW

AS HERMENEUTICS FOR CONRAD’S
HEART OF DARKNESS1

BRAULIO FERNÁNDEZ BIGGS

UNIVERSIDAD DE LOS ANDES, CHILE

The experience of reading Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (1899)

could become an overwhelming task. The narrator’s magnificent point of
view –that of Marlow– positioned from the prow of the Nellie while he
talks to his shipmates lets in its all-embracing atmosphere. Conrad is able
to have the reader feel himself on the vessel, have him become one of
Marlow’s companions, by hearing his mysterious account as narrated
through laconically-described, though disturbing, memories. The novel
lets the reader into Marlow’s narration by means of still another narrator
who introduces him several pages before, and who is also one of “us”; that
is, another companion on board the Nellie, sitting on the prow with
Marlow. As we know, in the rest of the novel Marlow’s voice will be
included in between inverted commas throughout almost a hundred pages
right up until just before the end when, in a brief last paragraph, he
interrupts the narrator to say:

Marlow ceased, and sat apart, indistinct and silent, in the pose of a
meditating Buddha. Nobody moved for a time. “We have lost the first of
the ebb,” said the Director, suddenly. I raised my head. The offing was
barred by a black bank of clouds, and the tranquil waterway leading to the

1
This chapter is part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso Internacional
de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, 9-10 October,
2013.
 Apocalypse Now as Hermeneutics of Heart of Darkness 127

uttermost ends of the earth flowed somber under an overcast skyí seemed
to lead into the heart of an immense darkness.2

The reader is surrounded by the same atmosphere as those who, on that

deck, are listening to the narrator, delivering his long tale, at night in the
estuary of the river Thames, and the reader, too, is affected by it. As one of
Conrad’s Spanish translators suggested, “el gran hallazgo de Conrad [fue]
hacer al lector un sitio entre la comunidad de los oyentes que asisten al
relato oral de Marlow.”3
At the same time, the reader is surrounded by the mystery in Marlow’s
narration and, above all, becomes a part of it. Marlow remains mysterious,
as everything he tells us is enigmatic in both what is clear and what is
deliberately obscured. Thus, what can the reader –the listener– feel with
phrases like this?: “I tried to break the spell íthe heavy, mute spell of the
wildernessí that seemed to draw him to its pitiless breast by the
awakening of forgotten and brutal instincts, by the memory of gratified
and monstrous passions.”4
We all know Marlow is looking for Kurtz. We know that he is
navigating up the river and that things happen, many things. Nothing is
completely unobscured or totally clear. On the contrary, everything is
mysterious, opaque and murky. It is neither ambiguous nor confusing, but
rather all lies in shadows… even Kurtz himself; even Marlow’s feelings
towards Kurtz are left in total darkness. On the other hand, the images are
always projected and expanded, as the “semantic fields” are not closed but
in a constant flow of progression. Vanishing points directed towards those
who understand also appear. Perhaps the only brutally clear episode is the
final one, when Marlow lies to Kurtz’ girlfriend regarding his last words.
All of the above does not stand as the novel’s flaw, but rather, as its
greatest achievement, as it is in full accordance with its main objective, its
soul, and its tale; we travel to the heart of darkness. Can we expect clarity,
objectivity, lights, or evident guidelines? Certainly not. We should also
bear in mind, a fortiori, that this heart of darkness is seen as a metaphor
for the ineffable wild depth only. For in truth we are travelling to the
depths of the human heart, to the shadows of its very own darkness, even
to a sort of primitive state, to the wilderness, and to an original chaos in

2
Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness (New York: Barnes & Noble Classics, 2003),
124.
3
Miguel Martínez-Lage, “… La verdad según Marlow”, in Conrad, Joseph. Los
libros de Marlow: Juventud, El corazón de las tinieblas, Lord Jim y Azar (Madrid:
Edhasa, 2008), 29.
4
Conrad, Heart of Darkness, 111.
128 Chapter Eight

which that human heart, freed from ordinary constraints, seems to

approach the demonic. No geographic coordinates are assigned to this
place or point in this direction; neither cardinal points nor clear guides of
any kind. And there cannot be! In this journey towards the deepest
darkness of the human heart we can only encounter a terrible and
disturbing mystery. Or, as Kurtz discovered, “the horror…”
I find this extraordinarily well understood and conveyed in Francis
Ford Coppola’s film. And therefore the experience of rereading Heart of
Darkness after watching Apocalypse Now (1979) is a revelation. We know
Coppola, together with John Milius, who based the script of the movie on
Conrad’s novel. In general terms, the movie’s plot has evident similarities
with the book, even though the scenario has shifted from the Belgian
Congo –explored by rubber and ivory extracting companies at the end of
the nineteenth century, to Vietnam in the 1970s, with the North
Vietnamese and the Viet Cong in the midst of war against the United
States. Where there is no exact equivalence we find an enriched symbolic
correspondence. Thus the initial chaos, the river, the ship navigating
through threatening waters, Kilgore, the party for the soldiers (a scene
charged with phallic symbols), the helicopter with the prostitutes (“The
Playboy Bunnies”), the photographer, the reading of Eliot’s “The Hollow
Men”, etc. There are many examples of such echoes or correspondences in
the film, but this has not left everybody satisfied. For instance, in “Make
Friends with Horror and Terror: Apocalypse Now”, Saul Steier, one of
Coppola’s most severe critics, complained about the bizarre and grotesque
nature of many scenes of the movie5. Such an opinion seems prompted by
a desire for an excessively literal comparison of both works. I think
Conrad’s achievement with his mysterious language is not different from,
but akin to what Coppola achieves through visual effects. Conrad’s book is
literature; Coppola’s film is cinema6. It is all about creating an atmosphere
of delirium and excesses, incomprehensible to those in its midst.
According to Garrett Stewart, what Conrad attains with nuances and
metaphors, Coppola achieves it through spectacle, by “trying to find in
visual chiaroscuro and collage the equivalent of the writer’s brooding,

5
Saul Steier, “Make Friends with Horror and Terror: Apocalypse Now,” Social
Text 3 (1980): 118-119.
6
To grant him some justice, and as many critics have done too, they have set the
perspective of Apocalypse Now as an interpretation or metaphor of the Vietnam
War and the American attitude towards it. I do not agree with this either, but
critique seems coherent under this point of view.
 Apocalypse Now as Hermeneutics of Heart of Darkness 129

rhetorical cadences and driven iterations.”7 John Hellman adds that it is

about the “aspects of a complex presentation of one source in the terms of
another.”8 On the other hand, there are similarities in the narrative between
the two, as Linda Costanzo Cahir has suggested in “Narratological Parallels
in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and Francis Ford Coppola’s
Apocalypse Now (1979): While a crew member from the Nellie tells us
about Marlow’s story, Coppola’s camera does the same with that of
Captain Benjamin Willard in Vietnam. Both men are restless and the
stories of both inspire restlessness. And even though the end of the film
sets itself apart from the novel –Willard murders Kurtz while the
moviegoer is presented at the end of Coppola’s movie with the sacrifice of
a cow by villagers– its ultimate meaning remains the same: Millard/Marlow
has touched the horror and in the lie told to Kurtz’s girlfriend we find his
murder symbolically implied.
As Cahir said, “Coppola understood that technique and theme,
structure and meaning are inseparable entities. To tell a story differently is
to tell a different story. Ultimately, it seems, Conrad and Coppola tell the
same tale.”9 But the truth is more than merely “seem”; Coppola has
effectively told the very same story. Thus his narration –his cinematographic
story– does not only enrich but also enlightens Conrad’s literariness, as it
functions, I suggest, as a kind of hermeneutics for Heart of Darkness. As
Stewart argues, “departing from Conrad, Coppola gains access to their
common theme at a deep level. The revisionary impulse becomes, as it
sounds, a second look, harder, darker.”10 Moreover, it is an unlimited
story, “never exorcized, the oldest story of all: the truth about human
nature.”11 Let us see why…
Since the publication of T.S. Eliot’s “Tradition and the Individual
Talent” we have conceived the idea that past literary works do not only
influence those of the present, but, at the same time, the contemporary
works also modify our perspective of those older works, and how we read
them. New works are explained by those from the past; in other words,

7
Garrett Stewart, “Coppola’s Conrad: The Repetitions of Complicity,” Critical
Inquiry 7, no. 3 (1981): 456.
8
John Hellman, “Vietnam and the Hollywood Genre Film: Inversions of American
Mythology in The Deer Hunter and Apocalypse Now,” American Quarterly 34, no.
4 (1982): 430.
9
Linda Costanzo Cahir, “Narratological Parallels in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of
Darkness and Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now,” Literature/Film
Quarterly 20, no. 3 (1992): 187.
10
Stewart, “Coppola’s Conrad,” 456.
11
Ibid., 456.
130 Chapter Eight

there is no vanguard without rearguard.12 So as to provide a strictly literary

example, it is indeed true that Joyce’s Ulysses cannot be understood
without Homer’s Odyssey. But it is also true that after Ulysses we no
longer read Homer in the same way. For Eliot, this forms part of the
intrinsic nature of his concept of “continuity” or “tradition” in Western
literature. We find a superlative example of the above in our case study –in
which two artistic genres that are radically different (cinema and literature)
come together. Then we are faced not only with Conrad’s influence over
Coppola, however important it has been. Nor is it about Coppola (and
Milius) basing his movie on the Polish-English writer’s novel, so as to
write the script and film it from the same model. All of this would still be
merely “continuity” or “tradition”. When I propose seeing Apocalypse
Now as hermeneutics for Heart of Darkness, I base my assumptions on the
idea that Coppola has rewritten, cinematographically and with every
formal and contextual adjustment, an identical mythos; the same poetic
myth of the novel. For Hellmann, both works pursue “similar purposes in
the dreamlike (or nightmarish) effect with which they render reportorial
detail,”13 “a psycho-symbolic journey within to the unconscious.”14
It is about retelling the same poetic myth with other tools, other
materials, in a single unit. Thus, as it is consistent with itself, in the new
creation –the new poiesis– the old myth seems new, revealing, even
discovering other shades and details as it unveils itself. It does not modify
its essence, but we see it in a way we had not seen it before. It shows
angles that in the “previous version” had been displaced by others,
preferred if you will, or emphasized. We know the poetic myth is the
cause of a series of actions and episodes and not the other way around.
12
“No poet, no artist of any art, has his complete meaning alone. His significance,
his appreciation is the appreciation of his relation to the dead poets and artists. You
cannot value him alone; you must set him, for contrast and comparison, among the
dead. I mean this as a principle of aesthetic, not merely historical, criticism. The
necessity that he shall conform, that he shall cohere, is not one-sided; what
happens when a new work of art is created is something that happens
simultaneously to all the works of art that preceded it. The existing monuments
form an ideal order among themselves, which is modified by the introduction of
the new (the really new) work of art among them. The existing order is complete
before the new work arrives; for order to persist after the supervention of novelty,
the whole existing order must be, if ever so slightly, altered; and so the relations,
proportions, values of each work of art toward the whole are readjusted; and this is
conformity between the old and the new”. T. S. Eliot, “Tradition and the Individual
Talent”, in The Sacred Wood and Major Early Essays (Mineola, New York:
Dover, 1998), 28.
13
Hellmann, “Vietnam”, 430.
14
Ibid., 431.
 Apocalypse Now as Hermeneutics of Heart of Darkness 131

That is why it admits other versions –in the sense we have been discussing
so far– without losing its essence. It is all about bringing complementary
angles into play that do not cancel each other out. The myth’s truth is so
vast –the “heart of darkness” so profound– that neither version exhausts it,
so each of them –close to the essence– shows aspects, multiple aspects,
that are necessary precisely because they belong to it. If the poetic myth is
the “soul of tragedy”15 as the animation principle, forms and elements with
which the artist expresses it can vary, as they do in this novel and in this
film. Thus, the issue is neither Vietnam nor the Congo, neither Marlow nor
Willard, even less is it about Kurtz as a rubber businessman and ivory
agent, or about a famous colonel in the American Green Berets. With the
consistency they achieve, as art objects with the same internal consistency
as reality, they manifest the same poetic truth of, as Stewart puts it, “the
human mind’s recurrent nightmare of its own abyss.”16 And this is what
matters in the end. This is why I refer to the concept of a “version” that
asks to be understood. That version must be about the myth itself, not
necessarily coping the precise time and place or plot, or other elements of
the original that are less central, more incidental, than that underlying
myth.
George Steiner stated that “the true hermeneutic of drama is staging.”17
Why? Because it is in the attempt to display the formal elements in a
genuine and consistent way by means of or in, when a poetic truth will
show or manifest itself and where we find the question regarding the
ultimate meaning. I think films usually fail in their effort to adapt novels
(or cinematographic adaptations of literary works, which is the same)
precisely because what they do is to simply transfer the plot –an
articulation of actions– from one artistic language to another. Following
Aristotle’s ideas, poetically speaking, cinema (imitating with images and
sound) will never achieve the same as literature (imitating with words).
Even though both arts do not differ much in what they imitate, they
definitely do differ in the means by which they imitate and, most certainly,
in the way in which they imitate18. Thus, they will never be poetically
comparable and the film version or adaptation will usually fail, as has so
often occurred. It is all about the insuperable difference in the mimetic

15
Poetics 1450a38-39.
16
Stewart, “Coppola’s Conrad,” 474. Regarding the title of the film, his article
finishes in the following way: “Apocalypse, now or to come, means in its own
original sense, after all, not only Doomsday but Revelation” (Idem).
17
George Steiner, Real Presences (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press,
1991), 19.
18
Cf. Poetics 1449a7 ff.
132 Chapter Eight

doing, unless, as I propose, the poetic myth is rewritten using the proper
means and ways of imitation regarding the art in question, in this case the
cinema; that is, with the same mimetic object and exploiting cinema’s own
elements. In so doing, the adaptation will poetically work towards a result
and an aesthetic effect that are true to its own nature. If the object of
mimesis is to achieve the same, and the film, with the elements that are
inherent to that media, works poetically to achieve a result and an aesthetic
effect on the audience according to its own nature, the result will not only
have an intrinsic value of its own –the purpose of any work of art is its
own perfection– but its effect will also be both new and equivalent.
Stunningly new… like seeing the same thing with new eyes: two different
mirrors for the same face. It will be an identical animation principle –the
fable or plot as Aristotle’s “soul of tragedy”– for different aesthetic
objects.
Even though it is not the main topic of the present chapter, I still
consider it a relevant digression for what has been said so far to insist upon
the impossibility of cinema adaptations for novels. Not, at least, if we
consider an adaptation, as I previously explained, as a mere transfer of
articulated actions from one argument line to the audiovisual format. At
the most, this film will be true to the episodes in the novel, to that simple
notion of “what it is about”, but it will never be true to its soul, to the
principle that animates it. Novels and literary works are not about
something; they are something, as German E. Vargas comments:

If one holds fiction to be an imitation of nature, then likewise one would

think that cinematographic adaptations of literary works would be
imitations of literature. Apocalypse Now proves that this is not necessarily
so. It also proves that there is more to literary adaptation than fidelity,
infidelity, and additions. In this film, we see a multiplicity of texts, for
instance, as well as musical and historical associations or adaptations, and
the ways in which these texts and adaptations can all intermingle and
cohere. By mixing rather than translating the images, narrative, and ideas
of literary works as with other “texts” such as musical pieces and historical
events, Coppola is able to develop a subtext for the film that freely
incorporates any association that is relevant to its purpose.19

Consequently, so as to effectively adapt, in the sense of recreating in

its genre, cinema should film the poetic myth. In my opinion, this is
precisely what Coppola has done in Apocalypse Now.

19
German E. Vargas, “Narrative Mode, Mixed Images, and Adaptation in Francis
Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now,” Atenea 24, no. 2 (2004): 98-99.
 Apocalypse Now as Hermeneutics of Heart of Darkness 133

Let’s ask ourselves: what is the substance of Heart of Darkness? What

is the essence of Apocalypse Now? A journey through an unknown land in
search of an unknown heart of a man who is out of control, whose
delirium to play God has seduced men beyond –at least one step further–
what is reasonably human, given the hybris. And this man must be taken
away, at whatever cost, as he must not remain there for his own sake; that
of his hypnotized subjects and the rest of the world. Meanwhile, the
searcher who is looking through the unknown is getting to know himself.
As Steier suggests, the film “takes the form of a quest, a form used as a
metaphor of the search for origins and self-knowledge, and seemingly
inverts it by pushing the central character […] deeper and deeper into
confusion and the unknown.”20 As scenario and context we find hundreds
of signs, clues, and remains of what this man –this terrible and dangerous
unknown man– has left behind and has been able to understand or translate
as “the horror”. And that is all…21 If all this can be poetically articulated,
if it manages to become an aesthetic object whose perfection lies in itself,
the importance of whether it is cinema or literature is relativised. We do
not care anymore for the ambiguous language or the subversive images
affecting us. But I say “we do not care” in terms of tools, resources, and
elements in which the myth turns into existence, precisely what matters the
most: its aesthetic truth, what it is as a poetic work.
As Marlow says about Kurtz, “[h]e has something to say. He said it”22.
What? “The horror! The horror!” It is not an elaborated phrase but a
linguistic condensation of what lies at the heart of darkness. Kurtz has not

20
Saul Steier, “Make Friends with Horror,” 115. The author includes other
interesting references to “racism” in the movie, attitude that is also present in
Conrad’s novel. Refer to 120-121.
21
There is another interesting element: both, the movie and the novel, share, and
Fabio Viti reminds us: the criticism to civilization: “La barbarie, la tenebra,
l’oscurità che prima era identificata nella natura ostile si rivela nella sua vera
essenza: la barbarie non è altro che un prodotto della civiltà, la contrapposizione
tenebra/luce non esiste più. La natura non è il male perché il male è un risultato
della civiltà. È la condanna conradiana del colonialismo. Il male, la barbarie
appaiono nella natura, nel selvaggio, non perché appartengono a questo universo,
ma perché è la civiltà a proiettarli fuori da sé. Al termine del viaggio nella natura
selvaggia e ostile Marlow/Willard incontrerà il prodotto massimo della sua civiltà:
Kurtz.” Fabio Viti, “Il primitivo secondo Kurtz. L’apocalisse dell’uomo civile
nelle ‘culture della crisi’,” La Ricerca Folklorica 10 (1984): 91. As complement to
the racial and gender issues, see Worthy, Kim. “Emissaries of Difference: Conrad,
Coppola, and Hearts of Darkness.” Women’s Studies 25, no. 2 (1996): 153-167.
22
Conrad, Heart of Darkness, 116.
134 Chapter Eight

only seen this darkness, but also contributed to it. At the same time, he is
the voice: in the novel as well as in the movie he is presented as a voice.

Anything approaching the change that came over his features I have never
seen before, and hope never to see again. Oh, I wasn’t touched. I was
fascinated. It was as though a veil had been rent. I saw on that ivory face
the expression of sombre pride, of ruthless power, of craven terror –of an
intense and hopeless despair. Did he live his life again in every detail of
desire, temptation, and surrender during that supreme moment of complete
knowledge? He cried in a whisper at some image, at some vision –he cried
out twice, a cry that was no more than a breath– The horror! The horror!23

Probably, a partial understanding of the above led Marsha Kinder to

affirm that Coppola, when identifying Kurtz with the war atrocities,
distorts the topic of power and alters the delicate equilibrium between
Conrad’s novel and Vietnam. In this line, she adds, “the film succeeds in
forcing us to experience the horror of the war and to acknowledge our own
complicity in it, but it fails to illuminate the nature of Kurtz’s horror.”24 I
propose the exact opposite. If considered correctly, Coppola has not set the
focus on the war, nor did Conrad focus on the exploitation of the Belgian
Congo. They are important elements of the background and scenery, but
the main issue is unquestionably Kurtz. In fact, Kinder also suggests that
the movie is “amazingly true to the story’s core of meaning”25 and “a
masterful work that equals the power of Conrad’s vision”26. Moreover, it
“must be seen both as a nightmarish vision of the historical events and as
an exploration of one man’s journey through madness.”27 This exact
exploration sets Kurtz as the cause and object, with Millard personally
participating, becoming an equivalent to Conrad’s novel and serving as
hermeneutics for it. Coppola is not telling the story of Vietnam nor is he
creating a metaphor for it. Rather, he has poetically rewritten the myth of
Heart of Darkness summarized in that shriek which is no more than a
voice thread: “The horror! The horror!” As Stewart correctly argues; “the
film’s real power derives from its sustained attempt to transpose the
story’s incremental repetitions of style, plot, and psychology into a new
cinematic register and a new century.”28

23
Ibid., 115.
24
Marsha Kinder, “The Power of Adaptation in Apocalypse Now,” Film Quarterly
33, no. 2 (1979-80): 13.
25
Kinder, “The Power,” 15.
26
Ibid.,18.
27
Ibid., 14.
28
Stewart, “Coppola’s Conrad,” 455.
 Apocalypse Now as Hermeneutics of Heart of Darkness 135

I am not in a position to know whether or not Coppola wanted his film

to serve as hermeneutics for Conrad’s novel. From the point of view of
intentio operis, neither is the case fully clear that the movie serves as
hermeneutics for the novel. Nevertheless, given the previous and main
arguments being, as I insist, that of rewriting the poetic myth, for the
spectator the movie serves as hermeneutics or it can, at least, work as such.
This simply confirms, from another point of view, the Aristotelian
postulate that “poetry is more philosophical and more elevated than
history, since poetry relates more of the universal, while history relates
particulars.”29 In other words, poetic works deal with general truths and
not with factual or empirical ones, as the historic discipline was
understood during the times of the Philosopher. Apocalypse Now works as
a hermeneutic exercise of Heart of Darkness precisely because it “relates”
the “universal”; an identical general truth. I have discussed the movie as a
hermeneutic exercise of the novel and not the other way round. Is this
objective or subjective? Are there objective reasons to affirm there is only
a one-way direction for this hermeneutic exercise? Or, does everything
depend upon the reader/spectator’s itinerary of receptions? If someone
watches Coppola’s film and then reads Conrad’s novel, when this person
watches the film for a second time, will its meaning be enriched? If the
idea is to rewrite the same poetic myth, the answer cannot but be
affirmative for both cases. With Eliot’s dictum about how new works
revise our reception of older ones firmly in mind, we realize that despite
almost a hundred years haved passed, between the publication of the novel
and the film’s release, if we see Coppola’s film a second time, this time
after having read Conrad’s novel, we will necessarily see it in a different
way. Our mental lenses would have changed.

Bibliography
Apocalypse Now. Directed by Francis Ford Coppola. 1979. USA:
Paramount Home Video, 2001. DVD.
Cahir, Linda Costanzo. “Narratological Parallels in Joseph Conrad’s Heart
of Darkness and Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now.”
Literature/Film Quarterly 20, no. 3 (1992): 181-187.
Conrad, Joseph. “Heart of Darkness.” In Heart of Darkness and Selected
Short Fiction. New York: Barnes & Noble Classics, 2003. 37-124.
Eliot, T.S. “Tradition and the Individual Talent.” In The Sacred Wood and
Major Early Essays. Mineola, New York: Dover, 1998. 27-33.

29
Poetics 1451b5-7.
136 Chapter Eight

Halliwell, Stephen, trans. The Poetics of Aristotle. Chapel Hill: The

University of North Carolina Press, 1987.
Hellmann, John. “Vietnam and the Hollywood Genre Film: Inversions of
American Mythology. In The Deer Hunter and Apocalypse Now.”
American Quarterly 34, no. 4 (1982): 418-439.
Kinder, Marsha. “The Power of Adaptation in Apocalypse Now.” Film
Quarterly 33, no. 2 (1979-80): 12-20.
Martínez-Lage, Miguel. “… La verdad según Marlow.” In Conrad, Joseph.
Los libros de Marlow: Juventud, El corazón de las tinieblas, Lord Jim
y Azar. Madrid: Edhasa, 2008. 9-29.
Steier, Saul. “Make Friends with Horror and Terror: Apocalypse Now.”
Social Text 3 (1980): 114-122.
Steiner, George. Real Presences. Chicago: The University of Chicago
Press, 1991.
Stewart, Garrett. “Coppola’s Conrad: The Repetitions of Complicity”.
Critical Inquiry 7, no. 3 (1981): 455-474.
Vargas, German E. “Narrative Mode, Mixed Images, and Adaptation in
Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now.” Atenea 24, no. 2 (2004):
91-101.
Viti, Fabio. “Il primitivo secondo Kurtz. L’apocalisse dell’uomo civile
nelle ‘culture della crisi’.” La Ricerca Folklorica 10 (1984): 91-100.
 CHAPTER NINE

DEATH IN VENICE:
FROM THOMAS MANN TO LUCHINO VISCONTI.
AN ARTISTIC INTERPRETATION OF ART1

ISMAEL GAVILÁN
UNIVERSIDAD DE LOS ANDES, CHILE

1. Introduction
From its very beginning, film making has engaged in the practice of
transposing literary texts to film. It soon found its greatest potential in the
creation and communication of stories; hence, its interest in keeping
certain dependence on literature, particularly on its dramatic and narrative
strategies. In other words, the film industry chose to re-tell the stories that
literature had already told using new forms of expression. Understanding
the transposition of literary works to the medium of films, has required to
expand the concept of comparativism because transposition is no longer
exclusively based on the textual qualities that define and differentiate
works of different orders, literary genres, or languages, but has also
widened the horizons of interpretative possibility that literary discourse in
itself entails within a framework of clear semiotic tone.2
Regarding the semiotics of cinema, Jean Mitry explains in most of his
works that cinema is not only an art, but “a kind of language, a ‘visual
event’ loaded with meaning.”3 Moreover, he argues that “cinema before

1
This chapter is part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso Internacional
de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, 9-10 October,
2013.
2
Jean Mitry, La semiología en tela de juicio: cine y lenguaje (Madrid: Ediciones
Akal, 1990).
3
Jean Mitry, “Preliminaries”, in Semiotics and the Analysis of Film, trans.
Christopher King (UK: Athlone Press, 2000), 1.
138 Chapter Nine

being a language is a means of expression”4; that is to say, it conveys

meaning, albeit in a different way than literature does, since the “text”
created by the film is formed by images. Therefore, Mitry is against the
analysis of films that is based exclusively on linguistic paradigms, as
Daniel Yacavone clearly points out: his interpretation of films moves
“toward a broader conception of the referential and expressive dimensions
of films and their created worlds.5 I think that this referential property –the
allusion or reference to these “worlds”, which, in turn, refer to realityí
present in films and in others forms of art is precisely the meeting point for
comparison and, certainly, the element that makes the interpretation of one
work of art from another work of art possible. I will develop this idea
further in section number two, taking into account George Steiner’s notion
of critical act.
In this chapter, I would like to engage in a comparative and
interpretative exercise, reading two classics from two genres íliterature
and filmí that have been compared in their fundamental features several
times; these are: Death in Venice, the novella by Thomas Mann, and the
film of the same name, based on the novella’s story, by Luchino Visconti,
whose cinematic “reading” of the plot is one of the most interesting and
brilliant examples of how to transform a work of art from one medium to
another, as an active critical act.6
First, I will roughly outline what we mean by that phrase: “an active
critical act”; then, I will describe both the novella and the film in their
most important features, and later, I will establish some points that I think
are unique in Visconti’s reading of Mann’s novella, thus emphasizing the
differences in the arts of literature, music, visual arts, and film. I aim to
elucidate how these manifestations operate as part of Visconti’s
interpretative mechanism, as it broadens the perspective of Mann’s
novella, rather than denying it, or doing something radically different to it;
that is to say, understanding it in all its possibilities of creative potential, in
what it means to develop certain qualities that only the language of film
can completely show.

4
Jean Mitry, The Aesthetics and Psychology of the Cinema, trans. Christopher
King (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2000), 54.
5
Daniel Yacavone, Film Worlds: A Philosophical Aesthetics of Cinema (New
York, Columbia University Press, 2015), 66.
6
José Román, “Luchino Visconti: Un novelista cinematográfico”, Revista de cine,
no. 4, Santiago: Universidad de Chile (2005): 7-14.
 Death in Venice: From Thomas Mann to Luchino Visconti 139

2. Steiner’s Critical Act

As George Steiner íon whose premises this brief reflection restsí rightly
states, all art, literature, and serious music, is also a critical act.7 Whether
realistic, fantastic, utopian, or satirical, the work of every artist is a
counter-statement to the world, as it implies the embodiment of
concentrated and selective interactions between the restrictions imposed
by the actually observed, and the limitless possibilities of the imagination.
This intensity formed of vision and speculative ordering is always a
criticism, since it establishes that things could be different. Likewise,
literature and the arts become criticism in a particular and practical sense:
they embody an expository reflection, a value judgement on what has been
transmitted, and the context to which the expressions of these various arts
belong.
Certainly, all aesthetic creation is an example of intelligence at its
highest, as it relates raw material, anarchic prodigality of consciousness,
and the subconscious to order it in a new and creative way. This
translation may transform the inarticulate and private into an intelligible
matter. Hence, readings, performances, art critiques, literature and music,
which are analysed and critically appreciated from within the same form
of art become a relevant hermeneutical authority, rarely equated to that
offered from outside; that is to say, presented by the reviewer, critic, or
academic. Thus, every poet, artist, and film maker can share the light of
his own expressive and creative resources, probably based on the formal
and substantive achievements of the great predecessors, submitting this
“co-creation” to the most strict analysis and appraisal. Such a critical act
plays an important role in all reading worth considering. For instance,
when the poet criticises the poet from within the poem, when the painter
criticises the painter from within the four corners of the canvas, or the
musician criticises the musician from the inside of the musical
composition, we can witness a living hermeneutics that is carried out with
creative responsibility. That creative responsibility becomes a response
and, at the same time, prompts another response, which in turn is a real
understanding of the work of art that demands an appropriation of
meaning, as well as its appreciation. In other words, the aesthetic review
that I attempt to outline is better expressed when it acquires a responsible
form, comparable to its object, or, paraphrasing Borges, when an artist or
work of art invents its precursors in the re-creation of its expressive

7
George Steiner. Presencias Reales: ¿Hay algo en lo que decimos? (Barcelona:
Ediciones Destino, 1991), 24ff.
140 Chapter Nine

possibilities, whether material or symbolic.8 In this way, it seems to me

that Visconti’s reading of Mann’s novella is an active critical act. I will try
to clarify the challenge that this poses.

3. Novel into Film: Visconti’s Reading of Mann

Published in 1912, Death in Venice by Thomas Mann is a short novel or
novella that relates the last days of the celebrated writer, Gustav von
Aschenbach, who succumbs to the beauty of the young Tadzio, only
thirteen or fourteen, whom he meets at the Hotel Lido in Venice. From this
fascination, which turns into obsession, the narrator reflects, following the
thoughts of its protagonist and discussing the proposals of Plato’s Phaedo
and Nietzsche’s The Birth of Tragedy about beauty and art, and questions
whether they are the result of a natural process or the product of work and
reason. In this way, Mann presents the struggle between the Apollonian
force (which Aschenbach, and perhaps Thomas Mann, had embodied
throughout their lives) and the Dionysian (the destructive and, at the same
time, vital force, which now intoxicates him). In fact, most characters in
the novel move between restraint and passion. Despite its fairly concise
plot, the story is full of symbolic and mythological references, abstract
thought, and aesthetic reflection.
Apart from being one of the most significant representatives of Italian
neorealism during the 50s and the first half of the 60s with such films as
Rocco and his Brothers and Senso, Visconti addresses what has been
called the Tedesca or German trilogy with Falling Gods, Ludwig and the
film being discussed here, Death in Venice. Released in 1971, with a
superb performance by Dirk Bogarde, Visconti’s film is noted for his
remarkable photography work, which combines his skilful montage
scenes, saturated with aesthetic details, and decadent scenes in order to
keep the attention of the viewer through long panning shots that recreate,
quite plausibly, a closer look that involves us, with an almost natural
rhythm, into the plot. In turn, the music of Mahler’s adagietto from his
fifth symphony, as well as the fragments of his third symphony, constitute
another “protagonist”, which provides a non-verbal language, weaving a
dense plot that evokes the narrative of the novel.9
Having established this general presentation of both the novella and the
film, we will now analyse how Visconti reads Mann. First, we can
8
Ibid.
9
Miguel Ángel Hernández: “Mahler-Aschenbach: la encrucijada de la creación:
consideraciones filosóficas en torno al film Muerte en Venecia de Luchino
Visconti”. Revista de cine, no. 3. Santiago: Universidad de Chile (2002): 33-54.
 Death in Venice: From Thomas Mann to Luchino Visconti 141

appreciate, within Visconti’s film development, a thematic stylization with

the resources used. Unlike what he did with the other film that takes a
novel as its source íIl Gattopardo by Lampedusaí we neither expect, nor
do we find here the narrative fidelity that the novella provides. A relevant
fact is that Visconti decided to start off with the arrival of Aschenbach in
Venice, which is not in Mann’s novella and becomes a telling gesture; in
turn, three immediate references radically differ from the original text:
Aschenbach is presented as a musician, not as a writer; the music of
Mahler creates a characteristic atmosphere that invades the entire film, and
as an evocative detail, the vaporetto in which our protagonist arrives to
Venice, has a meaningful name: Esmeralda. I will revisit each of these
details, but for now I will only offer them as examples in order to make
clear the way in which Visconti differentiates his film from Mann’s
novella from the very beginning. As I stated before, the film is a critical
act íthrough artí of Mann’s novel. What can be said about that?

4. Adaptation as Critical Act

First, it is interesting to explore the key role that music plays in the film.
By different accounts, we know that Mann declared that one of his sources
of inspiration for the novella was his learning of the death of Gustav
Mahler in May 1911. Such a declaration is not irrelevant, if we do not
think only in the possible sources of Death in Venice, but in Mann’s
specific interest in music, as we can see in other novels such as The
Buddenbrock, The Magic Mountain, and in Doktor Faustus. Music for
Thomas Mann is not only a significant correlate of the various actions in
his works, but provides the foundation that moves his characters to find
their destinies. Under the formative influence of Schopenhauer, Nietzsche
and Wagner, Mann makes music the centre of his aesthetic, moral, and
behavioural concerns, as well as of his thirst for knowledge. It is as if the
art of sounds were the light that illuminates our desired and real perception
of our actions, thus, making us see reality under a different and
problematic prism. Therefore, it is not mistaken to think that Visconti, in
an act of true creativity, decided to present Aschenbach as a musician and
not as a writer. Furthermore, his choice of Mahler’s music does not only
illustrate the action of the film, but becomes a real commentary, in sound,
to the scenes that follow. Why does he choose the fifth symphony
adagietto? The answer is multifaceted and complex.
The adagietto is based on two sources: the lied “Liebst du um
schönbeit” (If you love me for my beauty) of the song cycle based on
poems by Rückert, composed by Mahler himself. He quotes the “reason
142 Chapter Nine

for the look” from the opera Tristan and Isolde by Wagner, a true
paradigm of passion and desire. Visconti subtly unravels the feel of what
Aschenbach expresses better than any dialogue or narrative may say in
words. In addition, the adagietto is not the only part of Mahler’s music
included. In a fleeting but telling way, Visconti introduces a remarkable
scene: Tadzio is on the beach, playing with friends and the sea breeze
brings the image of a nearly perfect display of beauty, strength and
enthusiasm in adolescent bodies to Aschenbach’s eyes. His face looks
radiant, admiring the scene. And, as that happens, we hear the singing by a
contralto of the fourth movement of the third symphony, the “O Mensch
Gib Acht!” which refers to the final part of Thus Spoke Zarathustra. What
is the meaning of this reference? According to Visconti, pleasure is deeper
than pain, as the former claims for eternity, whereas the latter is finite. We
see here a deep irony, one that establishes distance between desire and its
object, for it is not only the physical longing that draws Aschenbach to the
young man, but the idea that he is an example of perfect artistic beauty. In
the film, Visconti makes us reflect about aesthetic and existential truths
and the “price” that an artist must pay in response to the call of his
vocation. This is symbolically represented when in the final scene
Aschenbach stretches Tadzio’s hand and, heightened by the crescendo in
Mahler’s adagietto, collapses on his chair and dies from cholera infection.
Visconti employs pictorial “quotation” superbly, making references to
visual arts in different moments of the film. I want to briefly offer here
three examples: first, the figure of Tadzio in the novella seems more an
abstract figure out of a Platonic dialogue than a real presence. In the film,
however, Björn Andrésen literally embodies that indistinct, androgynous,
and seductive beauty, so much so, that Botticelli’s Birth of Venus or
Spring becomes the physical reference for Tadzio. With this gesture, we
are not only guided to understand beauty as the speculative act the novella
shows, but also to see in Tadzio’s face something that reminds us of the
masterful paintings of the Italian Renaissance. Secondly, in the final scene,
when Aschenbach is dying on the beach, he has a last glimpse of Tadzio:
twilight falls, the games are over and the camera captures, from an unusual
angle, the young boy with one hand on his waist, lifting the other, as the
sun sets beneath the horizon, and the sea covers his feet. It is impossible
not to think about Apollo, not only because he is both a symbol of art and
beauty, as well as of destruction and disease. Visconti offers multiple
references to sculptures of David by Donatello and Michelangelo who, in
turn, took for their models the Apollo Belvedere. Here we see a
combination of paganism of classical antiquity and the Judeo-Christian
message of the young man chosen to save his people. That intersection is
 Death in Venice: From Thomas Mann to Luchino Visconti 143

intensified in allusions to the challenges that are demanded of those who

exercise their art: detachment, renunciation and awareness of mortality.
Certainly, Mann established a link with these allusions, those that Visconti
masterfully develops through images. Is it a revival of an earlier
sensitivity, one from the Belle Époque in which the novella takes place? I
hesitate to answer this question, though it opens up discussion on the
intricate relationships between art, subjectivity and the educational value
of pain and pleasure.
A third significant image comes when Aschenbach discovers Tadzio
alone in the hotel lounge playing on the piano a snippet of Beethoven’s
Fur Elise. Aschenbach then remembers his own youth, when, at a brothel,
he met a young prostitute named Esmeralda. After a moment, Aschenbach
gives excuses and leaves the lounge, and what we see in the mirror is the
image of the girl sitting at the feet of the bed. That image is a subtle link to
Toulouse-Lautrec or Edvard Munch: a clear allusion to the connections
between eroticism (prostitute), disease (syphilis), innocence (young
teenagers) and Beauty (full lines and seductive bodies) in a suggestive
amalgam. But through the name of the young prostitute íEsmeraldaí we
see that Visconti also alludes to a scene from another novel by Thomas
Mann, Doktor Faustus, where the protagonist, Adrian Leverkühn,
musician, has the same experience as the one depicted in the film. That is
significant because in Mann’s Doktor Faustus that event will lead
Leverkühn to catch syphilis from Mephistopheles, the ironic gift of artistic
genius. Esmeralda refers to a similar character in the above-mentioned
novel and is also the name of the ship on which Aschenbach arrives in
Venice, thus it produces a constellation of allusions to Mann’s work that
Visconti allows us to appreciate in the film. To an extent, the film director
goes beyond mere transposition of a literary work onto the screen, but
expands its meaning through images.
What these few examples show is how a film does not only recreate a
novel or becomes exclusively its semiotic equivalent. We are in the
presence of a true act of critical creation where Visconti used Mann’s
novella to make it say with force and subtlety what in the novel may not
be openly perceived, a suggestive reflection of the nature of art and its
implications for us as viewers, readers, or creators. The tension between the
Apollonian and the Dionysian principles that Mann presents in Death in
Venice is intensified in the film, as Visconti seems to suggest that these
forces may become tragically incompatible. Both in the novel and in the
film, we see a morbid staging of a decadent sexuality, yet in the latter
Visconti emphasises the sensual relationship between Aschenbach and
Tadzio, who also has a more active role in the film. Author and director
144 Chapter Nine

endeavour to make us realise that beauty always inspires, yet this

inspiration may lead to different ends: insatiable desire or aesthetic
pleasure.

Bibliography
Death in Venice. Directed by Luchino Visconti. 1971. USA: Warner
Home Video, 2006. DVD.
Hernández, Miguel Ángel. “Mahler-Aschenbach: La encrucijada de la
creación: consideraciones filosóficas en torno al film Muerte en
Venecia de Luchino Visconti”. Revista de cine, no. 3. Santiago:
Universidad de Chile (2002): 33-54.
Mitry, Jean. La semiología en tela de juicio (cine y lenguaje). Madrid:
Ediciones Akal, 1990.
—. “Preliminaries”, in Semiotics and the Analysis of Film, trans.
Christopher King. UK: Athlone Press, 2000.
—. The Aesthetics and Psychology of the Cinema, trans. Christopher King.
Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2000.
Román, José. “Luchino Visconti: Un novelista cinematográfico”. Revista
de cine, no. 4. Santiago: Universidad de Chile (2005): 7-14.
Steiner, George. Presencias Reales ¿hay algo en lo que decimos?
Barcelona: Ediciones Destino, 1991.
 CHAPTER TEN

IN DIALOGUE WITH THE POETIC MYTH

OF BRIDESHEAD REVISITED1

CARMEN SOFÍA BRENES

UNIVERSIDAD DE LOS ANDES, CHILE

This chapter analyses the adaptations of Evelyn Waugh’s novel,

Brideshead Revisited, for the 1981 TV serial and for the 2008 film. The
analysis is limited to the first reception of the work of the two groups of
screenwriters who wrote the screenplays for the serial and the film,
respectively. In the case of the TV serial, although John Mortimer is given
credit as writer, the TV screenplay was actually written by the producer,
Derek Granger, in collaboration with other writers.2 The screenplay for the
film was the work of Andrew Davis and Jeremy Brock.
Viewers both in Britain and America were enthralled with the 11-
episode TV adaptation of Brideshead Revisited.3 The serial initially
elicited assorted reactions from the critics, although the favourable reviews
outnumbered the unfavourable. Thomas P. McDonnell described the serial
as “brilliant”4, while in the opinion of Joseph Sobran it was full of

1
This chapter has been funded by the National Fund for Scientific and
Technological Development and is part of Fondecyt Initiation Project 11110275
(Chile).
2
Mortimer’s screenplay, which consisted of six episodes, was never used. Cf.
Valerie Grove, A Voyage Round John Mortimer (London: Penguin, 2008), [Kindle
DX ebook]. Amazon.com.
3
On Monday evening, Jan. 18, 1982, WNET premiered in New York the TV
serial. “It was estimated that 60 percent of all the TV households in America
watched PBS for an average of three hours”, David Stewart, “Revisiting
Brideshead Revisited”, Current.org, December 30, 2011,
http://www.current.org/1920/04/revisiting-brideshead-revisited/ (accessed July 12,
2014).
4
Thomas P. McDonnell, “Beyond Brideshead”, National Review 36, no. 7 (April
20, 1984): 53.
146 Chapter Ten

“pregnant pauses” and as slow-moving as the novel.5 As a matter of fact,

the serial does unfold at a slow pace, in which both Geoffrey Burgon’s
musical score and the acting play important roles. This, which might be
otherwise regarded as a flaw, is also an achievement that is particularly
valid if we consider, along with Jeffrey Hart, that in this way, the TV
version –and, specifically, the scene in which Charles Ryder observes
Lord Marchmain crossing himself before he dies– takes into account and
represents that feature of the original novel which, according to Hart, is
embodied in T.S. Eliot’s poem: “The point of intersection of the timeless
with time.”6
In due course, the TV adaptation was recognized as one of the most
outstanding productions of British television. In 2000, a group of film
industry professionals polled by the British Film Institute awarded the
serial tenth place on the list of the 100 Greatest British Television
Programmes; in 2007, Time magazine included it in its top 100 best
television shows of all time; and in 2011, thirty years after being produced,
The New York Times reported that “Brideshead still stands as the sine qua
non of mini-series.”7
The 2008 film adaptation directed by Julian Jarrold was, on the
contrary, not a box office success8 and received more negative than
positive write-ups. While some praised the director and screenwriters for
having “reinterpreted” Brideshead Revisited “for a new generation”9,
others criticized this version for having reduced the plot to its romantic
elements and having resorted to narrative shortcuts to make it less
complex than the original. Pattenden, for instance, described this version
as “superficial and sexualized” and added that the film had failed to
exploit the potential of the text to reformulate the issues of the novel in

5
Joseph Sobran, “Slow-Mo Waugh”, National Review 34, no. 5 (March 19, 1982):
310.
6
Jeffrey Hart, “Brideshead Indeed Revisited”, National Review 34, no. 9 (May 14,
1982): 541.
7
Thomas Vinciguerra, “‘Brideshead Revisited’, 30 Years Later”, New York
Times, sec. Arts / Television, December 30, 2011,
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/01/arts/television/brideshead-revisited-30-years-
later.html (accessed July 12, 2014).
8
On the first weekend the box-office takings of the film were US$339,616 in the
USA “Brideshead Revisited (2008)-Box Office Mojo”,
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=bridesheadrevisited.htm (accessed
July 12, 2014).
9
David Ansen, “You Can Go Home Again”, Newsweek 152, no. 4 (July 28, 2008):
53.
 In Dialogue with the Poetic Myth of Brideshead Revisited 147

terms of today’s society.10 Mollie Wilson O’Reilly said the film rejected
the notions about faith that gave sense to the novel: “suffering, holiness,
sin and redemption.”11 Kevin Doherty accused the film version of not
going beyond melodrama and failing to explore the collapse of aristocracy,
the question of personal and religious identity, and the mysteries of human
love12. David Skinner called it “an especially lean representation of the
original novel.”13 There was a somewhat similar reaction on the part of the
major critics in the American media: A.O. Scott, R. Ebert, M. Olsen, etc.
This difference in reception by the critics suggests a hypothesis that
may help to illustrate Marta Frago’s idea of adaptation and re-adaptation
being a dialogue between the adapter and the poetic myth of the story.14
Specifically, the hypothesis of this article is that the film adaptation of
Brideshead Revisited does not permit us to see the same shift that gives
unity to the novel and the TV version. The idea is not to conclude whether
Jarrold’s story is better or worse than the original, but to verify whether
some of the core features of the novel on which the film is based are
actually discernible.

1. The Poetic Proposal

Before focusing on this issue, it may be of use to recall briefly Frago’s
observations on adaptation. She points out that alongside the semiotic
drift, there is another one which, in addition to addressing narratological
and structural issues, focuses on the fable or poetic myth as the element
that structures the text and is the meeting point of language and reality.15
An adaptation understood as dialogue and interpretation will differ from
another if it manages to recreate or reshape in the new work the same
underlying essence or poetic myth that gives life to the original in an
innovative way. As Frago explains, the poetic myth “is accessed from the

10
Oliver Pattenden, “Brideshead Revisited”, Cineaste 34, no. 1 (2008): 58-59.
11
Mollie Wilson O’Reilly, “Bare Ruined Choir ‘Brideshead Revisited’”,
Commonweal 135, no. 14 (August 15, 2008): 20.
12
Kevin Doherty, “Brideshead Revisited Again”, National Catholic Reporter 44,
no. 26 (August 22, 2008): 17.
13
David Skinner, “On Jeremy Irons’s Cheekbones”, Humanities, (September/
October, 2008): 2.
14
Cf. Marta Frago, “Reflexiones sobre la adaptación cinematográfica desde una
perspectiva iconológica”, Comunicación y Sociedad XVIII, no. 2 (2005): 49-81.
15
Ibid.
148 Chapter Ten

same narrative fiction, but places us above it, not at the level of fiction but
at that of reality and human experience.”16
The question raised by this analysis is what kind of dialogue has taken
place between the poetic myth of Waugh’s novel and the group of writers
of the TV serial and the movie? Or, to put it more directly: why is it
possible to say that the TV version of Brideshead Revisited is a proposal
that rewrites the underlying essence of the original work and the film
version is not?
Frago argues that there is a stable way of approaching the analysis of
an adaptation, which consists of observing the constant patterns existing in
the original and in the adaptation. This procedure, less observed among
recent authors, is not restricted to ascertaining what is radically new in the
adapted work when it is compared to the original, but starts from the
observation of what the works being studied have –or should have– in
common, on the assumption that what they have in common is the poetic
mythos, which is embodied in the constitution of the plot and is the
principle that provides the unity and internal coherence of the work. The
poetic myth, as Aristotle argues, is “like the soul” of the dramatic and
narrative work because the way in which the parts of the work are
articulated may represent, in the sense of “act as”, a specific aspect of the
human soul in its tension towards the life attained.17
Before addressing the analysis of the stories, we should consider one
more fact, namely, the existence of “dialogic activity”18 in the process of
adaptation. In other words, when a writer faces somebody else’s text –
whether it is to adapt it or simply to enjoy its content– a dialogue is
established between work and addressee, which has the typical traits of
friendship. It is a relationship in which, as García-Noblejas once said,
“politeness does not detract from bravery.” This implies that although
there is politeness towards the text at the time of the first reading (or “first
navigation”, as García-Noblejas calls this moment that Ricoeur refers to as
“understanding”), there should also be bravery with respect to the sense
that the text offers in terms of the global or synthetic reception of the work

16
Marta Frago, “Adaptación, readaptación y mito” (presented at the Literature and
Film International Congress, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago, Chile, 2013).
17
Cf. Juan José García-Noblejas, “Pensar hoy un sentido trascendente para la
catarsis aristotélica”, in Lavoro e Vita Quotidiana, ed. Giorgio Faro, vol. IV
(Roma: Edusc, 2003), 272.
18
Marta Frago, “Reflexiones sobre la adaptación cinematográfica desde una
perspectiva iconológica”, cit., 69.
 In Dialogue with the Poetic Myth of Brideshead Revisited 149

as a unity (the moment of the “second navigation”, or “application”

according to Ricoeur).19

2. Outline of the Story

Before analysing the TV and film versions, here is a brief reminder of
what the story is about. I shall use the narrative thread of the TV series20,
which follows that of the novel quite closely. Charles Ryder’s story is told
with a flashback. It opens with Ryder serving as an army officer during
World War II. At the beginning, little is known about him. A first person
narrator off screen says that he is tired of his monotonous life and
meaningless marriage. The narrative has an air of nostalgia, which
becomes even more evident when he arrives, with his regiment, at an old
stately home called Brideshead. Ryder reminisces that it was in that house
that he lived the best moments of his youth, which he condenses under
Virgil’s Latin phrase, “Et in Arcadia ego”. The story leaps further back
and begins narrating Ryder’s youth.
Charles, an agnostic, arrives to study at Oxford University in the early
1920s, where he meets an unusual character, Sebastian Flyte, member of
an upper class Catholic family. Despite his eccentric reputation at Oxford
–and perhaps for that very reason– Charles becomes close friends with
Flyte. This friendship is consolidated one summer, when Flyte invites
Ryder to his family home at Brideshead. Ryder avows that he has never
felt as happy as then.
Their friendship begins to undergo a change when Charles meets other
members of the Flyte family and Sebastian feels jealous when he realizes
that Charles gets along well with them. He drinks more heavily than usual
and accuses his friend of being a spy of his mother, Lady Marchmain.
19
The notion of courtesy applied to reception is George Steiner’s. Cf. George
Steiner, Real Presences (London: Faber and Faber, 2010), 175. For more on the
notions of “first” and “second navigation”, cf. Juan José García-Noblejas,
“Resquicios de Trascendencia en el cine. ‘Pactos de Lectura’ y ‘Segundas
Navegaciones’ en las películas”, in Poetica & Cristianesimo, ed. Rafael Jiménez
Cataño and Juan José García-Noblejas (Roma: Edusc, 2004), 29-70.
20
As an initial reference, I have used the timed breakdown of the serial, developed
by Rafael Zanetta Benguria for “Brideshead Revisited desde la Poética aristotélica:
Sústasis, mythos y conversión” (Undergraduate Thesis, School of Communication,
Universidad de los Andes, 2013). I thank the author for his permission to use this
material. If not otherwise indicated, the quotes are from the novel, cf. Evelyn
Waugh, Brideshead Revisited: The Sacred and Profane Memories of Captain
Charles Ryder (London: Penguin, 2003). [Kindle DX ebook]. Amazon.com.
150 Chapter Ten

Eventually, their friendship wears thin. Charles leaves Oxford to take up

painting and Sebastian, after being expelled from the University, goes
travelling in Europe and becomes an alcoholic. Charles gets on with his
painting and Sebastian gets on with his drinking. In the end, Flyte goes to
Morocco, where he and a German protégé live in decadence.
Ten years go by. Charles becomes a fairly prestigious painter, but his
life is monotonous. To break up this monotony he travels all over Central
America in search of new landscapes and inspiration. On the voyage back
to Europe, there is a chance encounter with Julia, Sebastian’s sister. There
are long conversations leading to a love affair even though they are both
married. They arrive in England and some time passes. Charles and Julia
carry on with their affair and decide to leave their respective spouses.
They move to Brideshead. Unexpectedly, Lord Marchmain, who had spent
years in the south of Italy with his mistress, announces his return to the
mansion. He is seriously ill and dies after receiving Extreme Unction and
accepting God’s forgiveness. This fact appears to impress Charles. It also
has an effect on Julia, who reconsiders her decision and says to Charles
that she cannot live with him: “I’m not quite bad enough to do; to set-up a
rival good to God’s”.
The story ends in the present, when Charles, in the midst of World War
II, is back in Brideshead. He feels “homeless, childless, middle-aged and
loveless”. He asks his deputy commander, Hooper, to take over being in
charge of the troops for a while and re-enters the mansion’s chapel. He
notices the Blessed Sacrament in the tabernacle. Charles genuflects, kneels
on a pew, and prays. He remains there for a moment, watching the small
lamp that illuminates the altar and then leaves. When Hooper sees him, he
says: “You’re looking unusually cheerful today”.

3. The Principle of Unity of the Novel and the Serial

The next step is to contrast the original novel and the TV serial (initially
similar in the constitution of their structure) with Jarrold’s film. The main
difference lies in the fact that whereas the novel and the television serial
are stories that show their unity in the act or movement of conversion or
openness to a transcendent faith, the film is a love-story in which the
development of the theme of love does not go beyond the initial stages of
attraction and erotic love.
Let us consider the first part of this assertion in further depth, that is,
the story of the novel and the serial as a representation of the action of
 In Dialogue with the Poetic Myth of Brideshead Revisited 151

conversion.21 A review of the beginnings and endings of the plots and

subplots of the story, makes it possible to suggest that the main thread of
the transformation of the characters is the movement of conversion,
although this becomes manifest in different ways.22
Charles, who had been indifferent to religion, sees the sign he had
asked for when Lord Marchmain is dying and understands God’s action.
At the end of the story, having recalled his past life, he takes a leap of
faith, embodied in his genuflection and prayer at the chapel. This is
followed by such fullness of joy that Hooper comments on the fact that he
looks “unusually cheerful”. In turn, Julia, who had no interest in coming
closer to God, recognizes that she can’t shut herself out “from his mercy”
and concludes that God has a special plan for her: “if I give up this one
thing I want so much, however bad I am, he won’t quite despair of me in
the end”. She ends up by taking care of the others, as a manifestation of
living by her faith. Cordelia, the youngest of the Flyte children, enjoys
closeness to God from the beginning of the story, but as the story unfolds,
her relationship with Him becomes more mature and understanding when
she realizes that everyone must follow a path of their own, which does not
necessarily identify with hers. Sebastian, who once refused to fight
temptation –“O God, make me good, but not yet” was his prayer at the
beginning of the story– ends up being happy because he feels useful by
helping his friend Kurt and, later, some monks in a monastery in Morocco.
Lord Marchmain, after a dissolute life, repents his sins and accepts God’s
forgiveness. His death “has been very peaceful”, says the nurse who takes
care of him23. Lady Marchmain dies without witnessing her husband’s and
children’s conversion, but Julia and Sebastian know that it was their
mother’s prayers that prevented them from definitely distancing
themselves from God.24

21
I study this issue in more detail in Carmen Sofía Brenes, “Verosimilitud,
necesidad y unidad de acción en la serie televisiva Brideshead Revisited (ITV-
Granada 1981)”, in Fuster Cano, Enrique (ed.), La figura del padre nella serialità
televisiva, Edusc, Roma 2014, pp. 173-184.
22
As García-Noblejas points out, the route of application, involving a personal
interpretation of the work as a unit, cannot be imposed on the viewers but can
certainly be suggested. Cf. García-Noblejas, “Resquicios de trascendencia en el
cine. ‘Pactos de Lectura’ y ‘Segundas Navegaciones’ en las películas”, cit. This is
what I do.
23
This line is not from the book.
24
Julia explicitly says this in the fountain scene. Sebastian, implicitly, when
talking about his mother, looks at the picture of the Virgin in his hospital room in
Morocco.
152 Chapter Ten

All these endings combined with Hooper’s final lines about Charles’
cheerful aspect and the music of Geoffrey Burgon’s Ave Verum
accompanying the image of the mansion with which the last episode of the
serial ends, point to a reading of conversion as a human action pervaded
by hope. This relationship between the way in which events intertwine
with the overall sense of the story, permits us to conclude that the
movement of conversion that gave unity to the novel is also present as the
mythos or soul of the story told in the serial (not always in the same way,
but always responding to one principle: God’s call to turn to Him and the
response of each man or woman).

4. Structuring of Events and Characterization in the Film

The film adaptation of Brideshead Revisited, however, is not a reformulation
of this same narrative core. To prove this point, it is necessary to analyse
some changes in approach with respect to the novel and the TV serial. As
Vineberg25 notes, one of the most significant changes in the structuring of
events in the film, which modifies the balance of the story and changes its
sense, was to have brought forward the romance between Charles and
Julia. In the film, Sebastian goes to Venice to visit his father and his
mistress, accompanied by both Charles and Julia. At this point in the film,
the film adapters invent a first kiss between Charles and Julia, which is
witnessed by Sebastian, and unleashes a reaction of jealousy. And from
then on, the plot becomes a love story, with a love triangle.
Along with this change in the structure of events, there are others that
refer to characterization, which also result in a change in the sense of the
original story. In the film fiction, Sebastian is explicitly homosexual and
Lady Marchmain is an inflexible woman who tyrannizes her children with
her Catholic ideas and is therefore to blame for Sebastian’s mental
breakdown for having reproached him with the charge that his behaviour
hurts Catholicism. Another change in characterization has to do with the
protagonist’s character. In the film, Charles is driven by social ambition,
expressed in his wish to have Brideshead for himself.
There are three scenes that –in my opinion– clearly show how the
approach of the film story differs from the TV serial which, as already
said, follows more closely the structure of the original work. The first
scene is Charles and Julia’s reunion on the boat, ten years after their first
meeting, when both of them are married; the second one is the death of

25
Steve Vineberg, “Brideshead Revisited”, Christian Century 125, no. 19
(September 23, 2008): 51.
 In Dialogue with the Poetic Myth of Brideshead Revisited 153

Lord Marchmain in Brideshead, surrounded by Charles and the whole

Marchmain family; and the third one is the scene that closes the novel, the
TV serial and the movie: Charles’s return and visit to the chapel when he
is stationed at Brideshead during the war.
The way in which the reunion between Charles and Julia on the boat is
shown reveals a progressive attention to an explicit physical relationship
between the characters, which is evident in the treatment of the five
original lines in the novel, which develop into a lengthy nude scene in the
serial and, in the film, a scene of open sexual content.
In turn, the scene of Lord Marchmain’s death is treated in a very sober
manner both in the book and in the series, while in the film the actions
take place more quickly and are constantly accompanied by music that
underscores the feelings of the characters. Charles’s attention at that
moment is focused on Julia more than on the liturgy and Lord
Marchmain’s impending death. In addition, Julia is the focus of attention –
also the visual focus– of the scene, which is a change with respect to the
serial.
The most interesting point of comparison between the TV serial and
the movie version is in the final scene. While in the novel and the series
Charles focuses his attention on the Catholic tabernacle over which a
“small flame red” is shining, in the film, Charles approaches an image of
the Virgin and Child, in front of which there is a lit candle. In the novel,
when Charles catches sight of the flame and the “beaten copper lamp of
deplorable design”, he kneels down and prays; in the series he also kneels
down and prays. In contrast with this, in the film Charles moves towards
the candle, is about to put it out, but does not. However, unlike the Charles
Ryder in the novel and in the serial, he neither kneels nor prays. Then,
Charles leaves the chapel. But whereas Charles, in the novel and the
series, hears Hooper’s voice saying: “You’re looking unusually cheerful
today”, in the film Charles disappears into a white mist, and hears nothing.

5. Different Ways of Engaging in Dialogue with the Poetic

Myth
The changes in the structure of events and characterization in the film,
relative to the original novel and the TV serial, and the three scenes of the
film that have been described make it possible to draw at least three
conclusions: 1) the modification in the structure of events may lead to
changes in sense; 2) the overall sense or unity of the work is related to the
way in which the diegetic action closes in the final scene; and 3) the poetic
myth or unity principle of the work that gave unity to Evelyn Waugh’s
154 Chapter Ten

novel has been recreated by the screenwriters of the TV version, whereas

it is not present in the same way in the movie.
If, as Mamet interprets, the soliloquy is “the protagonist talking to
God”26, we can conclude that in the book and the TV serial Charles’s
voice recounting his memories is the thread to narrate a drama of
conversion. On the contrary, as the film narrates Charles’s memories from
an ending that appears to be grafted on to the story (Charles leaving the
chapel, and then walking into a white light that enshrouds him makes no
narrative sense), it is a mere melodrama in which the authors, probably in
order not to betray the expectations of the viewers acquainted with the
original novel, had to make adjustments to come up with the expected end.
However, it was not what the love story they had told called for: the love
affair had ended long before, when the lovers parted.
To come back to my initial insistence: the conclusion that the film
version of Brideshead Revisited is not a recreation of poetic myth of the
story told by Evelyn Waugh in the novel and by the TV serial does not
mean that it is either a good or a bad adaptation. It merely confirms that
the dialogue between the film writers and the novel was more distant from
the essential core of the original story than the dialogue of their TV peers.
What happens is that in the case of a work considered a classic27, it is
unsurprising that the film should have met with some resistance on the part
of the audience because of the substantial changes made in some core
issues of a story that they know and love.

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Ansen, David. “You Can Go Home Again”. Newsweek 152, no. 4 (July 28,
2008): 53-53.
Brenes, Carmen Sofía. “Verosimilitud, necesidad y unidad de acción en la
serie televisiva Brideshead Revisited (ITV-Granada 1981)”. In La
figura del padre nella serialità televisiva, edited by Enrique Fuster
Cano, 173-184. Roma: Edusc 2014.
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Doherty, Kevin. “Brideshead Revisited Again”. National Catholic

26
David Mamet, Three Uses of the Knife: On the Nature and Purpose of Drama
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1998), 77.
27
As an example, Penguin includes it in its collection of Classics
http://www.penguinclassics.co.uk/nf/Book/BookDisplay/0,,9780141182483,00.ht
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iconológica”. Comunicación y Sociedad XVIII, no. 2 (2005): 49-81.
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Faro, IV: 265-292. Roma: Edusc, 2003.
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of Captain Charles Ryder. London: Penguin, 2003.
 CHAPTER ELEVEN

AUSTER VERSUS AUSTER:

AN ANALYSIS OF THE FEEDBACK PROCESS
BETWEEN CINEMA AND LITERATURE1

FRANCISCA APEY RAMOS

UNIVERSIDAD DIEGO PORTALES, CHILE

Adaptation, as an artistic process, has been used with all the ways of
traditional artistic expression: music, theatre, painting; art in general. But
with the beginning of the cinematographic age, a new way of
representation came into being, one that relied on, that exploited and
combined, many of the other long-established means of artistic expression
that we have listed. However, one kind of art stands out as posing
particular problems and possibilities in adaptation to the screen, and that is
literature.
In literature, we can find a way to create stories that possess a rich
blend of images and a particular narrative rhythm, a fundamental aspect
that attracts the new film makers searching for something more than just
the telling of a really good story. That’s why the structure, language, and
plot of a novel are all aspects that the screenwriter takes into account and
not the story alone, when adapting works originally crafted in words to the
screen.
But what happens with the contemporary novel, in which the story may
not be nearly as important as playing with language? This question is the
key to understanding the complexity that we confront when we decide to
bring to the big screen works that owe their power to their verbal artifice,
such as Joyce’s Ulysses or Cortázar’s Bestiario. This new generation of

1
This chapter is part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso Internacional
de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, 9-10 October,
2013.
 Auster versus Auster 157

writers has adopted, since the avant-garde era and the rise of cinema as a
commercial and cultural expansion axis, a complex way to present their
works. And it is here where the narrative used by the American writer and
screenwriter Paul Auster in his works, presents an opening to the problem
of the cinematographic adaptation from contemporary narrative. Focusing
on two of his novels, Mr. Vertigo and In the Country of Last Things; and
two scripts, Smoke and Lulu on the Bridge, we will analyse the setting,
action, and creation of conflict, stating the possibilities within the texts to
confront the problem of adapting from this new kind of narrative.
In the creation process, Paul Auster focuses on three topics that
determine the internal structure of his works: chance, death and memory.
We can find these three in all of his works and they are the ones that
determine the action of the story. The characters of In the Country of Last
Things, Mr. Vertigo, Smoke, and Lulu on the Bridge are conditioned by the
casualty that real life presents, in which death and memory organize
reality, a reality that becomes fantasy in Auster’s works. He usually
fictionalizes everyday activities and ends with an event that constantly
haunts its participants, who gather around their acute consciousness of
death. As the German critic and philosopher Walter Benjamin stated, after
tragedy, communication is fragmented, thus destroying every sense of
linearity in discourse, which needs to generate new linguistic games to
endure the shock of facing death.2 And it is that focus on the subject and
the form that allows us to understand the magnitude of the Austerian
discourse, where every character begins his journey, determined by
chance, from and towards death.
As we can observe in both Lulu on the Bridge and Mr. Vertigo, fantasy
interrupts routine and inserts itself in reality as a basic element that forms
part of the verisimilitude of the work. In Mr. Vertigo, the longing for
survival of a child in a United States in crisis, takes him to discover his
flying abilities. In this novel, Auster plays with our memory as he
recreates a time when dreaming was forbidden, inserting a fantastic
element within the horror of the crisis. The story comes from the mind of
Walt, an old man who, nearing death, remembers someone who changed
his life by granting him a simple wish. Walt flies for the first time in a
most improbable scene, and we can observe how flying stops being one of
our childhood dreams and becomes the novel’s generating principle of
verisimilitude. In fact, it is the language itself that bring us to this point in

2
Cf. Walter Benjamin, Ensayos escogidos (Buenos Aires: El cuenco de plata,
2010).
158 Chapter Eleven

which Walt’s stream of consciousness dissolves into the physical flight

that changes his life.

Presently I grew still, almost tranquil, and little by little a sense of calm
invaded me, radiating out among my muscles and oozing toward the tips of
my fingers and toes. There were no more thoughts in my head, no more
feelings in my heart. I was weightless inside my own body, floating on a
placid wave of nothingness, utterly detached and indifferent to the world
around me. And that’s when I did it for the first time-without warning,
without the least notion that it was about to happen. Very slowly, I felt my
body rise off the floor. The movement was so natural, so exquisite in its
gentleness, it wasn’t until I opened my eyes that I understood my limbs
were touching only air.3

The script of Lulu on the Bridge is marked by two balanced dichotomies:

cinema/literature and fiction/reality. The work refers to Auster’s literature
line, presenting a strong text in narration and action. The narrator acts as
an omnipresent voice that goes beyond action itself, while the discourse
and the characters’ actions challenge and complement the introduction
reproduced by this regulating entity. It is in this script where Auster
reaches íjust as we can observe in his narrative work The Book of
Illusionsí, the precise balance to establish the unity between both formats.
Chance, as a topic, settles the work’s starting point. Izzy Maurer, a well-
recognised jazz saxophonist, is shot in one of his concerts and in his last
minutes of life, he fantasies a happy ending.

On one level, it’s all very simple. A man gets shot, and in the last hour
before his death, he dreams another life for himself. The content of that
dream is provided by a number of random elements that appear to him just
before and after the shooting. A wall of photographs in a men’s room
featuring women’s faces –mostly the faces of movie starsí and a chunk of
plaster that falls from the ceiling. Everything follows from those elements:
the magic blue stone, the young woman he falls in love with, the fact that
she’s an actress. 4

Through his works, Auster manages to compose a sense of life, in

which everyday characters, inserted in a normal world and living
commonplace experiences, are subject to the whims of chance and, after
the crash of their previous reality, they manage to find in a person, an
object, or a situation, a way to go on with life. But, on the other hand,
memory serves íin the storiesí as the fundamental and the only
3
Paul Auster, Mr. Vertigo (New York: Penguin Books, 1994), 64.
4
Paul Auster, Three Films (New York: Picador, 2003), 223.
 Auster versus Auster 159

instrument or means by which the characters can find themselves and

create, somehow, an appearance of linearity in their own situation, which
allows them to endow the otherwise random with a kind of sense. This is
mainly because Auster’s works are composed of jumps backwards and
forwards in time, plot twists, flashbacks and recounts, all of them
configured by a fragmented form of the discourse sheltered by the fragility
of the absence and the constant presence of death.
This absence, along with the uses of memory, play a fundamental role
in Auster’s script Smoke, in which the main character íPaul Benjaminí
organizes his world through his dead wife’s memory, provoked by one of
Auggie Wren’s photographs, and defining things through the ephemeral
moment of the burning of a cigarette’s smoke.
Moreover, Paul Auster’s work possesses, among its general
characteristics, a unique setting in which the characters are in constant
interaction with the elements that constitute the space they inhabit. While
we insert ourselves into this new world, it is feasible to recognize in every
corner different objects, situations, and individuals from our daily life who
in contrast to the fiction and fantasy that the characters deliver, manage to
attain a status that hovers between the real and the fictive, making them
the basis of the work’s verisimilitude. This game, intentionally balanced
by the author’s ability to create and manage his productions, allows the
reader’s or observer’s complete insertion within the story, finding in this
universe coherence maintained by the clash between the context and the
situation created by the artistic space. Auster doesn’t recreate reality
through a veil; instead, he places us in a universe so plausible that fiction
cannot take the reality out of the frame. This capacity arises from the
constant change in format that, next to the narrative form of its discourse,
establishes a work that does not recognize its structural or creative limits.
In the Country of Last Things, Auster presents a dystopian world on its
way to complete destruction. The protagonist, Anna Blume, achieves the
goal of inserting us, by means of a letter to her boyfriend, in a walled city,
where after an outbreak of disease everything has collapsed, while she
desperately searches for her brother William. Anna’s letter forms the main
narrative, in which the protagonist is free to describe, through stream of
consciousness, her path through the fallen city. The fragmented discourse
of the protagonist is directly associated with the apocalyptic setting that
surrounds her, in which death is the principal motivation that impels
Anna’s actions. She has seen death, the sudden decline and collapse of an
entire society, and through her words, the speed and dramatic cuts
summarize the shock of a woman faced with death.
160 Chapter Eleven

New tolls go up, the old tolls disappear. You can never know which streets
to take and which to avoid. Bit by bit, the city robs you of certainty. There
can never be any fixed path, and you can survive only if nothing is
necessary to you. Without warning, you must be able to change, to drop
what you are doing, to reverse. In the end, there is nothing that is not the
case. As a consequence, you must learn how to read the signs. When the
eyes falter, the nose will sometimes serve. 5

When we read In the Country of Last Things, death races, euthanasia

clinics, or the trash and treasure collectors who wander through the story
do not surprise us. This glance into the apocalypse does not bother the
reader as might be expected, and that is because of the way this fictive
world and its inhabitants are constructed. Anna warns us that we will be
facing a city that disappears a bit more with every aspect of it that she
names, and the reader accepts it, not because that reader is searching for a
way to escape its own reality, but because in the fragments of this
narrative conscience the reader finds a parallel to his own world. The way
this universe is constructed demonstrates how this new narrative íwith
cinematographic expertiseí creates and represents a plausible, actual and
even future reality.
The range of topics previously presented is not only suitable to
Auster’s literary production, but they are also to be observed in his
movies. Paul Auster is not daunted by a change in format; on the contrary,
he seeks such changes. As many other authors have done since the earliest
days of the film industry, Auster constantly tends to be jumping between
subjects in his own writing. It is because of this that when he faces a
format change, the richness of his literary work does not alter. When some
authors focus mainly on the aesthetics, linguistic form, or the type and
quality of the takes, Auster, as a translator, writer and screenwriter,
favours the strength of the story over whatever may be its original form.
Through this analysis of the construction of the Austerian world, it is
possible to highlight, within the aforementioned works, a coherent line
from the moment of creating a story, where all assumption starts from a
common point with man’s sensory conception, whether related to memory,
proximity to death, or chance. This constellation of possible topics has
men as the central axis of its structure, establishing the human predicament
as the first element of connection with the text.
It is at this point that the importance of Auster’s linguistic forms can be
understood íand where we can make sense of the possibility of an
adaptation. In the moment we enter into the world of his books, we can

5
Paul Auster, In the Country of Last Things (London: Faber and Faber, 2010), 13.
 Auster versus Auster 161

recognize two parallel experiences in the reading: the character’s

psychological description ímost of the time the story is in the first-person
singularí in which we can get to know the train of their thought,
understand how they remember events in the past, or think of events to
come. But, on the other hand, these thoughts are always connected to an
action, be it as inspiration or consequence. That’s how we can grant this
double facet of Auster’s linguistic construction as a promotional axis of
the format change, where action and thought regulate themselves without
underestimating each other. When many claim that literature has
bewitched cinema, it is necessary to correct this assumption and say this
process can also happen in the opposite way. What would contemporary
literature be like without the deep consciousness of film?
The literary process suffered a change íjust as Benjamin established6í
after the second World; a change that produces a rupture in the
communication of facts, with language fragmented and focused on the
individual. This individual is the representation of a society ífollowing
Adorno’s hypothesis7í, in such way that the human dimension is never
lost. Paul Auster’s work rescues this human unity and defragmentation,
where a man’s path through space and his thought introspection are
brought together by the linguistic construction. Auster’s universal topics
allow us to know humanity on a daily basis, a fact by which the change
from reality to fiction turns into a possibility in this Austerian
representation of life.
Whether it is adaptation through illustration, transposition, interpretation,
or free format8, the possibility of such adaptation is always present in
Auster’s work. The form of his art does not change the content; rather, it
highlights it, allowing the opening of the story to any possible format.
That’s why one should recognize Paul Auster as a leading figure in the
creation of parallel worlds where every option is possible because the
story is rooted in the human.

Bibliography
Adorno, Theodor. Notas de literatura. Barcelona: Ariel, 1962.
Álvarez López, Esther. “El ilusionista de las palabras: Paul Auster y su
universo creativo”. Arbor 186, no. 741 (2010): 89-97.

6
Cf. Benjamin, Ensayos escogidos.
7
Cf. Theodor Adorno, Notas de literatura (Barcelona: Ariel, 1962).
8
Jose Luis Sánchez, De la literatura al cine: teoría y análisis de la adaptación
(Barcelona, Paidós, 2000), 63.
162 Chapter Eleven

Auster, Paul. In the Country of Last Things. London: Faber and Faber,
2010.
—. Mr. Vertigo. New York: Penguin Books, 1994.
—. Smoke. Directed by Paul Auster, Wayne Wang. 1995. Miramax. DVD.
—. Lulu on the Bridge. Directed by Paul Auster. 1998. Capitol Films.
DVD.
—. Three Films. New York: Picador, 2003.
—. El narrador, Pablo Oyarzún, Trans. Santiago: Metales Pesados, 2008.
Benjamin, Walter. Ensayos escogidos. Buenos Aires: El cuenco de plata,
2010.
González, Jesús Ángel. “Words Versus Images: Paul Auster’s Films from
Smoke to The Book of Illusions”. Literature/Film Quarterly (2009).
Ebook.
Sánchez Noriega, José Luis. De la literatura al cine: teoría y análisis de la
adaptación. Barcelona: Paidós, 2000.
Traisnel, Antoine. “Storytelling in Paul Auster’s Movies”. 2002. Ebook.
 CHAPTER TWELVE

NORDIC NOIR:
THE WORLD OF WALLANDER AND MANKELL
AS SEEN ON SIDETRACKED, THE BBC EPISODE.

JUAN JOSÉ GARCÍA-NOBLEJAS

PONTIFICAL UNIVERSITY OF THE HOLY CROSS, ROME

The streets were dark with something more than night

(Raymond Chandler, “The Simple Act of Murder”, 1944)

By way of introduction, here are four observations on the scope of what is

meant by Nordic Noir. The shared theme of the father, or father figure,
who is sought, is a relevant motive, which is worth examining. This
motive consists of assessing the presence of an evaluative discursive
position (sometimes called subtext1), which in this series tends to question,
rather than confirm, the referential of the diegetic2 world, raised to the

1
The first use of the term is attributed to Konstantin Stanislavski (Cf. An Actor’s
Work: A Student’s Diary, New York: Routledge, 2008) to insist that for the
theatrical performance, “the most important text is the subtext.” Despite the fact
that the theatrical text differs from the narrative texts of novels when adapted to the
screen, it makes sense to consider Stanislavsky: “spectators come to the theater to
hear the subtext. They can read the text at home.” The term referred to the implicit,
the unsaid, as something close to the literary and cinematographic theme, analytically
distinct from the plot, etc. Cf. e.g. in technical literature for writers, Linda Seger,
Writing Subtext, Michael Wiese Productions, Studio City, 2011; or Charles Baxter,
The Art of Subtext: Beyond Plot, Minneapolis: Graywolf Press, 2007.
2
Diccionario de la Real Academia Española de la Lengua in its twenty- third
edition includes the term diegesis, hitherto in purely technical use, to name “in a
literary or cinematic work, the narrative development of the facts”. See also the
Film Language Glossary, Columbia School of The Arts: From the Ancient Greek
for “recounted story”, diegesis is a term used in film studies to refer to the story (or
narrative) world of a film” (accessed Jan.15, 2014).
http://ccnmtl.columbia.edu/projects/filmglossary/web/terms/diegesis.html
164 Chapter Twelve

level of a statement. This can be appreciated in the characterization of the

environment, the characters, and the development of the events described.
Later, we will endeavour to explain the anthropological and ethical
political nature ímore or less historically stableí that arises from the main
examples of Nordic Noir, in their characterization of the father figure and
his family and professional relationships. In this context, we can observe
what happens to Wallander who is one of the best-known figures of this
genre in the celebrated series.

1. Four Introductory Observations

1.1. Characteristics of the Noir Detective

First observation: Raymond Chandler3 outlined five defining characteristics

for the noir detective novel or story. These rules hold considerable interest
in that they are almost literally applicable to Nordic Noir, both in the
original versions as novels, and subsequently, as a TV series.
According to Chandler, a Noir story: 1) must be “realistic” about
characters, atmosphere and ambience: it is about real people in a real
world; 2) it must have a “founding value” in addition to the mystery,
something that gnaws at the reader’s consciousness; 3) the criminal should
be punished in one way or another, though not necessarily through the
formal justice system; 4) the story should play fair, without narrative tricks
being played on the reader or viewer; 5) a love story for the protagonist
weakens the genre because it creates a kind of expectation that does not fit
well with the efforts of the police to solve their cases.

1.2. Crime Stories and Family

Second observation: the narrative configuration of crime stories often
includes or accompanies an exploration of fields, values, or virtues and
feelings of an explicit family type. In this respect, the study by Leonard
Cassuto4, which analyses so acutely the sentimentality of the supposedly
“hard-boiled” genre, from Sam Spade to Hannibal Lecter, has been of
value.

3
Luca Crovi, Noir. Istruzioni per l’uso (Milano: Garzanti, 2013), 44-46.
4
Leonard Cassuto, Hard-Boiled Sentimentality: The Secret History of American
Crime Stories (New York: Columbia University Press, 2009).
 Nordic Noir: The World of Mankell and Wallander 165

1.3. Fiction’s Cathartic Borders

The third observation, which takes a little longer to explain, is central to
the present study. After analysing five series of Nordic Noir, for the sake
of clarity and precision, and keeping in mind what readers are likely to
have seen on European or American television, we have chosen one
illustrative case for analysis and discussion. This is Wallander, produced
by the BBC and with Kenneth Branagh in the leading role. Certainly, there
are always correlations and comparisons that provide insights and had
there been more time and space, it would have been desirable to include
references to the other two televised series based on the Wallander novels:
the nine Swedish-films starring Rolf Lassgård and the long-running TV
series starring Krister Henriksson.
It would have also been useful íin the context of Nordic Noir– to
consider the Danish series Forbrydelsen (The Killing) in its three seasons
because the family of the protagonist, entangled in a criminal plot, is
present and significant. It would have also been possible to speak of The
Bridge, as a Swedish-Danish co-production that mixes the same two areas.
A similar situation occurs with Bogden, a series with both a socio-political
and a family context, highly representative of the Nordic perspective,
though not quite fitting the Noir genre.
In these circumstances, it is appropriate to address a common
perspective that appears to observe the cathartic borders5 of Nordic Noir.
This has to do with the personal appropriation, on the part of the viewer, of
the stories and the dramas possessing a minimum of poetic or artistic
features, as we will see in Mankell’s writing.
From an analytical point of view, the characters are isolated from
reality, enclosed within a diegetic action or frame, which is offered to the
viewer as if no one is presenting it. However, the proposal regarding the
mimetic character of human reality is perceived as something that, being
poetic, also claims to be “realistic”6 and reflective of how human reality

5
Cf. Juan José García-Noblejas, “Pensar hoy un sentido trascendente para la
catarsis aristotélica”, in Lavoro e vita quotidiana, ed., Giorgio Faro (Vol. IV,
Rome: Edusc, 2003), 265-92.
6
See, for example, “Scandinavian crime fiction. Inspector Norse”, The Economist,
http://www.economist.com/node/15660846 (accessed Mar. 11, 2010), where the
literary agent Niclas says Salomsson first hallmarks realism as “realistic, simple
and required ... and stripped of unnecessary words.” In this sense, and referring
more specifically to the characterization of the protagonists, and of course of Kurt
Wallander, Laura Miller speaks of “existential malaise” in “The Strange Case of
the Nordic Detectives”, Wall Street Journal,
166 Chapter Twelve

appears, not in an abstract or absolute way, but reflecting the human

reality in Nordic countries today.
We are dealing with a narrative and dramatic tale that mirrors our
society, the assessment of which is ultimately left up to each of us. Not
just as characters, but as readers or viewers. But since there are basic
personal references íin terms of fear and mercy that reflect a particular
social eraí we can properly speak of catharsis.
Therefore, it is about speaking of those cathartic elements, taking the
figure of Wallander in his professional and familial aspects, rather than
employing the classical terms of fear and mercy. In this way, we can speak
in terms of the ethical tendencies of people in society7: mercy and good
reputation or honour. Consequently, besides the personal sympathy or
antipathy regarding the characters, there is a sense of the story that goes
beyond the strictly diegetic world of the characters, which arises by vitally
and personally appropriating –and not just as viewersí the worlds
presented in these texts.
There are connections that underlie our identification with the ethical,
political and aesthetic principles that govern the diegetic events.
Therefore, the actions of the characters, in addition to their diegetic
function, are judged and rated by reference to these personal principles. A
sense that can be considered more or less virtuous or depraved, linked to
human dignity, offering an ethical-political view of the world.
It is true that sometimes the dramatic function and the moral evaluation
of actions and characters are confused. This is because the actions of these
worlds come to us as implicitly narrated, referring to principles that apply
only to the evaluation of the ethical-political and the aesthetic traits
embodied by the characters and their actions. But we, as persons and as
citizens, are not reduced to the role of spectators, dedicated only to
observing and accompanying artificial characters and actions in their
diegetic evolution. That is fine, and is part of what Coleridge meant by his
famous phrase, the willing suspension of disbelief, in order to leave readers
themselves open to fiction. But the most important thing is that, once we
have established our distance from the literary and cinematic fictions, we
ought to be able to discern and decide the cathartic sense of our role as
spectators. This we do as persons, but also as citizens living within a
society.

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052748703657604575004961184
066300 (accessed Jan.15, 2014).
7
Cf. Leonardo Polo, “Las virtudes sociales: Los héroes y los líderes. La tendencia
a la fama”, in Quién es el hombre. Un espíritu en el tiempo (Madrid: Rialp, 1993),
127-53.
 Nordic Noir: The World of Mankell and Wallander 167

1.4. Catharsis and Nordic Noir

Once we have bridged the gap between the diegesis and our vital world,
the fourth and last observation leads us to a discussion about the cathartic
feature of the Nordic Noir series. These are very well constructed series in
their audio visual, technical and dramatic aspects, even though they
become mainly vague and dark from a thematic point of view.
Furthermore, taking into account that mercy and fear (or reputation and
honour) play a determining role in these series, we must take into
consideration the notion of catharsis that brings us closer to the
Aristotelian terminology with regards to Greek drama. In doing that we
must also consider the perspective of “truthful reason” which includes the
poetic notion of myth8, not considering now the relevant philosophical and
poetic9 details of the practical reason and truth10, significantly different
from the factual and “speculative” one. In a few words, we can say
something about the difference between speculative truth and practical
truth. The first one comes from

our understanding judgements when it “reflects” the real order; it means

that when it situates closer to what is close in reality, and when it separates
what is separated in reality. However, practical truth is not only a mere
“reflection”. The “practical” epithet typifies this kind of truth: it is a kind
of truth that comes from action […]. The practical truth reveals as a key
piece of a philosophical ethic opened by nature to transcendence […].
Theoretical reason goes straight but we can’t always say the same about
practical reason. Practical reason doesn’t go straight beforehand but it must
be rectified and corrected as it goes along. For this reason, the word

8
Paul Ricoeur warns (Cf. “Le mythe”, in Anthropologie Philosophique (Paris:
Seuil, 2013), 237-76, that myth has to be considered to do justice in its use
according to the Aristotelian Poetics, as “a form of speech [on the fact] that raises
a claim to meaning and to truth”, a question that is not only a philosophical and
philological one. It is also due to the socio-cultural anthropology or the
comparative history of religions. See also, for example, Charles Johnson, “The
Truth-Telling Power of Fiction”, The Chronicle of Higher Education,
http://chronicle.com/article/The-Truth-Telling-Power-of/143281/ (accessed Dec. 2,
2013).
9
Juan José García-Noblejas, “Sobre la verdad práctica y las ficciones poéticas” in
Mimesi, verità, fiction. Ripensare l’arte sulla scia della Poetica di Aristotele, eds.
R. J. Cataño and I. Yarza (Rome: Edusc 2009), 31-52.
10
Cf. “Practical Reason”, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy,
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/practical-reason/, accessed Jun. 26, 2014).
168 Chapter Twelve

“rectification” summarizes, in a very good sense, the process of the

discovery of practical truth11.

The process of achieving human excellence based on virtue comes from

this practical truth and it also becomes the key piece of a philosophical
ethics open to transcendence12. The important point is to observe the
notion of myth in these series because, as it usually happens in tales and
dramas13, it has an ethical and moral consistency we must consider in
order not to let this matter be subjected to vague or ambiguous analyses.
In principle, the Nordic Noir series is to be considered as a cathartic
text because its characters, dialogues and diegetic actions depend on the
concept of myth as something that links, brings to life and endows the
actions and relationships among characters with a recognizable sense. That
sense goes beyond the ethical and political scope of the sense given by the
diegesis itself.

2. An Ethical Point of View

Presumably, the best known of those Nordic Noir series is Wallander, a
BBC British version of the Mankell novels, filmed in Ystad, the small city
where the Swedish inspector works.
This background brings with it the perspective of an analytical point of
view (a way to understand plots) and it is basically ethical and political.
After watching this series and recognizing the difficulty of developing a
descriptive and inductive introduction, common features could be located
in the Nordic Noir series, and especially in their manner of focusing on
reality.
For this exercise, the chosen text is the first chapter of the British
series, Sidetracked (2008, adaptation of Villospår, original text edited in

11
Cf. Ana Marta González, “Verdad y libertad. Su conexión en la acción humana”,
in La libertad sentimental, Cuadernos de Anuario Filosófico, ed., Javier
Aranguren, Serie Universitaria, no. 73 (1999): 95-110.
12
Cf. Ana Marta González, Ibid.
13
Without expanding too much on this known analytical commonplace, see., for
example, the study of Enrica Zanin, “The Moral of the Story: on Narrative and
Ethics”, Amsterdam International Electronic Journal for Cultural Narratology, no.
6 (2010-11), http://cf.hum.uva.nl/narratology/a11_zanin.htm (accessed Dec. 2,
2013), which analyses the respective positions of Hilary Putnam and Martha
Nussbaum. Putnam maintains his definition of a nuanced “imaginative recreation
of moral perplexities”, while Nussbaum focuses on the consideration of the
accounts as “reference for moral learning.”
 Nordic Noir: The World of Mankell and Wallander 169

1995 as the fifth volume of the Mankell’s series). It is semantically

representative of the features shared by the episodes in this series.
This first episode includes three scenes that briefly described can help
us to understand the argument that follows. It begins by showing us a
wonderful countryside under a blue sky. Then, we see a girl in hiding who
covers herself in gasoline and sets fire to herself in the presence of
Wallander, who is not able to prevent it. It is an introduction that
immediately presents the police case and, at the same time, introduces us
to the figure of the protagonist with his special way of facing the world,
his family and his profession. Then we have the credits of the film; the
musical theme is an adaptation of the song titled “Nostalgia”14 that
introduces us to the mood, to an emotional state semantically oriented
towards a strong nostalgic wish for a world different from that in which
Wallander and the other characters are living. A world that, without doubt,
is at the same time created by Wallander himself and the perplexed and
complainant laissez faire, laissez passer approach of his actions.
The second scene presents both atmospheres in which Wallander’s
controversial life is developed: a discussion at the police station about the
suicide of the fifteen-year-old girl shown at the beginning. This is a
suicide that is understood by Wallander as a crime, as he says: “somebody
should be searching for this girl.” Then, we go on to see a more or less
peaceful but tense meeting with his daughter at his house, with whom he
argues about the health and care for her grandfather, Wallander’s father.
In the third and final scene of this episode, we find a long discussion
between Wallander and his father at his house and studio. Wallander, in
tears, tells him that he has had enough. His father, understanding his
situation, talks about the landscape he is always painting. He tells him that
each morning, when he begins painting, he has different ideas while
reflecting on his paintings, but, nonetheless, he always ends up painting
the very same landscape: “Maybe you don’t like it, but it’s yours.”
Wallander and his father then make plans to travel to Rome to see
paintings in museums and galleries, and later, they walk through the
garden to the seashore. In that moment, the musical theme of the series
plays and we zoom in on Wallander’s worried face in a close up.
Immediately after, we see the final credits on the screen. The tone, theme,
figure and vital environment of the protagonist have been introduced.
Some poetic (narrative and dramatic) structures implied in these
episodes are interesting because they promote the appearance of a vital
ethical sense on the part of the audience. This is the same sense that
14
From the album Despite the Snow, original by Emily Barker & The Red Clay
Halo.
170 Chapter Twelve

appears to the reader of the literary texts by Mankell through the narrative
access to Wallander’s mind.
As shown by Chandler and Cassuto, and particularly through the case
of Wallander, these series show, from an ethical and political point of
view, the difficult articulation of a necessary and desirable but precarious
family life (the father-son relationship) within or parallel to the
professional world of crime investigation. The crimes that are shown in
these series are not ordinary in any way: these are horrifying because of
their brutality and insanity. But, at the same time, they have an apparent
rational coherence in the criminals’ mind. Furthermore, these crimes are
especially surprising because they have some kind of “normality” in
societies that seem to be living the final period of a smoothly functioning
politically correct welfare state. This ethical and political dimension of the
Nordic Noir series gives us a critical point of view that has been socially
accepted by a large part of the Swedish and Danish public.
It is important to know that these national spectators, living as citizens
in a society that is considered similar to the one we see on the screens,
have transformed these bestsellers into blockbusters. And they have also
converted the series Forbrydelsen (The Killing or The Bridge), produced
by the Danish public television, into a social phenomenon, deliberately
created as quality entertainment and, at the same time, a direct means of
promotion for public debate on ethical and political issues.

3. Fictional Worlds and the Real World

We all know that the world of television fiction is not our real world. But
we have to be able to recognize that there is some kind of “porous nature”
between life seen on the screen and real life. So we must take note, in an
academic context, of a “not-so-pacific” or dangerous transference between
the world depicted in the media and our real world. This is important
because of the worry that “infinite little stories from the media could
replace the great world narratives: ideologies, philosophies and religions.”15
When Roger Silverstone mentions these stories from the media, he is
referring to the wide range of what they offer. Characters and their stories
become bigger or smaller as long as we are able to face the fact that these
characters live in a world governed by narrative and dramatic requirements
or necessities, whereas in our real world, certainly conditioned by few
factors, we have the real freedom of determining our own way of life.
These stories will become “big” if they are able to cast this light, which is

15
Roger Silverstone, Perché studiare i media? (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2002), 9.
 Nordic Noir: The World of Mankell and Wallander 171

not theoretically or technically referred to in the diegesis but grasped as a

practical issue that brings us to recognize throughout how our freedom
must subsist not in fiction, but in the real world. Besides this, if we want to
know what happens inside the story, we have to follow the characters that
are building these stories “from the inside”.
What becomes problematic íbeing intuitively trivialí arrives when we
come face to face with these same stories as texts or “lazy machines”, as
Umberto Eco16 has stated. That happens if we take them as denunciative
systems that, though not obviously, can build and judge these very same
characters “from the outside” and give sense to all these stories, along with
the spectators’ help through some political ideology or some transcendental
philosophy.
There is a double identification: a necessary one, from the characters of
the plot, and a problematic one from the textual enunciation that constitutes
them. This is similar to the analytical17 view that suggests two
“navigations” for narrative texts. The first “navigation” is a descriptive
analysis for the diegetic instance or plot.18 And the second “navigation” is
something different that brings us to a personal appropriation of the text.
This second kind of activity implies that we reactivate our sensitivity and
our spirit in front of the world, after having engaged in the willing
suspension of disbelief that we concede in order to enter into the plots
offered by the fictional worlds. But what just few people do is to
recognize, and bridge the gap between fiction and sense of life in reality.
That so few are able to bridge that obvious gap is no doubt due to the
immovable fact that the characters are not people, although to understand
the stories, we “do as if they were”. Furthermore we must voluntarily
“abandon” the role of spectators or readers to recover our personal identity
or condition. This condition, without doubt, becomes improved or
impoverished when applying this willing suspension of disbelief that gives
us access to the fictive world and its vital sense.

16
Cf. Umberto Eco in Lector in fabula (Milano: Bompiani, 1979). Francisco V.
Gomez says, for example: “Lector in fabula convincingly explained how to
interpret one of the greatest metaphors that humans have devised to talk about the
world, our world: narrative texts”, http://is. gd/o2xZUT (accessed Mar. 21, 2013).
17
Cf. Juan José García-Noblejas, “Identidad personal y mundos cinematográficos
distópicos”, in Comunicación y Sociedad XVII, no. 2 (2004): 73-87.
18
Cf. Barry Forshaw, Nordic Noir: The Pocket Essential Guide to Scandinavian
Crime Fiction, Film & TV (Harpenden: Oldcastle Books, 2013); or, for example,
Stafford Hildred, The Secret Life of Wallander (London: John Blake Publishing,
2010).
172 Chapter Twelve

4. Nostalgia for a Better Future

If we consider all the characters, plots and complete texts of the Nordic
Noir series, we can observe that the vital sense is realistic, just as Chandler
asked for: as we follow the characters, we see that they move into a well-
known world, similar to ours. But this vital sense includes a very critical
vision of the current situation of things in society and in life.
In the Nordic Noir characters, we find a kind of nostalgia. There is an
absence of a real mother country, of a family or friends that might have
existed, not as one might expect in a mythical happy Arcadian past but,
rather, located in a wishful future, from which they should be carried to
the present in order to change things. Their life appears to the spectator
with ethical, political and aesthetic tones that seem to say: “That’s our
reality, but we desire a different one, a better one for our children”.
In the series, a unique plot is developed in ten or twenty episodes, each
of them of sixty minutes long. This temporal length allows us to pay
attention to small details, to the downtimes, and above all, to see the
motives and consequences of the decisions of the characters and their
actions, something that is almost impossible in most of the films made for
the big screen.
In the Nordic Noir series, there is a special narrative and a dramatic
tempo, which, close to the visual and musical aesthetic aspects, is
transformed into a great critical vehicle and shows us a great wish for
better-civilized conditions for everyone. And, as requested by Chandler for
the Noir, this is done stylistically, thereby playing fair with the viewer. For
instance, regarding the theme, the unofficial motto from the former leader
of the “real” Unit One is illustrative in itself: “You chase a beast, but catch
a human being.”19

4.1. Nostalgia from an Ethics of Rules, Virtues and Goods

So we are talking about a perspective that seems to want to abandon an
ethical point of view based only in mere circumstantial obligations coming
from a juridical positivism without enough space for people’s freedom.20

19
Cf. Gunhild Agger, “Emotion, Gender and Genre: Investigating The Killing”,
Northern Lights, vol. 9 (2011): 111-125. See also “Approaches to Scandinavian
Crime Fiction”, Crime Fiction and Crime Journalism in Scandinavia Working
Paper no. 15 (Aalborg, 2010) http://is.gd/K0PwTU (accessed Mar. 21, 2013). Cf.
“Scandinavian Crime Fiction, Mediatization and Cultural Citizenship”,
http://is.gd/FBtDkQ (accessed Apr.21, 2013).
20
Cf. Leonardo Polo, “La ética y las virtudes”, Atlántida, no. 14 (1993): 80-92.
 Nordic Noir: The World of Mankell and Wallander 173

Mankell, son of a judge, says that democratic life does not work without
justice: “This is the subtext of Wallander’s stories”21, Mankell says
without asking for any requirement in his fiction that such justice be done.
It is an ethical perspective that becomes critical because it tries to get
the improvement of the person with respect to the vital social ending,
without the isolation of a possible stoic vision of life, as is usually
conferred on Nordic cultures. The ethical perspective is also noticeable
and it shows up between the cracks of the Nordic Noir stories. It seems to
ask for stability. Some grains of desperation are seen when they are
reduced to the mere instant pleasures that come from drugs, casual sex, or
from the results of professional work.
In this synthetic view of the Nordic Noir, we can see that the ethical
and political dimension of these series seem to favour the presence of the
only positive norm that really exists, and we all know that this norm is
love, as a way of keeping together the personal, social, and familial
relationships, without considering the superficial emotions of some
characters from these series.
The series moves between the characters’ lack of satisfaction and their
desire for “something better”. This is a way of running away from the
situation that they live in, looking for a future based on the moral main
concept of doing good or simply doing what we have to do, and doing it
correctly. That is why this series shows and, at the same time, questions
the personal and vital instability that comes from focussing our lives on
our professional life, damaging the personal and familial dimensions.
On these two planes, the spectator builds his or her participation. At
first, the spectator follows the character in a voluntary and passive way,
but finally tales an active role: the spectator finds himself (beyond
diegesis) in front of a text that judges the characters íand not just convey
themí and he tries to assess the real combination of both.

4.2. Finding Ethical Sense in Texts

As we know22, ethics cannot be learnt from books. If there are no virtuous
men, there is no possibility of finding ethics because ethics is found in the
capacity of understanding the principles by which men live and act.
The final identification with characters is not always useful because
they do not have the principle of their actions within. They are just an

21
Cf. Jake Kerridge, “Henning Mankell, Interview: Branagh is this generation’s
Alec Guinness”, The Telegraph, 6-7-2012 (http://is.gd/i2rFDz, accessed 22-4-
2013).
22
Cf. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1176 a 17-20.
174 Chapter Twelve

embodied element of the stories from which they come out. The narrative
and dramatic texts, beyond their diegesis, are the ones that become similar
to Aristotle’s “virtuous men”. They seem to have an exemplary temper and
we must learn from them (or discuss with them) because it is with/from
them that we can find these principles. This means that, in the last resort,
the spectator’s alter ego agrees or disagrees with the stories more than
with the characters.
We know that the two great ethical and social tendencies are mercy
and reputation or honour, and we can really observe them in these
characters, but without remaining enclosed within the narrated world.
Characters’ mercy is related to the unitary and global sense, in which they
appear, and (beyond inter-textual and industrial issues) moves forward
questioning their dependence on the principles and the values of the author
that brought them to life. The characters’ genuine tendency to honour
means tending to the last aim; it doesn’t come from the honour that some
characters receive from others. Thus a good reputation of a character arises
from his actions as found in the text itself, but is finally confirmed by the
spectators. Those spectators, with their personal values and principles
(contrasting or not with the textual ones) judge and give honour to the
characters with their love, lack of satisfaction, or their expected oblivion.
Personal values cannot be reduced to character values.
So, this academic perspective, with distinctions that are keenly felt but
not often discussed, makes it necessary to talk about the father-son or
family relationship in the Nordic Noir stories, because the crisis of the
welfare state in which the characters live is something included in the
sense of family nostalgia that comes from these same series. In any case,
we must consider that a sense of filial piety points directly to the origin.
“Honouring the father” also points to the future. He who is merciless will
not be a good father23.

5. Kurt Wallander
Kurt Wallander is the reference point for what we have said up to now.
Wallander is bewildered by the society he lives in and he fights to receive
mercy from his father; at the same time, he wants to be honoured by his
daughter. Wallander is also the title of the series. Therefore, we have to
consider the hovering presence of Mankell with his principles about the
character’s mercy and his world. The same happens with our principles in

23
Cf. Leonardo Polo, “La ética y las virtudes”, Atlántida, cit.
 Nordic Noir: The World of Mankell and Wallander 175

the way they affect the more or less honourable “final judgement” we will
make about Wallander and his world.
These observations are based on Sidetracked, the first episode of
Wallander. All in all, I consider that they can be applied without
constraints to all the series and ímutatis mutandisí to Nordic Noir.
Considering that the following are practical and, therefore, personal
observations, typical of what Paul Ricoeur calls “appropriation” of an
enunciation or a text24, they do not need the critical apparatus that usually
goes with more technical or theoretical considerations.
Sidetracked is an interesting episode because, being a British
production filmed in Sweden, it offers some images with a great visual
beauty alongside actions with a disturbing physical brutality and moral
depravity. It is also interesting because the visual backgrounds and the
personal drama based on Wallander’s family and professional life make
clear the nostalgia for a culture and society more harmonious with our
native dignity.

5.1. Two Interesting Points from the Series

Being explicit with annoying criminal themes, these long episodes of
ninety minutes of film adapting 400 pages or so, we might ask: Why is this
series so interesting?
There are two major reasons. First of all, there is the capacity of
imagining and thinking through many moments of silence that allow us to
observe landscapes and also the faces of great actors. There is Kenneth
Branagh and David Warner as his father, making us reflect on themes
related to the meaning of life itself. We cannot say that these are series for
spectators who are interested only in a murder mystery and a detective
plot. It would be as ridicule as if we wanted to hear Beethoven’s Ninth
Symphony in twenty minutes instead of its full length of sixty-five.
The second interesting point comes with the narrative and dramatic
format. It allows us to pay attention to the antecedents and, above all, the
consequences of the characters’ actions and the effects caused on them and
on the characters around them. Furthermore, we observe all these
consequences in Wallander, the character, because we can watch him from
a privileged position: we watch almost everything through his mind (his
thoughts, his memories). All that we know about him must be shown
through realization and actuation when filmed: close-ups, glances, the
gestures of Branagh and the other actors, and also the landscape and the
24
Cf. Paul Ricoeur, Cinq études herméneutiques (Genève: Labor et fides, 2013),
70-71.
176 Chapter Twelve

interior sets around Ystad. This unity of personal perspective can become
sometimes an inspiration (although apparently unsubstantial) to solve the
criminal case.
Wallander dedicates almost all his time exclusively to his job and this
is why he is efficient. He is also an intuitive observer of people, situations
and things, loyal to his companions and erratic with respect to the
behaviour codes of the police squad he belongs to. His way of living,
eating and drinking is not exemplary at all. When Mankell asked a doctor
friend which illness would such a character suffer according to his
lifestyle, the doctor answered “diabetes” and so Wallander became a
diabetic. Surprisingly, by adding this human weakness, the character
became more credible and more popular. But, as we know, according to
Mankell himself, being the same age as his character, they both like Italian
opera and have a passion for their job. Though if Wallander were a real
person, Mankell insists he would never become his friend or invite him to
dinner25.

5.2. Wallander as a Father, Husband and Son

Wallander is not a good son and he became a policeman against the
explicit wishes of his father. It is not easy for him to be a good father, not
even when his daughter tries to kill herself twice and (a curious repetition)
when she decides to become a policewoman. It is hard for him to leave his
work to visit his father when the father starts suffering from Alzheimer’s.
Eventually, he goes to visit him but not as often as he knows he should.
His job is a priority for him and he has no free time to visit his father.
Wallander is not a good husband because he does not pay attention to
his wife. He is not respectful to Mona. She separates from, and then
divorces him, but Wallander will remain in love with her and miss her
throughout his life; a love which is only broken for a while when he falls
in love with the widow of a Latvian police officer, a relationship that will
never result in marriage.
Wallander is not a good father because he is not interested about things
that affect his daughter, Linda. Even though they do not have a good
relationship, both paternal and filial relationships stabilize. Linda becomes
a real link that allows him to keep alive the memories of his ex-wife and
helps him to improve the relationship with his father who is slowly
becoming senile.

25
Cf. Hildred Stafford, The Secret Life of Wallander, cit.
 Nordic Noir: The World of Mankell and Wallander 177

5.3. Wallander and a Love Relationship in a Decadent World

As we know, Wallander is only good as a policeman. But we also know,
seeing his mind and his sensibilities, that undoubtedly he wants to be a
good person and up to a certain point, he is a good person. He is a person
who is forgiven by his father and they come to have a parent-child
intimacy and understanding as good friends. He wants to be a real person
and, in the end, will be forgiven by his daughter with whom he will
establish a strong paternal relationship. Friendship appears to be a deep
and stable manifestation of the filial and paternal relations of the
characters.
When his father dies, Wallander regrets not having taken care of him.
When he himself, in his sixties, suffers the symptoms of Alzheimer’s like
his father, the attention he gives to his daughter and his granddaughter,
Klara, makes the parent-child relationship more explicit, something that
has been growing as the central theme of the protagonist’s life, through ten
long stories.
These stories, by contrast, represent a Swedish world that, under an
apparent unproblematic tranquillity and beauty, suffers from confused and
underhanded shots of xenophobia, bad consciousness of a pro-Nazi past
and a certain kind of fanaticism tied to the Lutheran religion. Shots are
linked to the unexplained death of Olaf Palme, to the poverty resulting
from drug problems, suicide and other unwished-for inheritances of the
welfare state. This world manages to include the pro-Soviet or pro-
American espionage cases and family disasters, and of course, the brutal,
pathological killings that have to be solved by him in the little town of
Ystad.
We stand before a desolate human landscape; a world that Wallander
does not understand. His life is almost shattered; he is lost in a strange
world, he has lost his anchor to life, he is far from admiration, respect,
and, in some cases, even sincere friendship with his colleagues, friends
with whom he usually quarrels, and conflicts with his family members
must also be endured.

5.4. Wallander’s Remaining Stories

At the end of the series, four aspects, full of details and referential
indications of these episodes remain in the viewer’s mind:
178 Chapter Twelve

1) The inhuman horror and the incomprehensible perversity of the crimes

that Wallander faces and resolves and that finally have an effect on
him.

2) The atmosphere of the natural and the built-in world: the wonderful
landscape, the twilights and dawns, the winds, roads, and fields, the
lakes, forests, the swans that fly by, the land to be harvested, the
middle-class dwellings, fast food restaurants, peasant homes, and open
air spaces, offices and houses where terrible things happen.

3) Over all, the human landscape of two groups of people where

Wallander finds his vital place: his police colleagues with whom he
feels he has conflicts, but finds assurance. Then, his almost broken
family, put back together again with great difficulty. As background, a
society that experiences both an official welfare state and real
discomfort.

4) The assembling of these three themes and their tremendous negative

aspects, nonetheless, are bracing and even hopeful in the way they are
known and reported. This brings to mind the fourth chapter of the
Aristotelian Poetics in which we find the concept of “mimesis”. This
means to imitate the way others behave and enjoy ourselves with the
result of this activity; because through this activity “we learn to know”,
and “though the objects themselves may be painful to see, we are
delighted to view the most realistic representations of them in art, the
forms, for example, of the lowest animals and of dead bodies. The
explanation is to be found in a further fact: to be learning something is
the greatest of pleasures not only to the philosopher, but also to the rest
of mankind, however small their capacity for it”26.

In addition, to recognize evil, as the Stagirite observes, when we see or

experience directly something horrible, produces horror, disgust and
anxiety. But if this horror comes through a poetic “mimetic”
representation, instead of producing horror, it arouses in us some kind of
pleasure. This is the pleasure of knowing about something we could not
stand if we had seen it directly. This concept, explained in terms of fear
and mercy, is of course what we call catharsis27. Wallander, the series, is

26
Poetics, 1448 b 4-19.
27
Cf. Juan José García-Noblejas, “Pensar hoy un sentido trascendente para la
catarsis aristotélica”, cit.
 Nordic Noir: The World of Mankell and Wallander 179

cathartic. While Wallander, the character is only considered cathartic

when integrated into this katholou, this “fast and essential totality” which
is the complete world of the series.
I understand that not just Wallander, but Nordic Noir by and large
tries to give a reason for the moral discomfort of our times. And also
points out the professional scope (in Wallander’s case, an almost
obsessive one) as a source of personal and social problems, in order to
allow paternal and filial relations to be fostered and respected. However,
this discomforting social, professional, and family view observed from a
purely critical, realist point of view makes our poetical perception adopt
cathartically pleasant moulded features. This allows us to know personally
a kind of reality that we would not be able to contemplate in any other
way.

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Northern Lights, vol. 9 (2011): 111-25.
Aristóteles. Ética Nicomáquea, Ética Eudemia. Introd. Emilio Lledó.
Trans. and notes, Julio P. Bonet. Madrid: Gredos, 1985.
—. Poética, ed., Daniele Guastini. Roma: Carocci, 2010.
Baxter, Charles. The Art of Subtext: Beyond Plot, Minneapolis: Graywolf
Press, 2007.
Cassuto, Leonard. Hard-Boiled Sentimentality: The Secret History of
American Crime Stories. New York: Columbia University Press, 2009.
Crovi, Luca. Noir. Istruzioni per l’uso. Milano: Garzanti, 2013.
Eco, Umberto. Lector in fabula. La cooperación interpretativa en el texto
narrativo. Milano: Bompiani, 1979.
Forshaw, Barry. Nordic Noir: The Pocket Essential Guide to Scandinavian
Crime Fiction, Film & TV, Pockets Essentials, 2013.
García-Noblejas, Juan José. “Pensar hoy un sentido trascendente para la
catarsis aristotélica.” In Lavoro e vita quotidiana, edited by Giorgio
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—. “Identidad personal y mundos cinematográficos distópicos.” In
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Johnson, Charles. “The Truth-Telling Power of Fiction”, The Chronicle of
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cr&utm_source=cr&utm_medium=en, (accessed Dec. 2, 2013).
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 PART IV:

LATIN AMERICAN VOICES ON SCREEN

 CHAPTER THIRTEEN

BLEEDING THE RUBBER TREES:

PARALLELISM AND PARADOX IN LA VORÁGINE
AND FITZCARRALDO1

CAROLINA RUEDA
UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA, USA

The Amazonia is as transnational as oxymoronic.

The Amazonia is always represented as a vastness that
can only be understood in its miniscule essence;
always explored and never completely known; an
object of developing utopias never brought to life.
Rivera’s image of the Amazonia as a devouring
(cannibal) space is sustained.
—Ileana Rodríguez2

The encounter between the “lettered city” ía concept that connects those
urban subjects who wholly believe in the notions of civilization and
progressí, and the liminal and unknown territories, in which subjects live
far from “civilization”, is a recurrent theme in the Latin American literary
genre known as novela de la tierra.3 Many works considered novelas de la
tierra address issues associated with the diverse social, cultural, economic,

1
This chapter is part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso Internacional
de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, 9-10 October,
2013.
2
Ileana Rodríguez, “Naturaleza/nación: Lo salvaje/civil escribiendo Amazonía”,
Revista de crítica literaria latinoamericana XXIII, no. 45 (1997): 36.
3
The novelas de la tierra narrate clashes between civilization and barbarism, as in
La vorágine (José Eustasio Rivera, 1924); stories of despotic landowners, as in
Doña Bárbara (Rómulo Gallegos, 1929); and the lives and conflicts of peasants
and other rural folk, as in Don Segundo Sombra (Ricardo Güiraldes, 1926). An
underlying subject may be the overpowering and, at times, destructive force of the
jungle.
 Bleeding the Rubber Trees: La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo 183

and political conflicts that emerge as a result of the aforementioned

encounter. Important authors inscribed within this genre, such as José
Eustasio Rivera (Colombia), Rómulo Gallegos (Venezuela), and Ricardo
Güiraldes (Argentina), address in their novels, among other topics, the
conditions of subordination and exploitation that marked the lives of those
who lived in remote areas (such as the Amazon basin) at the beginning of
the twentieth century, in contrast to the lives of urban and educated
subjects who, identifying with ideas of progress and civilization, were
strongly motivated to spread these ideas throughout the emerging Latin
American nations.
Of all the novels associated with Latin America’s novelas de la tierra
tradition, La vorágine (1924), by the Colombian writer José Eustasio
Rivera, is especially relevant. Equally important among cinematic works
that touch upon a similar conflictual encounter, this time from the
perspective of a European vision of Latin America, is the film Fitzcarraldo
(1982) by the German film maker Werner Herzog. This chapter presents
an analysis of these two works, which show a series of strange
parallelisms, though there is no factual connection between them. I analyse
the similarities between the stories, both of which take place in the early
twentieth century during the Amazonian Rubber Boom. I explore the
resemblances between the two heroes, their idiosyncratic and romantic
characters, as well as their troublesome encounters with the unknown and
intriguing universe of the Amazon basin. I also explore the epic and
partially autobiographic nature of both works, highlighting the blurry line
between reality and fiction. Both authors, who at times appear to become
their own fictional protagonists, had to confront íin reality and in the
fictional story they createdí the violent exploitation of indigenous people
in the Amazon jungle. The parallelisms between both works are certainly
uncanny and fully manifested through the character Fitzcarraldo, who
incarnates very well the feared rubber barons described in such detail in
Rivera’s novel.
La vorágine, by José Eustasio Rivera, thought of as a kind of national
epic, narrates the intriguing and tragic adventure of Arturo Cova, a young
Colombian poet, who flees the city of Bogotá with his pregnant lover,
Alicia, escaping his social obligations as well as the pressure to marry,
imposed upon them by her family and other members of their community.
They seek refuge in remote areas of Colombia’s south eastern plains
(“los llanos orientales”) and the Amazon jungle. Following a seven-month
adventure through this extensive territory, confronting his own wishes and
moral views, and dealing with his relationship with Alicia that soon
becomes quite burdensome, Cova also learns of the violence and abuse
184 Chapter Thirteen

committed against the local people by the owners of the rubber businesses
settled in the region. The “rubber fever” was responsible for all sorts of
mechanisms through which peasants, farmers, and indigenous people were
used as a source of cheap labour in the extraction and commercialization
of this natural resource. In the novel, Rivera combines factual and
imagined events to describe Cova’s journey as he penetrates deeper into
the jungle. From a personal perspective, Cova is the victim of his own
troubles and uncertainties, which seem to increase as he becomes involved
with several characters in the novel, while condemning the atrocities
committed against the local people. The author skilfully describes the
character’s weakening psychological state and the process through which
his thoughts and memories eventually metamorphose into the most
unsettling hallucinations.
Certain particularities are especially important when analysing the
relationship between La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo: José E. Rivera is both
author and editor of La vorágine. The novel is visibly semi-
autobiographical ímuch of what occurs to the main character is narrated in
the first-person and relates directly to specific circumstances of the
author’s life. Similarly, Werner Herzog is both author and editor of the
film Fitzcarraldo, and the main character he created, an eccentric inventor
and adventurer, resembles in many ways the German director. The
documentary Burden of Dreams, by the American non-fiction film maker
Les Blank, is another important work relevant to a comparative
examination of the two works discussed in this chapter. It is possible to
suggest that, as seen in Blank’s documentary, Herzog becomes his own
fictional character while he deals with the production of his film at
different times and in different locations throughout the Amazon
rainforest. In other words, the adventures of the European explorer, who
wished to complete an extremely ambitious project in the middle of the
jungle, is repeated when the German director ías documented in Burden
of Dreamsí “re-enacts” the challenging tasks undertaken by the character.
In this sense, the title of the documentary describes with precision the
experiences of both the character in the film and Herzog himself.
Fitzcarraldo narrates the almost inexplicable adventure of an Irishman
by the name of Brian Sweeney Fitzgerald, who calls himself
“Fitzcarraldo”, a name he believes will be easier to pronounce by the
native people he encounters in his travels. At some point in the early
twentieth century, this middle-aged man, obsessed with bringing opera
music (especially the music of the Italian tenor Enrico Caruso) to the
Amazon region and building an opera house somewhere in the jungle,
travels to South America and settles in the Peruvian city of Iquitos. The
 Bleeding the Rubber Trees: La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo 185

film opens at the real Teatro Amazonas Opera House, constructed in

Manaus, Brazil, between 1885 and 18954, where Fitzcarraldo is seen
arriving just as Caruso finishes singing Giuseppe Verdi’s Ernani. To raise
the funds needed for the construction of the opera house, Fitzcarraldo
becomes involved in rubber production, the source of wealth for many
businessmen and explorers at the time. He purchases a parcel of land rich
in unexploited rubber trees located in an out-of-reach area near the
turbulent Pongo das Mortes rapids (Rapids of Death). He knows that if he
can travel past the rapids, he will become the largest rubber baron in the
Amazon region. Literary critic Ileana Rodríguez clearly explains this
particular circumstance as follows:

To push past the rapids would mean a commercial monopoly beyond them,
and to control them would make it possible to control prices. And, by
controlling prices, he would have access and be able to manage the
surrounding towns and their inhabitants.5

The only way to arrive at this area is by crossing a narrow and steep
isthmus at a point in which two parallel rivers (the Patchitea and the
Ucayali) come within a mile of each other. Fitzcarraldo acquires a large
steamship and with the help of hundreds of native men, women, and
children he pulls the ship over the isthmus. The very night the job is
finally, after incredible adversity, completed, and while everyone sleeps,
some of the labourers untie the ropes that hold the ship fast to the shore.
The ship floats downstream along the Ucayali River and beyond the Pongo
das Mortes rapids, putting an end to the Irish impresario’s dream of
becoming “king” of the Amazon rubber business. Only Caruso’s opera,
which Fitzcarraldo plays in an attempt to outshine the natural sounds of
the jungle, can alleviate, and only partially, his anguish in the face of his
imminent failure.
Rivera’s novel and Herzog’s film coincide in many ways: First, both
works are set in the early twentieth century in a series of locations
throughout the Amazon basin; second, in both works the city of Manaus is
the centre of the lucrative rubber business. Third, both works describe
similar physical and psychological challenges faced by their main

4
This opera house was built at a moment in which Manaus was becoming one of
the wealthiest cities in the world due to the highly profitable rubber business. The
idea was brought by Antonio Jose Fernandes Junior who was a member of the
Brazilian House of Representatives and an opera lover. The building was
constructed in Renaissance style with materials brought from Europe and it was
furnished in Luis XV style.
5
Rodríguez, “Naturaleza/nación”, 39.
186 Chapter Thirteen

characters. However, the authors’ and characters’ backgrounds, beliefs,

and knowledge about the jungle are essentially different, and these
differing perspectives are precisely the reasons for the strange parallelism
effect connecting both works. With respect to the argument in La
vorágine, from the very beginning, the reader finds that before traveling to
Colombia’s remote south eastern regions, Arturo Cova was a romantic
intellectual living in Bogotá. Soon it becomes clear that he was also an
ambitious and adventurous individual, whose curiosity surpassed his fears
of the horrifying stories told about the Colombian Casanare region, where
he initiated his journey. With a highly poetic prose, Rivera describes the
many areas travelled by Cova, who soon transforms himself into a sort of
outlaw, a “fierce, unreserved adventurer, accustomed to scorn danger and
determined to self-impose and succeed at all costs.”6 However, Cova’s
initial impulsive and headstrong character weakens as time passes. In the
introduction to the second part of the novel, Rivera describes his
character’s deterioration process, along with the abandonment and “state
of death” of the fertile jungle territory that is now in total “darkness”:

Let me flee, oh jungle from your sickly shadows, formed by the breath of
beings who have died in the abandonment of your majesty. You yourself
seem but an enormous cemetery, where you decay and are reborn. I want
to return to the places where there are no secrets to frighten, where slavery
is impossible, where the eye can reach out into the distance, where the
spirit rises in light that is free!7

Cova’s progression in the novel as character/narrator is in many ways

similar to Rivera’s own life experience. Since early childhood, the author
showed special interest for writing about Colombia’s geography. He dealt
with themes of landscape and nature, trying to always reach a deep
understanding of their importance and inner power. His obsession with
such topics as human weakness and the tragic side of life, were transferred
into La vorágine, particularly in those passages that deal with the cruel
exploitation of the country and its people. Of equal importance is the fact
that this novel is the product of a crucial moment in the history of
Colombia. When Rivera wrote the novel, the country was affected by
complex economic conditions: throughout the 1920s, most Latin American

6
Eduardo Castillo, “La vorágine”, in La vorágine: Textos críticos, ed., Montserrat
Ordoñez Vila (Bogotá: Alianza, 1987), 43. My translation from the Spanish
original: “recio aventurero sin escrúpulos, habituado a desdeñar el peligro y
resuelto a imponerse y triunfar a toda costa.”
7
José Eustasio Rivera, The Vortex, trans. Earle K. James (Bogotá: Panamericana,
2001), 156.
 Bleeding the Rubber Trees: La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo 187

countries supplied the industrialized nations with agricultural products and

minerals, only to be forced later to import manufactured goods according
to the iron laws of the global market. This economic unbalance pushed the
natural-resource-exporting countries to develop new business strategies
that would allow them to compete globally.
Entrepreneurs from Bogotá and other parts of Colombia discovered a
great opportunity for national and transnational companies to increase
profits by utilizing the natural resources in peripheral and “uncivilized”
areas such as the Colombian Orinoco plains, the provinces of Casanare,
Putumayo and Guainía, and the Amazon jungle. It is worth noting that in the
early twentieth century, positivist ideas associated with the Enlightenment
continued to have an enormous influence on Western thought. From this
point of view, natural spaces and remote territories were no longer seen as
mythical places to be respected and kept from harm, but as fertile grounds
for proving and validating the power of scientific reason. Consequently,
emerging transnational corporations interested in the rubber business
began the over-exploitation of the Colombian provinces of Orinoco and
Amazonas, acquiring cheap human labour through practices that extended
to extreme abuse, torture, people trafficking, massacres by production
overseers, and enslavement of entire communities of rubber gatherers.
Abject poverty and misery prevailed while merchants and businessman
from the urban sectors of the country and abroad claimed to own vast
areas of rainforest rich in rubber trees. In the novel, Rivera describes this
harsh exploitation system that continued until the 1970s in Brazil. For the
literary theorist Françoise Perus, the abuse and enslavement practices
meant

[…] the possibility of fixing at an extremely low level the cost of work
force by incorporating capitalist relations of exploitation (based on the
buying/selling of labour force) of important semi-enslaving or semi-feudal
elements, that signify multiple forms of economic coercion. Generally
speaking, this signifies forms of accumulation based on a formal labour-to-
capital substitution aimed at obtaining absolute surplus.8

8
Françoise Perus, Historia crítica y literaria: el realismo social y la crisis de la
dominación oligárquica (La Habana: Casa de las Américas, 1982), 123. My
translation from the Spanish original: “[…] la posibilidad de fijar en niveles
sumamente bajos el valor de la fuerza de trabajo en la incorporación de las
relaciones capitalistas de explotación (basadas en la compra/venta de la fuerza de
trabajo) de importantes elementos semiesclavistas o semifeudales, que implican
múltiples formas de coacción extraeconómica; y, de una manera más general, en
formas de acumulación basadas en la subsunción formal del trabajo al capital, y en
la extracción de plusvalía absoluta.”
188 Chapter Thirteen

From another perspective, during the second decade of the twentieth

century new ways of thinking developed in Latin America, influenced by
the social changes originated with this period’s most influential
ideological model: the Mexican Revolution. In particular, the emergence
of new urban bourgeois forms began to contest the stagnant and outdated
oligarchic system that characterized the early stages of capitalism. Many
writers and intellectuals ascribed to this new social model, including the
Colombian writer José Eustasio Rivera who became a highly influential
figure among them. The author’s ideological transformation, however, was
by no means an easy one. The changes that took place in his life deeply
affected his character and in many cases they translate into his character’s
experiences in La vorágine. What follows describes Rivera’s experience as
a young writer who lived a humble but fairly comfortable life, first in the
Colombian provinces of Huila and Tolima, where he became acquainted
with rural life, and later in Bogotá, where he won a scholarship to study at
the “Escuela Normal de Bogotá” in 1906. Many factors regarding his
education in this institution resulted in his future transformation into
someone who radically contested the bourgeois life and mentality, and the
extremely inequitable politics of his country.
As the Chilean literary critic Eduardo Neale-Silva indicates in his
Horizonte humano: Vida de José Eustasio Rivera, the author of La
vorágine belonged to a heterogeneous group of young writers, journalists,
politicians, educators, and other intellectual figures who worked towards
the modernization of Colombia. The members of this group, referred to as
“La generación del centenario” (The Centennial Generation), not only
cultivated their own literary interests, but also got involved in projects
such as the construction of bridges, roads, railways, and river and maritime
ports of great importance for the improvement of the country’s
infrastructure. In addition, Rivera, who was a writer, a lawyer, and a
diplomat, had a keen interest in everything related to the economy and
politics of his country; the faithful representation of Colombia’s different
geographical areas, therefore, became one of his major literary objectives.
In June of 1921, the author was appointed to a government post in Lima
where his duties included representing his country’s intellectual and
academic communities. Soon he became an accepted member of the
Peruvian social and diplomatic elite, a remarkable accomplishment for
such a young author. According to Neale-Silva, “this first contact with the
political world was an exceptional experience: refinement, formulae,
smiles, tension, everything [was done] for the ‘reputation’ of his
 Bleeding the Rubber Trees: La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo 189

country.”9 On August 30, 1921, the journal Heraldo de Cuba published the
following statement regarding Rivera’s attitude and perception of Colombia
at the time:

The poet has spoken with great enthusiasm of his country’s impressive
moral and material improvements, and has, above all, described with pride
the civility of the Colombian people, who have forever abandoned civil
war and fiery political battles to commit to hard and honest work, which is
the foundation for the growth and prosperity of all nations.10

The Colombian government also hired Rivera as a lawyer and in 1922,

while working as Legal Secretary of the “Comisión Limítrofe Colombo-
Venezolana” (Colombo-Venezuelan Border Commission), he travelled
through various remote areas of Colombia, Venezuela, Brazil, Ecuador,
and Peru, becoming aware of the state of abandonment of many border
regions and the extremely precarious living conditions of the local
villagers. Once he abandoned the commission and continued his travels
alone, the author went through a process which, in one way or another,
transformed him into the character of Arturo Cova. If as a young writer
and intellectual Rivera dreamed of a glorious life, at this stage he
recognizes the impossibility of this dream, as expressed in La vorágine
through Cova’s reflections: “What have you done with your life? . . . And
your dreams of greatness, your thirst for recognition, your foretaste of
coming fame? Fool!”11
The author witnesses intense violence and enslavement of natives
throughout the Orinoco, Amazonas, and Putumayo areas íthe latter known
as “Paraíso del Diablo” (Devil’s Paradise) for the brutal acts committed by
the Peruvian Amazon Rubber Company then under the rule of Peruvian
impresario and rubber lord Julio César Arana del Aguila. Rivera’s conduct
as a middle-class urban man becomes a motive for self-disappointment; he

9
Eduardo Neale-Silva, Horizonte humano: Vida de José Eustasio Rivera
(Madison: Wisconsin University Press, 1960), 185. My translation from the
Spanish original: “este primer contacto con el mundo de la diplomacia fue toda una
experiencia: refinamiento, fórmula, sonrisas, tensión, todo por la ‘reputación’ de su
patria.”
10
As cited in Neale-Silva, 196. My translation from the Spanish original: “Con
entusiasmo nos ha hablado el poeta de los grandes adelantos morales y materiales
de su tierra, y nos ha ponderado, sobretodo, el civismo que ha adquirido el pueblo
colombiano, que ha abandonado para siempre las guerras civiles, las luchas
políticas ardientes, para entregarse al trabajo, la base de la prosperidad y el
engrandecimiento de los pueblos”
11
Rivera, The Vortex, 28.
190 Chapter Thirteen

renounces his former social and political aspirations, spurns Colombia’s

traditional oligarchy and powerful financial sectors and, in turn, becomes
an observer and a critic, initiating an intellectual battle against the
hegemonic order that promoted the brutality he often witnessed. The
ideological principles that prompted the aggressive capitalist expansion in
Latin America in the early twentieth century constitute a socially and
politically motivating matter that Rivera takes into account in his writings.
However, his writing process and critical stance also led to the author’s
self-disintegration, which, in a way, also speaks of the disintegration of
native communities forced to submit to a powerful other, and to the danger
of the jungle itself. Rivera clearly expresses this concern in a passage of
La vorágine:

[…] the jungles change men. The most inhuman instincts are developed;
cruelty pricks like a thorn, invades souls; covetousness burns like a fever.
It’s the thirst for wealth that sustains the weakening body, and the smell of
rubber produces the ‘madness of millions’ . . . On remote trails in the
solitude of the jungle, they [the Indians] succumb to fever, embracing the
tree from which the latex oozes. Lacking water, they stick their thirsty
mouths to the bark, that the liquid rubber may calm their fever; and there
they rot like leaves, gnawed as they die by rats and ants . . .12

La vorágine represents Rivera’s greatest aspiration as a writer and

intellectual actively involved in society, but it is also a self-condemning
text. This explains the paradoxical nature of the author’s life influenced by
the writing of his national epic novel. Both, his initial social and cultural
condition as an educated subject and his later shift into a radical attitude
that contested the norms dictated by his country’s ruling class and the
atrocities that in the name of progress and civilization were committed in
the jungle, generated in Rivera deep anger, frustration, and inner conflicts.
As Perus affirms, what Rivera narrates in the novel is,

nothing less than the collapse of Colombia’s traditional society under the
violent objective and subjective effects of the sui generis development of a
“capitalist” extreme, which in this case takes place outside the national
borders. In essence, Rivera is forcing us to see the barbaric character of
civilization, and not of nature.13

12
Ibid., 212-13.
13
Françoise Perus, Historia crítica y literaria, 164. My translation from the
Spanish original: “no es otra cosa que la descomposición de la sociedad
colombiana tradicional bajo los violentos efectos íobjetivos y subjetivosí del
desarrollo sui generis de un polo ‘capitalista’ que, en este caso, se encuentra
 Bleeding the Rubber Trees: La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo 191

In the end, the line between Rivera’s real experience and his protagonist’s
fate becomes blurred (this is uncannily similar to the relationship
Herzog/Fitzcarraldo detailed later in this chapter). In addition, the jungle,
like the two protagonists Rivera and Cova, becomes a merged abstraction;
a sort of non-space inspiring doubt regarding positivist notions of
governability, progress, civilization, and barbarism. In the jungle,
positivist discourse seems nonsensical, as Perus indicates in Selvas y
selváticos, “When individuals penetrate the jungle, hoping to bleed and
squander its resources, they perturb and violate the cosmologic order to
which they also belong. The upsetting of this order, by which death
generates life, reverses it, disturbing its senses, and warping its life
cycle.”14
In his film Fitzcarraldo, Werner Herzog introduces the viewer to a
location and a historical moment similar to those in La vorágine. The story
also takes place during the Amazonian rubber boom and addresses many
of the topics described by Rivera in his novel. The main character in the
film was inspired by the historical figure Carlos Fermín Fitzcarrald López
(1862-1897), a Peruvian entrepreneur who worked in the rubber business
in the late 1800s. In his investigation, Herzog learnt that Fitzcarrald was
famous for having discovered a steep isthmus of about one mile in length,
between the rivers Ucayali and Urubamba in Peru. This portion of land
was later named in his honour “Istmo de Fitzcarrald.” What most
interested Herzog about this man was his successful attempt (the exact
year is not clearly documented) to pull a very large steam ship over this
isthmus from one river to the other. Fitzcarrald’s efforts paid off when he
began charging a toll to merchants needing to cross this land bridge in
order to distribute their products throughout this treacherous area.
Herzog’s own eccentric and highly ambitious mind prompted him to
film a similar adventure. However, he made his task much more difficult.
In this sense, the film director’s aspiration resonates with Rivera’s
experience while writing La vorágine, a difficult task that deeply marked
the Colombian author. In fact, after their experiences in the jungle, both
the author and the film director suffered a personal transformation that is

incluso situado fuera del espacio nacional. Por lo mismo, lo que nos está haciendo
percibir Rivera es la ‘barbarie’ de la ‘civilización’, y no la de la naturaleza.”
14
Françoise Perus, De selvas y selváticos: ficción autobiográfica y poética
narrativa en Jorge Isaacs y José Eustasio Rivera (Bogotá: Plaza & Janes, 1998),
178. My translation from the Spanish original: “[a]l penetrarla [la selva] para
desangrarla, el hombre perturba y violenta el orden cosmológico al cual él mismo
pertenece. De ahí que la perturbación de este orden, según el cual la muerte es la
que da lugar a la vida, se vuelva en contra suya, trastorne sus sentidos y deforme su
ciclo vital.”
192 Chapter Thirteen

reflected in some of their future writings.15 Documents show that

Fitzcarrald’s ship was partially disassembled before crossing the isthmus
and then rebuilt. For the sake of his story, Herzog’s did everything
possible to maintain the ship intact. This extremely difficult manoeuvre
made production on the scenes in which the ship was transported almost
impossible. Herzog’s fictional character clearly resembles those
impresarios described by Rivera who made millions off the rubber trade in
the 1920s and built extravagant homes resembling the European palaces
they dreamed of owning. Fitzcarraldo may have very well been one of
those eccentrics who, in the early twentieth century, lived somewhere in
the jungle with servants to run their estates, and who imported European
musicians from the old continent for simple entertainment.
Apart from understanding the character created by Herzog, an analysis
of Fitzcarraldo becomes much more complex when considering the
German director’s own life, certain historical circumstances that could
have affected his perception of the world, and his encounter with the
Amazon jungle. Historically, the film was made after the transitional
“decolonization” period that followed the collapse of European
colonialism.16 This notion of decolonization refers to a period of transition
after the 1960s, during which the traditional sovereign and colonizing
nations (i.e., England, Portugal, Spain, and France) were forced to
relinquish their domination and political power over colonized nations and
had to redefine their identities as postcolonial states. An accelerated
decolonization process began around 1945, as it became increasingly
difficult to morally justify imperial power and as the colonized experienced
an increased sense of autonomy. Professor Muriel E. Chamberlain
describes in detail these circumstances in her book Decolonization: The
Fall of the European Empires (1985), emphasizing that, “when the second
World War broke out in 1939, roughly a third of the world’s entire
population lived under imperial or colonial rule; today [2001] less than 0.1
percent of the global population lives in dependent territories.”17

15
See, for example, Herzog’s Conquest of the Useless: Reflections from the
Making of Fitzcarraldo (2010) and Rivera’s answer to Luis Trigeros’s writings on
La vorágine: “La vorágine y sus críticos”, in La vorágine: Textos críticos, 63-76,
ed., Montserrat Ordoñez Vila (Bogotá: Alianza, 1987).
16
This transitional period can be set between World War II and the mid-1960s.
The revolutionary processes that brought about the collapse of European
colonialism began at the end of the eighteenth century with the French and Haitian
Revolutions.
17
Muriel E. Chamberlain, as cited in John Springhall, Decolonization since 1945:
The Collapse of European Overseas Empires (New York: Palgrave, 2001), 1.
 Bleeding the Rubber Trees: La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo 193

In addition, the Vietnam War, one of the most tragic events in the
history of the twentieth century, took place at a time closer to the years in
which Herzog made his two Amazonian epics, Aguirre, the Wrath of God
and Fitzcarraldo (1972 and 1982, respectively). The collective sense of
defeat left behind by this war made it impossible for former Imperial
discourses of triumph to survive in a world marked by this unfortunate
event. The German film maker’s poetic and romantic vision was markedly
influenced by the post-Vietnam era. In essence, the narrative in
Fitzcarraldo corresponds with the profound state of disillusionment
generated by this war worldwide. Herzog responds to the general sense of
defeat by making Fitzcarraldo a very difficult and conflictive hero who, in
the end, also fails.
There is, however, a paradoxical element in this mix. Personally, I
think the German director may have also been influenced by grandiose
ideas of European superiority and invincibility when planning the
production of Fitzcarraldo. As a matter of fact, during production members
of local communities in the Amazon territory frequently protested against
Herzog’s unawareness and lack of respect for their societal organizations.
In particular, an Aguaruna leader commented in an interview included in
Burden of Dreams: “from the start they [the film’s crew] never considered
that the communities here have their own authorities. They never
respected the organizations that are here.”18 The character created by
Herzog is, without a doubt, a “colonizer” who thinks highly of himself and
believes that he is capable of taming the Indians, as well as constructing
his own setting for entertainment, the opera house in Iquitos. Similarly,
from the moment Herzog landed in the Peruvian jungle with his German
production team, he committed himself to overcoming every possible
obstacle inflicted by nature and by the local indigenous communities. In
many ways Herzog also saw himself as an extremely capable, organized,
and efficient European.
Interestingly, the main character in this film is depicted as a descendant
of the eighteenth-century foresters and as a strong believer of their
scientific methods. Although not unique to Germany íthis science also
developed in the Scandinavian countries and in Franceí Scientific
Forestry became important towards the end of the eighteenth century to
incorporate rural natural resources into an industrializing modern
economy. In particular, this involved the felling of trees for industrial uses.
The efficiency of this procedure depended on the careful management of
the relationship felling/regrowth that entailed dividing the forest into
18
Les Blank and Goodwin, Michael, Burden of Dreams. DVD. Directed by Les
Blank. Flower Films, 1982.
194 Chapter Thirteen

perfect grids composed of equal parcels, with the number of parcels equal
to the assumed growth cycle of the trees. This was a way of measuring
forests and classifying large areas of land. This particular mentality shows
the difference between the Spanish conquistadors from the seventeenth
century whose methods were not systematic or influenced by scientific
reason,19 and the Post-Enlightenment “civilizers” whom Fitzcarraldo
represents. In reference to the origin of Scientific Forestry, film professor
Lutz Koepnick, notes:

In one way or another, Descartes’s metaphorical taming of the forest

cleared the ground for the emergence of the first systematic science of
forestry in the history of the West. Not surprisingly, it was inaugurated in
Germany in the latter half of the eighteenth century and built around the
image of the forest geometrist and his mathematical approaches to
straightening out the diversity, randomness, and irregularity of natural
forests.20

In Herzog’s film, Fitzcarraldo’s goal íto restructure the irregular

aforementioned isthmus into a perfectly defined grid before pulling the
ship acrossí became the director’s wish in the eyes of the local people.
This idea, nonsensical to many indigenous men and women involved in
the production, turns into a reason for mistrusting and ultimately despising
the film director. Herzog’s contradictory beliefs and his misunderstanding
of an intriguing other ínatives and jungleí are documented over and over,
with anguish but also with admiration for the unknown, in his diary
Conquest of the Useless: Reflections from the Making of Fitzcarraldo
(2009).
A series of incidents that occurred during production added to the
tensions between the film director and the local people. In 1979, during the
first filming attempt, a border conflict that was taking place between Peru
and Ecuador interrupted preproduction work. The armed forces from both
countries involved in the conflict were highly intimidating and the local
Aguaruna Indians were sensitive to their presence, as well as to the
presence of other outsiders. In Conquest of the Useless Herzog details a
particular event that directly affected the production:

19
The historical figure, Lope de Aguirre, could be one of those seventeenth
century adventurers. This Spanish conquistador was represented by Herzog in his
Amazon epic film Aguirre, the Wrath of God from 1972.
20
Lutz Koepnick, “Colonial Forestry: Sylvan Politics in Werner Herzog’s Aguirre
and Fitzcarraldo”, New German Critique, Special Issue on German Film History,
no. 60 (Autum 1993):151.
 Bleeding the Rubber Trees: La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo 195

There is a strong military presence, and a mortally afraid Indian soldier,

not more than seventeen, fired a shot at our boat on the Cenepa; it struck
the water near us. All those in the boat froze. I was about to slip into the
water, but was then embarrassed and decided not to, because the young
man seemed much more shocked at having shot at us than we in the boat
were, his target.21

“Mimicking” the adventure of historical figure Carlos F. Fitzcarrald,

Herzog also used hundreds of native men, women, and children from the
area to build the mechanism that would allow him to pull the ship over the
mountain. However, Herzog over amplified the process: if the historical
figure used one ship only, which was disassembled before crossing the
mountain, Herzog used three. Constant financial difficulties made his crew
try to talk the director out of hauling the ship over the mountain, and
perhaps protect him from his own insanity. At one point, a campground
where the hundreds of indigenous people working on the film were
sheltered caught fire, creating chaos amongst everyone involved in the
production. Bad weather and dramatic changes in the water level of the
rivers also became an obstacle. Herzog was constantly at risk of losing the
different vessels used to navigate. Landslides delayed the production of
many scenes. As Herzog mentioned in Burden of Dreams, despite the fact
that there was high technology available, nothing they did or didn’t do
could beat the power of nature.
With regard to the characters in the film, the actors originally cast,
Jason Robards and Mick Jagger, had to withdraw from the production. On
the second filming attempt, German actor Klaus Kinski was hired as
Fitzcarraldo, but his craziness and bizarre behaviour repeatedly sabotaged
the production as he swung from episodes of rage to episodes of panic.
Despite his exhaustion and that of his actors and crew, Herzog kept
making extremely difficult demands during the filming of Fitzcarraldo. At
one point, instead of filming near Iquitos, he moved the production fifteen
hundred miles away into a territory that, according to the director, would
make the experience much more realistic for the actors. Many times the
crew spent too much time waiting for the right time of the day to film, for
the water to be at the right level, for people and equipment to arrive. At
times, Herzog could only mock his own behaviour. When a couple of
natives acting in the film pointed arrows at him and another crewmember,
he humorously remarked:

21
Werner Herzog, Conquest of the Useless: Reflections from the Making of
Fitzcarraldo, trans. Krishna Winston (New York: HarperCollins, 2009), 19.
196 Chapter Thirteen

I’m afraid they’ll get more and more bored and suddenly shoot. “Look at
that big guy there with the weird lens. You think you can get him? I’ll get
him! No, you won’t get him; you’re shaking too much.”22

Besides the problems directly related to production, at the time of

filming íbetween 1979 and 1982í local and transnational companies were
involved in two lucrative businesses in the Peruvian rainforest: the
massive felling of trees for the production of lumber and the extraction of
oil in the area were attracting businessmen from Lima and abroad. For the
local indigenous communities, in particular the Aguarunas and Huambisas,
the intrusion of outsiders threatened their rights as landowners since many
members of these communities had no legal titles to their land.23 As
Maureen Goslin, the editor of Burden of Dreams, stated: “Herzog’s
intervention had become a historical sidebar, now overwhelmed by the
greater and more pressing problem of settlers and continuing fights for the
land titles.”24
Herzog’s filming experience became a highly intensified version of the
real venture executed in the late 1800s by Peruvian entrepreneur Carlos
Fermín Fitzcarrald. This almost catastrophic adventure derives from the
above circumstances and can be interpreted from two perspectives:

1) The film maker was perceived as one of the intruders seeking wealth
by exploiting local people and natural resources. Particularly, rumours
started about members of the film company who supposedly were raping
women, burning bodies, poisoning and decapitating people. As
documented by the film maker in Burden of Dreams, “there were other
rumours by the press that we were smuggling arms, that while we were
shooting we had destroyed their fields, but we are not shooting yet.”25
Other rumours spoke of their involvement with drug trafficking. The
director expresses his team’s awareness of the presence of rudimentary
forms of drug trafficking in the area and emphasizes their lack of
involvement with these practices.26 Other circumstances of a similar nature

22
Blank, Burden of Dreams.
23
Herzog made a promise to the local communities that he would do everything
possible to try to help them acquire the title to their land. This was another one of
the director’s unfinished tasks in the Amazon jungle.
24
Maureen Goslin, as cited in Blank.
25
Blank.
26
As an example of his awareness of incipient drug trafficking in the area, in
Conquest of the Useless Herzog mentions a circumstance in which a local man
hollowed out a tree trunk, filled it with cocaine, and set it adrift hoping it would
eventually arrive at the port of Leticia, Colombia, 15.
 Bleeding the Rubber Trees: La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo 197

convinced the German film maker that he was only one, and likely the
weakest, of the many antagonists fighting for their own interests. He saw
himself as a necessary enemy for the local Indians, and as the weakest
contender in a battle of powers being fought by the lumber and oil
companies, the Peruvian army, the local communities, and finally the
producers of the film. In essence, being caught in the middle of a battle
between capitalist ambitions and resistance Herzog lived in a constant
state of fear, knowing his dream of “conquering” could be shattered at any
time. In Blank’s documentary he expresses this recognition:

We are challenging nature itself and it hits us back. That’s what is

grandiose about it and we have to accept it. Kinski sees this as an erotic
element. Nature here is violence-based. I see not eroticism but fornication
and asphyxiation and fighting for survival and growing and rotting away.
Lots of misery, misery that is all around us. The trees here are in misery,
the birds are in misery. I don't think they sing. I think they squeak in pain.

2) It is a well-known fact that, for centuries, the rights of indigenous

communities throughout the Amazon basin have been violated. A history
of abuse, passed down from generation to generation in Indian memory,
can also serve as a mechanism of protection against the presence of
intruders. In Herzog’s film, the foreign impresario interpreted by Kinski is
seen by the local people as a highly threatening figure: not only a rubber
baron but a sort of “white devil” capable of massive killings. From this
perspective, Herzog also fought a psychological and symbolic battle
against the traumatic imprints of the former moment of violence and abuse
that José Eustasio Rivera described in La vorágine.

An uncanny parallelism is what best describes the similarities between

the two works analysed in this chapter. Eduardo Neale-Silva points to a
condition of actuality in La vorágine. He believes that the novel
functioned as a pretext to motivate the encounter between the bourgeois
urban subject and both the nature and the people of the “barbaric” and
“uncivilized” Colombian jungle. This consideration also applies to the film
Fitzcarraldo. The jungle is an ominous, extemporal, and menacing space
that, at any time in history, can radically affect and transform anyone’s
life. The transformation of both Rivera and Herzog depended greatly on
their intention of challenging the impossible until both “ran out of
fantasy,” as Herzog expressed in Blank’s documentary.
Other factors allow for a comparison between these two works: Both
the novel and the film refer to a specific historical moment associated with
modernization processes in Latin America involving the exploitation of
198 Chapter Thirteen

territories and people. In the early 1920s Rivera enters the Amazon jungle
becoming a witness of abusive tactics by rubber companies. Comparatively,
in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Herzog creates a character that, on the
one hand, embodies the violence that transformed forever the author of La
vorágine as an individual and as a writer, and, on the other hand, indirectly
alludes to the transnational companies that, at the time of filming, were
involved in a lucrative oil business and in the massive felling of trees for
the production of lumber. From another perspective, before travelling to
the jungle, Rivera was the archetypical urban and educated subject, whose
attained social status placed him at a level of superiority with respect to
the individuals and communities living in remote and marginal areas.
Originally, he was unaware of, and even oblivious to, the social,
economic, and political realities of his own country. Similarly, Herzog’s
sense of invincibility with respect to the jungle was a product of his
European/bourgeois origin. This also made him unaware of the reality of
the remote spaces that later humbled and transformed him. Although
Herzog tried to maintain a critical distance and eventually was able to
finish the film, in the end, the project became his failed “cinematic opera.”
Similar to the author of La vorágine, Herzog never fully understood what
he called the existent and non-existent harmony of the jungle:

[…] the harmony is overwhelming and collective murder. We have to

become humbled in the face of this overwhelming misery and
overwhelming fornication, growth and lack of order. I say this full of
admiration for the jungle. I love it, but I love it against my better
judgment. . . . If I believed in the devil, I would say the devil was right
here.27

Moreover, Herzog, who is also a prolific documentary film maker known

for his involvement with socio-political criticism, exposes through
Fitzcarraldo his preoccupations regarding the current disappearance of
indigenous communities in the Amazon basin. In Conquest of the Useless
he describes with disdain the strong influence of cheap Western
paraphernalia invading native communities in Amazonia, and in Burden of
Dreams he expresses his concern with the accelerating modernization
processes through which “we are losing riches and riches, […] cultures
and individualities and languages and mythologies, and we’ll be stark
naked at the end.”28 It is worth noting, however, that neither La vorágine
nor Fitzcarraldo was intended to be a social document. In essence, Rivera

27
Blank.
28
Ibid.
 Bleeding the Rubber Trees: La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo 199

was a writer highly influenced by Romanticism, Modernism, and

Naturalism, and the influence of these genres is clearly seen in his poetry
and narrative works. Other than a social document, La vorágine is a novel
that demonstrates its author’s romantic, sentimental, and poetical affinity,
as well as his proficiency as a narrator. Jean Franco contests the idea of
Rivera’s novel being a socially committed text, stating that “such vision of
the novel diminishes its importance; a report on the rubber workers’
conditions would’ve had more impact than Cova’s frenzies. The novel’s
justification is its absolute portrayal of human experience.”29
In both of the films he set in the Amazon jungle, Herzog developed
stories based on two very different characters. In Aguirre, The Wrath of
God he presented the conquistador Lope de Aguirre as a strong and
delirious man whose quest for power and fortune in the New World ends
in a dramatic and tragic way. At the end of the film, his cherished
daughter, as well as all of his men end up dead, pierced by the arrows,
without having ever seen their enemy: the Indians. Subsequently, the great
Spanish conquistador ends up alone, standing on his raft, surrounded by
local fauna, and deprived of his triumph. The outcome seems different for
Fitzcarraldo, who is able to gather hundreds of local natives to help him
draw a perfectly straight line on top of a mountain and transport a ship
across an isthmus. This achievement symbolizes the transformation and
appropriation of the jungle as well as the power this man might acquire
afterwards. Interestingly, the victory that both Aguirre and Fitzcarraldo
desired so passionately, as presented by Herzog, is doomed to failure.
Their defeat íwhich also applies to the film directorí relates to the
characters’ incapacity to escape their European imagination and to their
inability to try to understand the semantic multiplicity of the Amazon
rainforest.
At the end of Fitzcarraldo, it becomes clear that the rubber baron has
refused to accept his defeat, as he imposes Enrico Carruso’s opera music
upon the impenetrable forest. As for Herzog, after struggling for four years
with the production of his film, he finally assumes what Lutz Koepnik
lucidly notes: “[t]he jungle rejects any attempt to be read, mastered, or
even represented. As it reduces human beings to insignificant receptacles

29
Jean Franco, Decadencia y caída de la ciudad letrada: La literatura
latinoamericana durante la guerra fría (Barcelona: Random House Mondadori,
2003), 146. My translation from the Spanish original: “. . . tal visión de la obra
disminuye su importancia; un informe sobre las condiciones de los caucheros
habría tenido más peso que los arranques de Cova. La justificación de la novela
tiene que basarse en la visión total de la experiencia humana que allí se presenta.”
200 Chapter Thirteen

of what will always escape their grasp.”30 In the end, the four years of
cumbersome production on Fitzcarraldo weakened Herzog profoundly.
The cannibalistic, “seductive […] clear and tenebrous, beautiful and
horrible jungle”31, defeated him. When he said, “I live my life, I end my
life with this project” he wasn’t kidding. To this, he added assertively in
Blank’s documentary that if Fitzcarraldo were to become a failed project,
he would walk into the jungle and would never return. This statement,
without a doubt, resonates with Arturo Cova’s destiny as pronounced by
Rivera in the epilogue of La vorágine:

The last cable received from our Consul, addressed to the Minister and
referring to the fate of Arturo Cova and his companions, says textually:
“For five months Clemente Silva has sought them in vain. Not a trace. The
jungle has swallowed them!”32

Bibliography
Blank, Les and Goodwin, Michael. Burden of Dreams. DVD. Directed by
Les Blank. Flower Films, 1982.
Castillo, Eduardo. “La vorágine.” In La vorágine: Textos críticos, 41-3.
Edited by Montserrat Ordoñez Vila. Bogotá: Alianza, 1987.
Chamberlain, Muriel E. Decolonization: The Fall of the European
Empires. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1985.
Davidson, John E. “As Others Put Play Upon the Stage: Aguirre,
Neocolonialism, and the New German Cinema.” New German
Critique, Special Issue on German Film History, no. 60 (Autumn
1993): 101-30.
Franco, Jean. Decadencia y caída de la ciudad letrada: la literatura
latinoamericana durante la guerra fría. Barcelona: Random House
Mondadori, 2003.
Herzog, Werner. Fitzcarraldo. DVD. Directed by Werner Herzog. Werner
Herzog Filmproduktion, 1982.
—. Aguirre, The Wrath of God. DVD. Directed by Werner Herzog.
Werner Herzog Filmproduktion, 1972.
—. Conquest of the Useless: Reflections from the Making of Fitzcarraldo.
Translated by Krishna Winston. New York: HarperCollins, 2009.

30
Koepnick, “Colonial Forestry”, 136.
31
Luis Eduardo Nieto Caballero, “La vorágine”, in La vorágine: textos críticos,
29-35, ed., Montserrat Ordoñez Vila (Bogotá: Alianza, 1987).
32
Rivera, The Vortex, 371.
 Bleeding the Rubber Trees: La vorágine and Fitzcarraldo 201

—. Herzog on Herzog. Edited by Cronin, Paul. London: Faber & Faber,

2002.
Koepnik, Lutz. “Colonial Forestry: Sylvan Politics in Werner Herzog’s
Aguirre and Fitzcarraldo.” New German Critique, Special Issue on
German Film History, no. 60 (Autumn 1993): 133-59.
Neale-Silva, Eduardo. Horizonte humano: Vida de José Eustasio Rivera.
Madison: Wisconsin UP, 1960.
Nieto Caballero, Luis Eduardo. “La vorágine.” In La vorágine: textos
críticos, 29-35. Edited by Montserrat Ordoñez Vila. Bogotá: Alianza,
1987.
Perus, Françoise. Historia crítica y literaria: el realismo social y la crisis
de la dominación oligárquica. La Habana: Casa de las Américas, 1982.
—. De selvas y selváticos: ficción autobiográfica y poética narrativa en
Jorge Isaacs y José Eustasio Rivera. Bogotá: Plaza & Janes, 1998.
Pizarro, Ana. “Imaginario y discurso: La Amazonía.” Revista de crítica
literaria latinoamericana XXXI, no. 61 (2005): 59-74.
Prager, Brad. The Cinema of Werner Herzog: Aesthetic Ecstasy and Truth.
New York: Wallflower, 2007.
Rivera, José Eustasio. The Vortex. Translated by Earle K. James. Bogotá:
Panamericana, 2001.
Rodríguez, Ileana. “Naturaleza/nación: Lo salvaje/civil escribiendo
Amazonía.” Revista de crítica literaria latinoamericana XXIII, no. 45
(1997): 27-42.
Springhall, John. Decolonization since 1945: The Collapse of European
Overseas Empires. New York: Palgrave, 2001.
 CHAPTER FOURTEEN

OTHER EXPRESSIONS OF INDIGENISM:

FILM ADAPTATIONS OF TWO STORIES
BY JOSÉ MARÍA ARGUEDAS1

MARÍA IGNACIA LÓPEZ DUHART

UNIVERSIDAD DE LOS ANDES, CHILE

The Peruvian author, José María Arguedas (1911-1969) positions himself

in a dual space íboth in his own life2 and in his writingí between the
indigenous and the white, and thus is situated in a peripheral and
privileged, but also pathetic place, as Mario Vargas Llosa has suggested,
“because by living within those two antagonistic worlds, he became an
uprooted man.”3 Set in the midst of the indigenous movement, his work
attempts to give an account of the Indian reality in Peru by means of
fiction and the linguistic, historical, anthropological and narrative
resources. Thus, he becomes the voice of the American anguish and
historical tensions. Antonio Cornejo Polar argues that his writing develops

1
This chapter is part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso Internacional
de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, 9-10 October,
2013.
2
His father was a judge and became a widower when José María was only three
years old. He then remarried but the boy had a bad relationship with his stepmother
and her son Pablo. He spent most of his time with the people working in the
kitchen and the yard than with his father and stepmother. Even though his parents
were not indigenous, he was raised by indigenous servants. His mother tongue was
Quechua and during his childhood he was saturated by this culture and he learned
Spanish only during his school years. Throughout his whole life, José María
Arguedas moved from one world to the other.
3
“[P]orque el arraigo en esos mundos antagónicos hizo de él un desarraigado”.
Mario Vargas Llosa, La utopía arcaica. José María Arguedas y las ficciones del
indigenismo (Madrid: Alfaguara, 2008), 13.
 Other Expressions of Indigenism 203

from the dialectics between the indigenous Andean world and the master’s
peninsular world4.

1. José María Arguedas’s Short Stories

The present chapter analyses two of Arguedas’s stories: “La agonía de
Rasu-Ñiti” (1962) and “El sueño del pongo” (cuento Quechua, 1965); and
their corresponding short film adaptations; La agonía de Rasu-Ñiti (1985)
by Augusto Tamayo San Román and El sueño del pongo (1970) by the
Cuban director Santiago Álvarez. The purpose of this study is to analyse
both narratives in regards to how these cinematographic adaptations
account for their stories. The main emphasis is given by the manner in
which both directors, in their short films, integrate and deal with
Arguedas’s aesthetic and ideological proposal.
Both stories have been regarded by the critics as two of Arguedas’s
best written pieces5 and, due to their aesthetic and symbolic nature, both
stories have been successfully adapted in their vast number of
representations on stage6 with those adaptations in range from the theatre
to the cinema and even to ballet. The stories in this analysis are both short
film adaptations. This is a genre that, since its beginnings, has been
characterized by an experimental style and artistic freedom ífavoured,
among other things, because of its low cost, which allows for economic
independence. Paulo Pécora argues that the short film’s specificity “is not
found in its obvious physical characteristic, but rather in its refuge nature
and resistance spaces.”7 This, in turn, is consistent with the meaning of the
Arguedian work in which the author’s main intention is to recognize the
situation of the Peruvian native man within the hegemonic context that
marginalises him.
“La agonía de Rasu-Ñiti” tells the story of the danzak’8 (or scissors
dancer) last dance, Rasu-Ñiti, which means “the one who crushes snow”.

4
Antonio Cornejo Polar, “Presentación”, in José María Arguedas, Obras
completas I, ed. Sybila Arredondo (Lima: Horizonte, 1983), 11-14.
5
Mario Vargas Llosa, La utopía arcaica, 104.
6
Alberto Villagómez, “Arguedas y el teatro peruano.” Letras, no. 82 (2007): 69.
7
“[N]o está en su característica física más obvia, sino más bien en su carácter de
refugio y espacio de resistencia”. Paulo Pécora, “Algunas reflexiones sobre el
cortometraje,” in Hacer cine: Producción audiovisual en América Latina, ed.
Eduardo Ruso (Buenos Aires: Paidós, 2008): 380.
8
The danzak’ is the one who does the Scissors Dance (Danza de Tijeras), a festive
and ritual dance with a Spanish origin but integrating the Quechua culture. In the
story, Arguedas described the dance and the handling of the scissors as:
204 Chapter Fourteen

In the story, Rasu-Ñiti, in full awareness that death is approaching, calls

his wife, daughters and musicians íLurucha, the harpist, and Don Pascual,
the violinistí for them to witness his disciple, or “Atok’sayku” (which
means “the one who tires the fox”), in his final performance. The story
recovers one feature of the Peruvian indigenous world ritual as the
magical-religious imaginary is presented by means of a spiritual presence
and an ideal of death; the Wamani (or “Dios montaña que se presenta en la
figura de cóndor”9), which rests over the danzak’, summoning and talking
to him. In the story, the figure Atok’sayku is central as he will be the one
in charge of preserving the Andean dance traditions.
“El sueño del pongo” (cuento quechua) is an oral tale from an
unknown source that Arguedas heard from a member of the Qatqa
community and later wrote down in Quechua for a subsequent translation
into Spanish according to what, in his words, remained “almost engraved
in my memory.”10 In his introductory notes, Arguedas adds: “we have
tried to reproduce as faithfully as possible the original version but, without
a doubt, there is plenty of our own work and intervention in the text; and
this is also relevant.”11 It tells the story of a poor pongo who starts

Son hojas de acero sueltas. Las engarza el danzak’ por los ojos, en sus
dedos y las hace chocar. Cada bailarín puede producir en sus manos con
ese instrumento una música leve, como de agua pequeña, hasta fuego:
depende del ritmo, de la orquesta y del “espíritu” que protege al danzak’.
Bailan solos o en competencia. Las proezas que realizan y el hervor de su
sangre durante las figuras de la danza dependen de quién está asentado en
su cabeza y su corazón.
They are loose steel sheets. They are linked together by the danzak’s eyes,
and in his fingers he makes them collide. With their hands, each dancer can
make a light music with this instrument, like little water, or even fire: it
depends on the rhythm, the orchestra, and the “spirit” that protects the
danzak’. They dance alone or in competition. Their feats and the heat of
their blood during the dancing figures depend on who is “sitting” in his
head and heart.
See José María Arguedas, “La agonía de Rasu-Ñiti,” in José María Arguedas,
Obras completas I, ed. Sybila Arredondo (Lima: Horizonte, 1983), 205.
9
“[M]ountain God presented as a condor”. José María Arguedas, “La agonía de
Rasu-Ñiti,” in José María Arguedas, Obras completas I, ed. Sybila Arredondo
(Lima: Horizonte, 1983), 204.
10
“[C]asi copiad[o] en mi memoria”. Arguedas, “El sueño del pongo” (cuento
quechua),” in José María Arguedas, Obras completas I, ed. Sybila Arredondo
(Lima: Horizonte, 1983), 257.
11
“Hemos tratado de reproducir lo más fielmente la versión original, pero, sin
duda, hay mucho de nuestra “propia cosecha” en su texto; y eso tampoco carece de
importancia”. Ibid., 257.
 Other Expressions of Indigenism 205

working at his master’s house. The pongo ísilenced, quiet and menialí is
humiliated and looked down on by the master. Yet, he one day asks
permission to talk with his patroncito (“dear master”); he wants to share a
dream he has had. His master hears the story and the pongo tells him about
his dream in which both of them die and meet Saint Francis. The latter
asks the prettiest angel to cover the master’s body with honey and then
sends the oldest and most miserable angel to bring some excrement and
smear the pongo with it. The master listens to the pongo with great delight.
However, the pongo continues with his story and he then adds that Saint
Francis commands for the pongo and his master to lick each other’s bodies
slowly, for all eternity.

2. Short Film Adaptations

As it was previously stated, the adaptation of La agonía de Rasu-Ñiti is a
short film in a 30-minute video format, directed by Augusto Tamayo San
Román for the Communications Centre at Universidad Católica de Perú
in 1985. Renowned actors such as Luis Álvarez, Delfina Paredes and
Carlos Velásquez appear in this short film. Two of Tamayo’s comments
are worth mentioning regarding the adaptation of Arguedas’s work; the
first, “what I am most passionate about is reading literature and
transforming it into film”12, and the second, “to make Peruvian films is to
contribute to the existence of a country’s image on the big screen without
necessarily proclaiming it; this is authentic nationalism, not only words.”13
The above statements explain the director’s choice. La agonía de Rasu-
Ñiti offers a realist proposal, centred on the telling of the story as faithfully
as possible to the original text. Consequently, the succession of images is
almost literal in comparison to the text as it presents the physical spaces,
characters, and dialogues. Arguedas’s story is rich in descriptions and
highly visual in doing so, as with the beginning:

Estaba tendido en el suelo, sobre una cama de pellejos. Un cuero de vaca

colgaba de uno de los maderos del techo. Por la única ventana que tenía la
habitación, cerca del mojinete, entraba la luz grande del sol; daba contra el
cuero y su sombra caía a un lado de la cama del bailarín. La otra sombra, la
12
“[L]o que más me apasiona es leer literatura y transformarla en un filme”. Portal
del Cine y el Audiovisual de la Fundación del Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano,
http://www.cinelatinoamericano.org/cineasta. aspx?cod=1766 (accessed Oct. 2,
2013).
13
“Hacer cine peruano es contribuir a que exista una imagen del país en la pantalla
grande sin necesidad de proclamarlo, es un nacionalismo auténtico, no de
palabras”, Ibid. (accessed Oct. 2, 2013).
206 Chapter Fourteen

del resto de la habitación, era uniforme. No podía afirmarse que fuera

oscuridad; era posible distinguir las ollas, los sacos de papas, los copos de
lana; los cuyes, cuando salían algo espantados de sus huecos y exploraban
en el silencio. La habitación era ancha para ser vivienda de un indio.14

The above detailed composition of the place is similarly represented in

the film; the camera moves inside the room and focuses on the objects; in
the background we hear a song in Quechua. The director manages to
introduce the reader-spectator into a private, intimate, particular, and
protected world. Likewise, other scenes that portray everyday activities, as
when women de-kernel the corn and their daughters are running through
the field, are represented with ease and naturalness, with a hand-held
camera and are accompanied by chants and Andean music. The latter is
more than just an ornamental element, as it becomes a festive gesture
representing the figure of the dancer as part of the indigenous world
vision.
At the beginning of the story, in the take inside the house, the camera
moves towards the window and the exterior; we hear the wind, we see the
snow-capped mountain and the soaring condor íthis bird is a direct
representation of God. Waterfalls, rocky shores, a lake and mountains
appear in alternating images. The condor caws; the camera moves from a
panoramic view of the mountain to the frightened eyes of the dancer as
they open, then back to his body as he lays down inside his house. Tamayo
emphasises the triad’s strong bond; nature, deity and danzak’. The focus is
placed on the character who, feeling taciturn and contemplative, speaks in
a resounding voice; “El corazón está listo. El mundo avisa. Estoy oyendo
la cascada de Saño. ¡Estoy listo!”15. The script ías for most of the filmí is
identical to Arguedas’s text. Due to their importance and strength in both
tales, these words lead the development of the story. In this sequence
though, I emphasise the succession of images as they evidence the
significance of the story’s natural-spiritual element that the director

14
“He was lying on a bed of sheepskins on the ground. A cowhide hung from one
of the roof beams. Bright sunlight entered by the room’s only window near de
ridge of the roof and fell on the cowhide which shaded on side of the dancer’s bed.
The rest of the room was uniformly in shadow ínot quite in darkness, for it was
possible to distinguish clay pots, sacks of potatoes, piles of carded wool, and
guinea pigs a bit scared but coming out from their hiding places and exploring
quietly. The room was wider than most Indian dwellings.” (Translation from
Angela Cadillo and Ruth Flanders in “The Agony of Rasu-Ñiti.” Literature and
Arts of America, no. 14 (1980): 43); Arguedas, “La agonía de Rasu-Ñiti”, 203.
15
“The heart is ready. The world warns us. I am hearing the Waterfall of Saño; I
am ready!”, Ibid., 203.
 Other Expressions of Indigenism 207

intends to portray. After all, the danzaks’ are “characters infused with a
sacred and priestly role, and they go beyond other men in their
communication with the spirit encouraging at the core of all things.”16
Vargas Llosa argues that in “La agonía de Rasu-Ñiti”, Arguedas “is
meticulous in the description of this aspect in the fictitious reality.”17
Rasu-Ñiti stands up, takes the pair of scissors and makes them rattle,
the birds sing loudly, the wife and daughters hear and come to meet their
father; “El corazón avisa, mujer”18, he says. With its dance, the body of
the danzak’ provides refuge to the spirits in a ritual that invokes the sacred
cosmic force. So as to generate this in fiction, Arguedas uses a series of
resources in order to represent the atmosphere of ceremonial dancing. In
this respect, one such resource is description, in great detail, of the
moment when Rasu-Ñiti, aided by his wife, dresses up and is invested
with the nature of the divinity that has taken control over him:

Se puso el pantalón de terciopelo, apoyándose en la escalera y en los

hombros de su mujer. Se calzó las zapatillas. Se puso el tapabala y la
montera. El tapabala estaba adornado con hilos de oro. Sobre las inmensas
faldas de la montera, entre cintas labradas, brillaban espejos en forma de
estrella.19

Tamayo does not incorporate this scene, but he replaces it with a take
of the daughters running through the fields, while looking for the disciple
and the musicians so that they can be present at their father’s last dance.
This, in turn, generates greater dynamism and highlights the community
íthough also intimateí aspect of the dance. The director adds some
camera turns in order to provide greater visibility for the figure of the
disciple. He introduces one scene that is not present in the story, in which
one of the daughters calls Atok’sayku, who is noisily clattering the pair of
scissors on the river bank. Moreover, in the film, Atok’sayku listens to
Rasu-Ñiti’s thoughts íwhich in the story, the danzak’ tells only to himself.
It is a highly emotional speech with its value lying at the core of

16
“[P]ersonajes imbuidos de una función sacerdotal y sagrada, que llega[n] más
allá que los otros hombres en la comunicación con el espíritu que alienta en el
fondo de las cosas”. Vargas Llosa, 121.
17
“[E]s prolijo en la descripción de este aspecto en la realidad ficticia”. Ibid., 121.
18
“[T]he heart warns us, woman”. Arguedas, “La agonía de Rasu-Ñiti,” 204.
19
“He put on his velvet trousers, leaning on the ladder and on his wife’s shoulders.
He put on his slippers, his sash, and his hat. The sash was adorned with threads of
gold. On the broad brim of his hat, among patterned ribbons, gleamed star-shaped
mirrors.” (Translation from Angela Cadillo and Ruth Flanders in “The Agony of
Rasu-Ñiti.” Literature and Arts of America, no. 14 (1980): 43), Ibid., 204.
208 Chapter Fourteen

expressing the meaning and transcendence of the danzak’. In the story, the
reflection is told by a third person narrator; “Rasu-Ñiti era hijo de un
Wamani grande, de una montaña con nieve eterna. Él, a esa hora, le había
enviado ya su “espíritu”: un cóndor gris cuya espalda blanca estaba
vibrando.”20 In the film, the character owns these words and expresses
them through a first person narrator. Following this, the director alternates
landscape images once again so as to strengthen the bond between the
danzak’ disciple and its divine nature.
The small audience attends to the final dance performance and the
Wamani has already taken control over the body of the dancer as he
moves. Both in the story and in the film the scene of the representation
takes time as it is the moment of greatest tension in the story. Arguedas
describes the festive ritual, though also part of the danzak’s dying effort,
where the rhythms vary according to the dancer’s emotional states and
where the tunes of Lurucha and Don Pascual become magical: “¿De dónde
bajaba o brotaba esa música? No era sólo de las cuerdas y de la madera.”21
The same happens in the film in an intense sequence of no more than four
minutes when music and dance are energetic at first but then, as the
Wamani flaps around the Rasu-Ñiti, they become weak and mournful.
With his legs paralysed, Rasu-Ñiti falls on the ground but never stops
touching the pair of scissors. Along to the rhythm of the yawar mayu (or
blood river) íthe final step in the indigenous danceí the danzak’ remains
motionless, only his eyes move uneasily, until he finally dies. Tamayo
captures this moment by using a close-up, Lurucha changes the rhythm, he
plays the illapa vivon (or the thunder’s edge), and Atok’sayku continues
dancing.22 The camera focuses on the faces of the surprised ones among
the public. The energetic disciple screams: “¡El Wamani aquí! ¡En mi
cabeza! ¡En mi pecho!”23 With Tamayo being literal in this, as the
daughter observes the scene, she expresses herself by saying “No muerto.
¡Él mismo! ¡Bailando! […] íPor danzak’ el ojo de nadie llora. Wamani es

20
“Rasu-Ñiti” was the son of a big Wamani, from the mountain with eternal snow.
“By that time, he had already sent his “spirit”; a gray condor with its white back
vibrating”. Ibid., 206.
21
“Where was this music coming from? It was not only created by strings and
wood”. Ibid., 207.
22
I emphasize Andean music because, for Arguedas and as Tamayo argues, it is a
significant element; “it was one of the premature passions […] and a central
concern for his work as an anthropologist and folklorist, as a compiler and
translator of Quechua songs into Spanish” (Vargas Llosa, 131).
23
“The Wamani here! In my head! In my chest!”, Arguedas, “La agonía de Rasu-
Ñiti”, 209.
 Other Expressions of Indigenism 209

Wamani”24. Arguedas’s story ends with these words. Tamayo uses a zoom
over the face of the recently deceased Rasu-Ñiti and then we see the final
images of the snow-capped mountains which serve to end the film. With
this final scene, Tamayo manages to communicate the importance of the
succession, from the master to the disciple, by means of the immanent
presence of the Wamani, who takes control over the danzak’s body and
spirit.
We can now analyse some of the relevant aspects in the adaptation of
“El sueño del pongo” (cuento Quechua) from 1970, directed by the Cuban
Santiago Álvarez and based on the script written by Roberto Fernández
Retamar.25 Álvarez is known to be the master of the Cuban documentary
school. His work “has to be understood as a passionate defense of the
emancipation of the Third World countries”26, seen through his cinema,
his role as a reporter and leader of the Latin-American reality.
Consequently, the fact that he worked with this story íthat reveals the
ways of the despotic Peruvian governmentí is not irrelevant. His proposal
for El sueño del pongo is somewhat experimental: in nine minutes he tells
the story by using a dialectical editing (technique developed for the video
clip) through the combination of images and still pictures. With the
changes in focus and framing, neatness and movements (zoom in and
zoom out), there is continuity in the visual dynamic, but it nevertheless
reveals the filming cuts. The film alternates documents, as the images are
realist pictures in black and white; we see native people, Quechuan crafts,
blancos, market scenes, classic sculptures, etc. This, in turn, enriches the
film, contributing to this constant alternation between reality and fiction.
Images ísometimes shown as negativesí are superimposed over the
black background, along with circled or squared frames, sometimes of the
size of the screen, but at other times, much reduced. These resources
accompany the story itself, for example, when the master sees the pongo
for the first time and he says, “¿Tú de veras eres gente? No lo parece” 27,
and the pongo answers, “Debo ser algo señor y por eso me han enviado a
cumplir mi turno de pongo.”28 We see a reduced image over the black
background with the figure of a native man in a fetal position lying on the
24
Ibid., 209.
25
The short film obtained the Primer Premio Concha de Oro in the San Sebastián
film festival in Spain (1971).
26
“[H]a de leerse como una apasionada defensa de la emancipación de los países
del Tercer Mundo”. Carmen-José Alejos Grau, “La liberación en el cine
latinoamericano”, Anuario de la historia de la Iglesia, no. 11 (2002): 171
27
“Are you really a person? You do not look like it”. El sueño del pongo, directed
by Santiago Álvarez (1970; La Habana: ICAIC ,1970), videocassette.
28
“I must be something, my lord, so have I been sent to serve as a pongo”, Ibid.
210 Chapter Fourteen

ground. The same reduced image is used in another moment, when the
narrating voice describes the moment when the master notices the pongo:
“Y vio allá abajo al pongo más pequeñito que nunca, acurrucado, más que
arrodillado, como un pequeño montón de susto.”29 When describing the
miserable image involving the pongo, the pictures are combined so as to
show other parts of the little man’s body; an aged and dark-skinned face,
dirty feet with worn out sandals, then the image of his bare feet and
another of his faceless torso. The remains of the human figure define the
pongo, whose human quality is being questioned in the story: “íCreo que
eres perro. ¡Ladra! íle decía [el patrón]. El hombrecito no podía ladrar.
íPonte en cuatro patasí le ordenaba entonces. El pongo obedecía y daba
unos pasos en cuatro pies.”30
Álvarez adapts the voice of the third-person narrator of Arguedas’s
story to the voice of a little boy, Hernán, who tells the story. This
mediation reminds us of the popular and anonymous origin of “El sueño
del pongo”, as Arguedas had been told. The choice of a boy to tell the
story is a highly accurate one as it portrays the Arguedian imagination, a
choice seen in many of his narratives that have children as main
characters, with a mobility of movement and revealing voices.31 Regarding
this, Vargas Llosa adds, “The violence that prevails in the fictitious world
is glorified by the fact that the narrator and main character of the stories –
victim or witness of the cruelty– is almost always a child, a defenceless or
marginal person, the most vulnerable being, the least prepared to defend
himself.”32
The short film, with its childish voice tone, provokes an effect of
“defamiliarising” or “making strange” in the spectator, given that the
master’s cruelty and abuse described by the child’s voice is very violent.
The adaptation integrates certain characteristics of a children’s story;
descriptions and specific associations are an example of this. For instance,
we find the first description of the master, opposed ívisuallyí to the
pongo: “El señor era grande, gordo, casi blanco, rico y poderoso. El pongo

29
“[A]nd he saw the pongo smaller than ever, curled up on the ground and not just
kneeling, as a small pile of fear”. Ibid.
30
“íI think you are a dog. Bark! — the master would say. The little man could not
bark. ístand in four legsí would he command. The pongo obeyed and gave steps
in his four legs altogether”. Arguedas, “El sueño del pongo”, 251.
31
For some examples, refer to the following stories: “Agua” (1935), “Amor
mundo” (1967), “Doña Caytana” (1935).
32
“La violencia que impera en la realidad ficticia está magnificada, además, por el
hecho de que quien relata y protagoniza las historias, la víctima o el testigo de la
crueldad, es casi siempre un niño, una persona indefensa y marginal, el ser más
vulnerable, el menos preparado para defenderse”. Vargas Llosa, 110.
 Other Expressions of Indigenism 211

era pequeñito, flaco, indio, pobre como un puñado de polvo.”33 With this
brief differentiation, Álvarez sets the dichotomous structure upon which
the Arguedian tale is founded. Changes in the intonation of Hernán’s voice
representing the pongo and the master also help to create a strong
distancing effect ía “making strange”í of the scene.
In the moment when the pongo asks his master if he may tell him about
his dream, there is subversion in the existent value scale: a master,
dominating and the owner of language, and a subjugated pongo, depicted
almost as an animal, without the faculty of language. From this moment
on, “the pongo manages to break the dehumanization, assumes the speech,
and breaks the silence and domination.”34 By narrating his dream,
Arguedas accounts for the cultural hybridity, since the native man has
integrated the Christian worldview as part of his imaginative store.
“íComo éramos hombres, muertos, señor mío, aparecimos desnudos, los
dos, juntos; desnudos ante nuestro gran Padre San Francisco.”35 In
Álvarez’s adaptation, this westernisation is achieved by means of classic
human sculpture images and Christian iconography. These images
intensify and acquire a dreamlike nuance through the use of glasses and
distorting lights. The story shows the democracy of death, which will
collapse when the pongo’s body is covered in excrement while the
master’s in honey. When the master interrupts his story, as we see skulls
and diabolic images, and the child’s voice becomes suddenly aggressive;
“[a]simismo tenía que ser […] hasta en el sueño debe ser así, hasta en la
muerte y en el sueño de la muerte, el señor debe estar lleno de miel y el
pongo de mierda, claro pues, claro.”36 Once the master is quiet, the screen
turns white. From this moment onwards, there is an inversion and reality is
overturned through the little man’s dream: a third angel appears speaking
with an imposing voice “like a mountain thunder” and adds that both men,
master and pongo, are sinners íequating themí and as such, they deserve

33
“The master was big, fat, almost white, rich and powerful. The pongo was small,
skinny, native, and poor as a pile of dirt”. El sueño del pongo, directed by
Santiago Álvarez (1970; La Habana: ICAIC ,1970), videocassette.
34
“El pongo logra romper la cosificación, asume el discurso, rompe el silencio y la
dominación”. Julieta Haidar and Julieta Tisoc, “El discurso de la identidad en la
narrativa andina y mesoamericana.” Boletín de Antropología Americana, no. 28
(December 1993): 22.
35
“íAs we were men, dead, my lord, we appear naked, both of us, together; naked
before our Father Saint Francis”. Arguedas, “El sueño del pongo”, 253, 255.
36
“It had to be […] even in the dream it had to be, until death and in the dream
about death, the lord must be covered in honey and the pongo in excrement, of
course, sure”. El sueño del pongo, directed by Santiago Álvarez (1970), La
Habana: ICAIC, 1970), videocassette.
212 Chapter Fourteen

the eternal punishment given to them “como castigo insalvable e irrevocable,

tenéis que lameros el uno al otro, tú, pongo, lame al patrón, y, tú, patrón,
lame a tu siervo. Lama cada uno el cuerpo del otro entero, hasta el final de
los tiempos, para siempre.”37 With these words, materializing hints of
abomination, desire, vengeance and even homoerotism, the film comes to
an end. We see images of a native man now full sized, first in negative of
the film, then in the original, given that the antithetic and inversion
principles structuring the story are visually emphasised.

3. Conclusion
Regardless of the fact that the adaptations are very dissimilar, both íin
their own waysí manage to capture the elements of José María Arguedas’s
aesthetic. In both of these works there is evidence of a deep understanding
of the underlying texts, of the Arguedian fiction in the midst of the global
and the Quechuan world. Both directors, through their adaptations,
integrate an individual and aesthetic view on the matter at the same time as
they remain true to the Peruvian writer as the ultimate intentionality is
kept. In La agonía de Rasu-Ñiti there is an intention of saving the Andean
spirituality, its worldview as linked to the natural deity, and the
importance of the indigenous ritual. There is respect and a concern for the
danzak’ performance, with a mediating figure between the sacred and the
human. One of Tamayo’s greatest achievements is the importance he gives
to the character of Atok’sayku by integrating him prior to the story and by
giving him more dialogues in the short film. This reinforces the final scene
in which the daughter announces that the Wanami has not died as his spirit
has passed from master to disciple. With this twist, Tamayo supports one
of Arguedas’s most important literary causes: the transmission from
master to disciple which serves as a metaphor of the importance of
maintaining the traditional Andean beliefs and customs. In the case of
Santiago Álvarez, with a much more interesting approach in visual terms,
this is also manifested in the exhaustive reworking over the text of “El
sueño del pongo” (cuento Quechua). The aesthetic shows real images by
means of a technique that is constantly revealing the story’s fiction and
artifice. The decision to use a child’s voice as a method for “making
strange” the familiar estrangement resource, giving greater force to the
scenes of violence, together with the script adaptation íso that it is

37
“[A]s irrevocable and insurmountable punishment you have to lick each other’s
bodies for all eternity; you pongo, lick your master, and you lord, lick your servant.
Lick each other’s bodies until done, for the rest of your days, for all eternity”. Ibid.
 Other Expressions of Indigenism 213

adjusted to the little boy’s taleí are two relevant contributions to this
approach.
The story possesses a clear ideological desire to promote the
indigenous cause, an aspect which the film work develops in a very
creative way by means of an aesthetic experimental proposal. It maintains
the speech’s strength, but it is not turned into a political or demagogic
work since the stress is placed on the fiction, the telling of a tale. Finally,
we should mention that in both adaptations we find a process of literary
integration, but at the same time, there is a process of reflection and
creation which incorporates changes and contributions by the film makers
to the original texts, thus their decisions add density and artistic value to
the narrative works.

Bibliography
Alejos Grau, Carmen-José. “La liberación en el cine latinoamericano.”
Anuario de la historia de la Iglesia, no. 11 (2002): 165-76.
Arguedas, José María. “El sueño del pongo (cuento quechua).” In José
María Arguedas. Obras completas I, ed. Sybila Arredondo, Lima:
Editorial Horizonte, 1983: 249-58.
—. “La agonía de Rasu-Ñiti”. In José María Arguedas. Obras completas I,
ed. Sybila Arredondo, Lima: Editorial Horizonte, 1983: 203-10.
—. “The Agony of Rasu-Ñiti.” Translated by Angela Cadillo and Ruth
Flanders, Literature and Arts of America, no. 14 (1980): 43-16.
Cornejo Polar, Antonio. “Presentación”. In José María Arguedas. Obras
completas I, ed. Sybila Arredondo, Lima: Editorial Horizonte, 1983:
11-4.
Fernández Retamar, Roberto. El sueño del pongo. Short film. Directed by
Santiago Álvarez. 1970. La Habana: ICAIC. 1970. Videocassette.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2nWwJSzv2Do (accessed Sept. 26,
2013).
Giordano, Verónica. “La resistencia simbólica en las haciendas de la sierra
peruana.” Estudios Sociales. Revista Universitaria Semestral, no. 11
(1996): 161-77.
Haidar, Julieta and Tisoc, Julieta. “El discurso de la identidad en la
narrativa andina y mesoamericana.” Boletín de Antropología
Americana, no. 28 (December, 1993): 17-30.
Pécora, Paulo. “Algunas reflexiones sobre el cortometraje.” In Hacer cine:
Producción audiovisual en América Latina, ed. Eduardo Ruso. Buenos
Aires: Paidós, 2008: 377-88.
214 Chapter Fourteen

Portal del Cine y el Audiovisual de la Fundación del Nuevo Cine

Latinoamericano.
http://www.cinelatinoamericano.org/cineasta.aspx?cod=1766 (accessed
Oct. 2, 2013).
Tamayo, Augusto. La agonía de Rasu-Ñiti. Short film. Directed by
Augusto Tamayo. 1985. Lima: Centro de Comunicaciones de la
Universidad Católica de Perú. 1985. Videocassette.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=whrbwzk1_aI (accessed Oct. 1, 2013).
Vargas Llosa, Mario. La utopía arcaica. José María Arguedas y las
ficciones del indigenismo. Madrid: Alfaguara, 2008.
Villagómez, Alberto. “Arguedas y el teatro peruano.” Letras, no. 82
(2007): 65-81.
 PART V:

FILMS AND THEIR NARRATIVE STRATEGIES

 CHAPTER FIFTEEN

NARRATIVE STRATEGIES IN THE FILMS

OF PETER WEIR1

JORGE PEÑA VIAL

UNIVERSIDAD DE LOS ANDES, CHILE

The contrast between the commercial film industry, which is generally

associated with American films in Hollywood, and the European art film
industry, in which the role of the film director is a decisive and
distinguishing factor, has been both recurrent and commonplace. The
“cinema d’auteur” makes a similar acknowledgement in awarding
achievements in cinema just as we award a masterpiece of art in literature,
painting, music, or theatre. The artistic freedom and autonomy of the
European director in expressing his personal vision and appealing to a
cultured and usually small audience contrast with the director who works
in Hollywood, who is dependent on being able to raise vast sums and to
deliver a profit, and so is compelled by the genre conventions that are
commercially most successful.
This disjunctive way of making films, with its positive and negative
characteristics: art or industry, thematic depth versus mere entertainment,
can lead to one-side and unnecessarily exclusive vision. The films of Peter
Weir challenge these notions. His work constitutes a perfect amalgam of
both tendencies, as he transforms and synthesizes them from within. The
Australian films by Weir from the 1970s have a strong artistic flair,
representative of the European films and, without losing those
characteristics, the American films Weir made in the following decades –
based in Hollywood– accept the conventions of commercial films.
Nevertheless, in all of his films, of both his Australian and his American
periods, we can notice the same personal style in which the commercial

1
This paper has been written as part of the project, and with the support, of the
FAI Relief Fund Investigation, Per 002-09 of the University of the Andes,
Santiago, Chile.
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 217

techniques are exploited for strictly artistic goals. Thus, films by Peter
Weir cannot be easily assigned to one category –either the commercial
production for the masses, or the art-cinema for the few. The general
characteristics of his Australian period: the lack of narrative closing, his
appeal to realities beyond the rational (myths, dreams, the unknown), the
painting and artistic qualities, are present in Picnic at Hanging Rock, The
Last Wave, The Cars that Ate Paris, The Plumber and remain in his
American films: Witness, The Mosquito Coast, Dead Poets Society, and
Green Card, as Jonathan Rayner2 has stated. Weir shows a stylistic unity
that embraces both the notions of European “cinema d’auteur” and of the
classic American films. It is not about a mere choice of directing
commercial films in an interesting way, but rather a real and superior
synthesis of the best of both traditions. He admirably combines his wide
knowledge of the classics of Hollywood with the disciplined narrative of
the European art films. He masters the conventions of commercial films in
order to appeal to a wide audience, but at the same time adding to them a
deeper sense, when he treats key issues regarding the human condition,
and with this he revolutionizes a merely entertaining film3 from within.
Taking into account many artistic influences, from the acquired experience
of the new Australian cinema movement, through the deep knowledge of
the American industry of the film as entertainment, and of the cultural
features of the European art film tradition, he keeps up a personal style
which is found not only in his earliest films but, what is more unusual, in
his later productions, which have obtained wide commercial success.
Along with his very artistic cinematographic technique, what mainly
brings unity to his films is the configuration of the narrative plot. “Weir
almost certainly sees himself as a story-teller”4 and is not afraid of treating

2
Cf. Jonathan Rayner, The films of Peter Weir (New York: The Continuum
International Publishing Group, 2003). The text analyzes common relations present
in Peter Weir’s films.
3
Pat Mac Gilligan, “Under Weir …and Theroux”, in Film Comment 22 (1986):
23-32, “Hollywood is just irrelevant. They just provide the room you play it” (32).
4
“Weir almost certainly sees himself primarily as a story-teller. That does not
mean, however, that we need to perceive him like that. He is a story-teller who has
something to say about the grand themes, the big issues: life and death, why we are
here, freedom versus imprisonment of one kind or another, the spiritual side of life.
His willingness to take on large themes is one of Weir’s stylistic signatures. Most
of his films deal with fundamental questions of human existence –what then must
we do? What meaning can we give to life? What kind of moral choices face us?
Even when he takes on the limited canvas of romantic comedy in Green Card,
Weir tries to inject some higher significance into the narrative […]. In his
willingness to take risks, to go after significance, he is signaling one of the
218 Chapter Fifteen

the largest questions, those that affect the core of human existence. After
watching his films, the themes of which he treats continue to resonate
within us because they have been consciously and intentionally thought
about in those films. Our objective in the present work is to explore the
narrative strategies that Peter Weir unfolds in almost all of his
filmography. We believe there is a pattern in the configuration of the plots
in his films, so first we will describe it in a general way, and then we will
see how this pattern can be discerned in the different narrative
developments.

1. Narrative Strategies
The protagonist in the films of Weir is endowed with a charismatic
personality, somewhat eccentric and radical in his demands. He must face
a coercive reality; that of a strong establishment upheld by a rigid
authority that limits his freedom and prevents the realization of his dreams
and ideals. His subversive action against the restrictions of the system will
lead him to liberate himself from that restricted environment, to avoid the
different forms of oppression and to propose an alternative reality5. The
protagonist clashes with that given reality and builds up or channels all his
energies to establish a new one. That alternative world is far from being a
paradisiacal utopia or an idealized world, but there is always a dark side
present, which explains the usual pessimistic endings, either ambiguous or
sad of Weir’s films, which disappoint the expectations of the audience and
infringe on the safe, formulaic happy Hollywood ending.
The proposed alternative reality will face and stand in opposition to the
given reality. There is no place for any reconciliation or attainment of a

characteristics that make him a director worthy of consideration for auteur status.
He may fail at times in his movies, but at least he is attempting to give substance to
the narrative. He is not content to make hollow, superficially entertaining films that
you forget about the minute you live the cinema.” Don Shiach, The Films of Peter
Weir: Visions of Alternative Realities (London: Charles Letts & Co., 1993), 11.
5
“In all of his movies, the given reality that faces his protagonists (the school,
small town life, desiccated middle-class existence, a vulgar and materialistic
society, various form of oppression) is opposed by a vision of alternative reality,
almost always a reality that demands of the individuals that they allow their
dreams to inform their lives and that they follow their instincts, which will lead to
their liberation in one way or another. However, included in their vision of
alternative realities is the realization that the path to self-fulfillment, and replacing
our view of reality based on rationality and accepted values with one that allows
our spiritual and creative sides full play, is a very difficult and treacherous one and
society will do its best to defeat you” (Shiach, Films of Peter, 7).
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 219

superior synthesis. There is only the permanent confrontation and

opposition between these two views of the world. In this way, these two
worlds will collide, a true collision between opposing cultures and
lifestyles diametrically opposed and extreme in their mutual opposition;
the narration will adopt a dualist point of view because it will emphasize
these differences and oppositions. This opposition of cultures, worlds, and
ideals allows him to profile with clarity, and without major complexities
and nuances, the characters and lifestyles brought face to face. The
characters appear well shaped, and there is no place for ambiguities. When
the narrative development is polarized between these two extremes, these
opposing positions, the audience does not fall into a sort of Manichaeism,
but has in front of it the full breadth of the conflict in the story. Besides
that, this clash of cultures and beliefs is not presented in an aseptic and
neutral way, but gradually comes to favour the values of the charismatic
character, usually performed by a well-known actor (Robin Williams,
Harrison Ford, and Gérard Depardieu).
The script will, at some point, lead to the encounter between these two
distant and opposite worlds and persons, and will tend to decrease the
distances, between them, having them approach one another. Moreover, it
will make that two characters coming from totally different cultures fall in
love. However, given that their cultural roots are so different, this last
attempt will not succeed, and the common expectation of the audience,
always anxious about a happy ending, will fail.
Before elaborating on how these principles play out in the different
films, I would like to highlight in this narrative structure that we have
sketched, two common traits found in all his films. The first one is an
idealization of primitive cultures, depicted as being more in harmony with
nature, and a denial of the artificial aspects of so much of modern urban
life. The second, nowadays nearly unique given what is accepted in
fiction, is the absolute lack of explicit sexual scenes in his entire
production. The only partially erotic scene takes place when John Book
(Harrison Ford) sees Rachel, half-naked, washing herself (in Witness). But
it is totally innocent and more romantic than anything else.
These narrative principles that have been outlined so far in an abstract
way (criticism of a given coercive reality, liberation from that reality and
the proposal of an alternative reality, opposition between two worlds,
attempts of approaching and failure), are going to be analysed by
examining the specific themes of his films.
220 Chapter Fifteen

2. Narrative Structures Used in Several of Peter Weir

Films
2.1. The Australian Period
The first success of Peter Weir was Michael, a TV documentary included
in the film Three to go, for which he won the Grand Prix Award at the
Australian Film Institute in 1969. Since then he began to be seen as an
emerging talent in the new Australian cinema. The television documentary
is a report, a period document. Michael is a middle-class young man who
lives comfortably with his family in an apartment, when the 60’s juvenile
rebellion starts to appeal to him, raising questions about his complacent
bourgeois existence. The opening scene of the film is a pitched battle
between students –wearing shirts with Che Guevara’s face printed on
them– and the militaries. We do not know if they are real scenes or just a
projection, in Michael’s mind, regarding what will happen in the future.
Fast-paced scenes, John Lennon’s music, James Dean’s pictures,
subversive signs, TV programs in which experts argue about the juvenile
rebellion, interviews of young men expressing, vehemently and angrily,
their hostility to what they consider the limitations of “the system” fast-
paced and constantly changing scenes with juxtaposing images that jostle
and jar, promote the idea the society is beaten by changes and rebellion.
These images alternate with bland scenes of Michael’s family: trivial and
limited conversations while going to work at a formal office, arguing with
his girlfriend about her dress and other frivolities. The images are
interrupted by a scene of a TV panellist, speaking against the new sexual
tendencies of the youth, which Michael turns off with displeasure.
Michael, obviously bored with the conversation of his stock market
partners and their financial obsessions, goes to a meeting with a group of
young people; presumably, they represent the alternative juvenile culture.
In that meeting, many students announce the coming revolution that will
be required to overthrow the capitalist society. Michael shows up at a
family barbecue, with three hippies, in their deliberately outrageous
outfits. The hippies and their alternative culture are depicted as a contrast
to the established culture, so artificial, full of snobbery, and useless
pedantry. And so Michael seems to oscillate between two worlds: the
world of his respectable family and honourable work, and that new
alternative culture or juvenile counterculture. It seems he does not fit in
either of them. Both written and directed by Weir, Michael shows from the
beginning Weir’s distinctive narrative style.
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 221

Peter Weir’s career as a director truly began with Picnic at Hanging

Rock. The film begins with the following words: “On Saturday 14th
February 1900 a party of schoolgirls from Appleyard College picnicked at
Hanging Rock near Mt. Macedon in the state of Victory. During the
afternoon several members of the party disappeared without a trace”. This
leaves the impression that the narration of the film is based on real events.
That is to say, we are led to believe that the girls really went missing and
that there is no explanation for this strange mystery. Yet, these events took
place not in fact, but only in Joan Lindsay’s novel. Thus, those members
of the audience that are unaware of this, leave the cinema thinking the
events were factual and historical. The film creates an alternative reality –
Hanging Rock, the sacred place of the Aboriginals– with legendary
characteristics, unknown and mysterious, that are in complete opposition
to the rationalist and oppressive Victorian education that the ladies receive
in the upper-class society at Appleyard, an educational institution formed
on the model of education provided by English schools. The mystery of
Picnic at Hanging Rock remains, at the end, unresolved. The girls
disappear, Appleyard College starts to disintegrate, Sara and Mrs.
Appleyard die, and there is no explanation of what happened at Hanging
Rock. Irma, the only survivor, the girl who did not disappear, refuses to
reveal what happened. Michael seems not to remember anything about the
experience. The lack of a solution and of a proper narrative ending, so
characteristic of the postmodern era, frustrate the audience’s expectations
and may cause some to value the film more for the created atmosphere
rather than for the conveyed ideas. Part of the film’s appeal to the
unsolved mystery. Critics of the film frequently note that it promises more
than what is able to deliver. But it deliberately presents an alternative
reality, close to the native magic realism, through the very lack of a
rational explanation or understanding. The girls experience an attraction
for the instinctive forces symbolized by the hanging rocks. The school
imposes rationality and order; the rocks appeal to the girls because they
suggest a break from the puritan and oppressive rules of their high school.
It is worth mentioning that from a psychoanalytic perspective, the movie
emphasizes the transition from adolescence to adulthood, much in the
same way that Michael, Homesdale, The Car that Ate Paris, and Picnic
present in its narrative when it shows opposite forces: rationality/instinct,
extreme reality/inner psychic reality, conformity/release, order/disorder,
visible world/the unknown and mysterious. Peter Weir’s obsession with
these elements is going to increase in his subsequent films and they will
222 Chapter Fifteen

become, from the audience’s perspective, a characteristic trait in his film

career6.
The Last Wave is not an easy film. It touches upon large themes within
the context of a fantasy and horror movie. It has neither a clear ending nor
does it provide answers to the questions raised. The subject proposed
touches on the role that the Australian aboriginal culture plays in the
Western Christian world, one marked by materialism and rationalism, and,
on the other hand, shows how an Indian culture that manages itself in a
psychic and spiritual atmosphere of dreams, myths, and ancestral fears is
violated and devastated by the arrival of materialist criteria brought by
proper white men. These are familiar themes to us: dreams and reality, the
clash of cultures, the unknown and the psychic, the chaotic forces that lie
just beneath the thin layer of order in society, the person with special
powers and charisma, and the opposition between rationality and intuition.
The Western concept of justice is represented in the character of Burton,
the lawyer, and collides with the notion of justice of the ancestral
aboriginal culture. Western rationality proves itself entirely inadequate to
deal with forces of nature, both physical and psychic. It is within that
context that the imperialist tendencies of the reason of putting down every
aspect of reality in its own means are given. The rational and that which is
beyond the rational need to recognize the existence of the other; thus, the
rational should not deny the possibility that some truth could exist beyond
the understanding of reason. It becomes pertinent to cite Pascal in order to
explain this realization of the limits of reason when he wrote: “The last
proceeding of reason is to recognize that there is an infinity of things
which are beyond it […]”7.
David Burton takes on the defense of the aboriginals –he had first
thought they didn’t even exist in Sydney– and through them he comes to
know that he himself may descend from a South American tribe whose
members, according to aboriginal traditions, had visited Australia in the
prehistoric era. He must be a spirit from the “Dream Time”, that is more
real than the everyday reality. What happens in the Dream Time is the
source for the values, symbols, and laws of the aboriginal society. An
expert anthropologist explains to David that a spiritual race from the rising
sun, the Mulkruls, has the ability to get in contact with the Dream Time.
Weir is not interested in Indian demands but in showing an alternative
reality, mystic and unknown, hidden from the white Australian man who
has separated the world of dreams because that world is incoherent and
unreal. We see again in his films the formerly mentioned oppositions: the
6
Don Schiach agrees on this matter (Schiach, Films of Peter, 46).
7
Blas Pascal, Thoughts (Cambridge: The Harvard Classic, 1909), 267.
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 223

mystic world versus the rational grasp of the world in accordance with
natural laws, a boy’s intuition (a stormy rain without clouds?) versus the
rationality of adults, the inexplicable versus the comfortable securities of
religion. Weir wants to invite us to participate in the search for deep truths
beyond science and reason, given that rational man has lost contact with
the Dream World and the intuitive non-rational aspects of existence. In
contrast with that, dreams are real and prophetic for the aboriginals. From
information that David receives about his ancestral identity, dreams that
arise within him are not comfortable, because they anticipate the
destruction of the society by a tsunami, a huge wave. For the natives this
apocalyptic event is part of the evolution cycle, so they hope that from the
ashes of the white culture the seeds of a regenerated society will sprout.
David’s partners, who asked him to represent the aborigines in court,
are convinced that the Indian tribes are unable to exist in the city because
they, the whites with their rationalism, “destroyed their songs, dances and
laws”. This clear acceptance about the white Australian oppression is
accompanied by the blindness of the whites regarding the existence of the
aborigines in Sydney, in which David notices the ignorance of their laws,
due to the fact that they have been witnesses of Bill Corman’s
assassination for robbing tribe artefacts and pieces. We see again the
collision between two antagonistic cultures. Likewise, we notice the
imposition of the Australian law upon people who follow different
precepts and rules, as well as allusions to the repressive influence of
British cultural imperialism. The fact that Sydney is built on top of
underwater caves in which sacred aboriginal symbols were kept, serves as
a metaphor for a collective amnesia regarding its buried roots. The Last
Wave demonstrates how Australia has purposely deleted from memory its
native roots. It could be that David Burton, played by Richard
Chamberlain, is not a charismatic figure, but still he manages to convey an
intuitive and psychic special power. This character must undertake a
solitary battle between the prejudices and the ignorance of white society,
as well as face the aboriginal tribes as represented by the character of
Charlie. He oscillates between Australian white society, from which he is
increasingly detached, and the alternative reality, opposite from the
aboriginal tribes and their culture and Dream Time. His visionary and
psychic powers will ruin and break down his established world, his belief
system, his family, and even his own identity. His apocalyptic vision will
completely disrupt both his identity and his way of life.
This film was written and directed entirely by Peter Weir. It is one of
his most personal and artistic films. Less known than Picnic, it clearly
reflects the narrative structures that will persist throughout his career.
224 Chapter Fifteen

These two films are the most representative of his Australian period and of
his film art. It is not our intention to analyse The Plumber (1979),
Gallipoli (1981) and The Year of Living Dangerously (1982). We find in
all of them narrative structures similar to those we just studied. They will
be found as well in the best-known films made during his American
period.

2.2. The Hollywood Period

Weir’s frustration when he did not receive funding for The Mosquito
Coast prompted him to postpone his personal project and commit to
directing Witness, a film that was already in the works. He also had to
submit the film to external supervision, usual in commercial films, far
from the freedom he enjoyed during his career in Australia. He had to
make a film according to Hollywood rules, more focused on working with
guild technicians rather than independent artists. But, instead of seeing this
as a restriction to develop his personal style, he found he could infuse his
artistic view into a commercial film intended for a wide audience. Weir
wanted to work in a highly regulated environment like Hollywood, make
films ruled by conventional trends and formulas, but, at the same time, in
the most personal and controlling way he could. This prompted him to
produce several versions of the script. Witness presents a perfect blend of
the film industry’s commercial interests and the director’s artistic
intentions. Furthermore, Witness was a box office success (quite different
from The Mosquito Coast) because it wisely combined a thriller with
action and melodrama attributed to Westerns. It is his first American film
produced by Edward Felkdman at Paramount, and performed by American
actors, including Harrison Ford, among others.8 Feldman hired Weir with
the intention of depicting the American scene afresh, through new eyes not
yet wearily accustomed to the view. From the beginning we notice Weir’s

8
“On my first rewrite, I dismissed the melodrama, removed it even, and the
producer brought me back to earth and back to realities. He spoke as a great
American showman and therefore, for me, connected with the 1940s and the
golden age of Hollywood. He kept saying «audience» and «Remember it’s a
thriller, and if you keep that in mind you’ll construct a kind of hybrid between your
style and the genre»…I came to realise that if the Fords and the Capra’s had total
control, they might have had shorter careers –and made less good films. Here on
Witness, I was facing a genre film, something that one was very familiar with –go
in quickly, do it with style and grace, collect your check and leave”. Interview to
Peter Weir quoted in Harrison Ford. A Biography by Minty Clinch (London:
Holder & Stoughton, 1988), 220.
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 225

determination to contrast the sharp difference between the Philadelphia

urban jungle with the agrarian and archaic Amish community.
Nevertheless, this opposition is not balanced because from the very first
scenes we see idyllic images of the agrarian community, with farmers
walking amidst golden corn fields, with warm-hued landscape, where
everything conveys order, harmony, and peace, as a link between land and
nature, while the symbol of the decadent modern society, represented by
urban life in the city of Philadelphia, is described as a place where
individualism, aggressiveness and barbarism reign. The Amish people
seem to be a relic from an agrarian past, a vision of America as it was
three hundred years ago, primitive and close to nature. Men belonging to
this sect talk to each other slowly and with serenity. They eat, pray, and
work together, and pursue the same aims. The unity and paradisiacal
harmony, reflect the strong sense of community which is shown in the
idyllic scene of the construction of the barn, during which everyone
participates, each having a specific role, including Book who collaborates
as a carpenter.
Rachel and Samuel arrive at Baltimore train station; the scene shows
Daniel riding a carriage on a country road that runs next to the rails, where
a high-speed train passes by. In this scene Weir comments on the contrast
between technology and the rural era. When the carriage goes into the city,
drivers constantly honk at it and yell insults; the slow pace of the horse-
drawn carriage causes traffic to also slow down. Here the camera
treatment adopts Samuel’s point of view, in both the carriage-riding scene
and the scene of waiting for three hours at the station. The wide-eyed boy,
ecstatic with what he has been able to see, takes in this reality apparently
for the first time. Everything is anonymous and impersonal. Sometimes he
assumes that what he is seeing is familiar to him, but is disabused, as when
he approaches an orthodox Jew, believing him to be Amish. The
impression the boy gets from the city is negative; for him, it is a place of
aggression, confirmed by his witnessing the cold efficiency with which
McFee kills his partner in the restroom. The boy’s instinctive terror, as he
sees the murder through a door that has been left ajar, is expressed
convincingly by Lukas Haas, the young actor. From that moment the
camera’s point of view will pass from the boy to John Book (Harrison
Ford), who will carry Rachel and Samuel to his sister’s place. Here again,
Weir’s careful artistry displays the contrast between the rural simplicity of
Rachel’s outfit and her natural reserve, and the modern manners of the
cynical and divorced Elaine. When the boy in the police station sees
McFee’s picture and indicates to Book that McFee is the assassin, Book
will pass this identification on to his boss (Schaeffer), who already has a
226 Chapter Fifteen

well-founded suspicion. McFee will shoot at Book, who escapes seriously

wounded in the underground parking lot, a symbolic place of urban
alienation. When John Book warns Rachel that they have to get out of the
city and hide Samuel, the only witness, she tells him that they might be
safe in the Amish community. So far everything suggests to the audience
that they are watching a thriller. The images of the city, seen through the
eyes of both the boy and Rachel íthey express corruption and brutalityí
even among those who are supposed to be the protectors of the city and
should be the defenders of justice. Corruption, violence, rude manners,
bleak and dark landscapes increase the solitude and isolation the city
conveys. In other words, the city proves to be both brutal and alienating.
The contrast to life in the idyllic Amish community could not be stronger.
The film turns into a new direction and new arena: from thriller to love
story, from the city to the Amish community. Now someone from the
outside, someone foreign to that culture and mentality (the detective John
Book) will live in that community, which makes possible a kind of
juxtaposition of those two very different worlds. Here, there is peace and
salvation –contrasting with the noisy jostle of the city– which will allow
Book to heal his soul, as he recovers from his physical wound. When he
gets a fever, he touches Rachel’s hand; she will be the one who steadily
takes care of him with generosity and tenderness. It is the beginning of
their mutual attraction, though she remains outwardly puritanical. Her
smile, when she notices that her dead husband’s clothes are too big for
Book and she will need to adjust them, expresses her inward feeling
toward him.
We can see how Weir’s films treat a clash of cultures: the urban and the
agrarian, the culture of the East and the West, the modern/technological and
the archaic/natural, the cultures of individualism and those with a strong
community sense. Eli, who leads the united and closed community that
demands loyalty from all its members, is the guardian of order and
traditions. He cures Book’s wounds, gives him shelter, and shares jokes
with him. He lives by the rules of the community, and worries that Rachel,
in her attraction to Book, might violate them. In the contrasting world of
the city, Schaeffer, Book’s boss, is a hypocrite who is at the top of the
police corruption. He wants to kill the boy in order to protect the
corruption racket and to keep following the comfortable urban life he has,
covered by the fake respectability of a police officer who has the
responsibility of protecting society against crime, when in reality he is
living a permanent lie.
The film clearly idealizes the alternative reality of the Amish agrarian
community. They are presented as charming and nice people and their
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 227

ferocious puritanism is passed over without emphasis. Their lives, in their

isolated enclave, are always presented in a positive way, a contrast to the
customs of the urban American society from which they remain
deliberately and systematically aloof. This is part of an ideological
message that the movie wants to convey.
This idyllic enclave for the Amish, united in their beliefs, will be
threatened by enemies that come from outside. Book becomes partially
integrated in the community, and this leads to what might be considered a
kind of feminization, because he has started to accept the rules of the
leaders. Nevertheless, the policeman that he once was emerges when it is
time to defend the Amish. Following their principle of non-violence, the
Amish unresistingly accept the presence of the evildoers. In the end,
Rachel sees Book with resignation, through a window, returning to the city
from which, it seems, he was only temporarily disconnected. They are in
love, but they know that they belong to different worlds and those
differences are vast, and cannot be overcome. We can see how the triumph
of order and social structures prevails in Rachel’s decision to stay and in
Book’s decision to leave. The last scene shows Daniel, Rachel’s Amish
suitor, approaching the field while Book is travelling from the community
back to the city.
The Mosquito Coast, based on Paul Theroux’s novel, is one of Weir’s
most thematically accomplished films. The film’s lack of commercial
success is understandable: it did not conform to Hollywood conventions,
and did not meet audience expectations. In the first half of the film, the
audience identifies with Allie Fox (Harrison Ford), with his creativity and
inventiveness, able to build a city in the middle of the jungle from nothing.
But the audience sees how everything ends up in a tragedy because of the
main character’s íAllie’sí crazy obsessions. The audience leaves the
cinema on a sad note: the disappointment of an excessive utopia that ends
in failure. The movie narrates the rise and fall of this charismatic and
eccentric character, at once prophetic and apocalyptic, carrying his
creations and family through a tumultuous journey. Both in the novel and
in the film, it is Fox’s older son, Charlie, who offers the narrator’s
perspective. He thinks the world of his father is great and believes that
everything he says is true. It is possible to see this film from a
psychological perspective as well: Charlie’s transition into maturity, in the
sense that he has “to kill his father” –adopting the psychoanalytical
terminology– to free himself of his filial worship in order to start his own
life.
Allie Fox lives, as the film opens with his family in Hartfield, a partly
agrarian town. He works for a Polish landowner named Polsky who has a
228 Chapter Fifteen

huge asparagus plantation and asks Allie to supply him with a refrigeration
system. Fox shows Charlie his latest invention, called the “worm’s
bathtub”, which is not exactly the answer to Polsky’s request. This
brilliant inventor, having already patented several inventions, feels
misunderstood and decides to leave his country which inevitably goes into
ruin. His children constantly listen to him criticizing the American society:
its savage capitalism, the consumerism of trinkets, the corruption, the
omnipresent pornography, the increasing contamination, the financial
speculation, the importation of Asian products despite the presence of
superior American ones, the banality of offerings on television, the
increasing rate of crime, the superficiality and lack of values of the culture.
So far, so obvious: this merely offers what any American citizen might
note and deplore. When Allie and his family go into town to buy things for
his upcoming journey to the Honduran jungle, he spars with the store
clerks: “Who are you working for? The Japanese? I don’t want my hard-
earned American dollars converted into yen […]. Look around you,
Charlie, this place is a toilet. How did America get this way?”.
He is talking about the original ideals the Founding Fathers had, or that
he assumes America had as a “land of promise, land of opportunity”. He
wants to restore the authentic American ideals in Mosquito. His bitter
critic of his native land comes from love, and disappointment: “no one
loves this country more than I do, –Father said. And that’s why I’m going.
Because I can’t bear to watch”9. He says that nobody thinks of leaving
America except him, because he is “the last man”, among other things
because the nuclear holocaust is getting close. He is like those pioneers
that left the security of a stable existence in Europe in order to found a
new civilization in the other side of the Atlantic. Here we notice the
contrast between this developed, but contaminated and culturally decadent
civilization, and the Central American virgin land, where there may be no
man-made culture, but where it is still possible to build up a new
civilization on new foundations. It seems to me that in Allie Fox we are
given an exemplar of the rational “civilized” man, with his absolute faith
in science, technique, progress, and reason, but who realizes that the
original ideals of his own land have been perverted.
In his journey by sea to Mosquito with his family, a new dualism and
antagonism –also symptomatic of the Illustration– between Allie, the
rational man, scientific, master inventor, and the detestable Reverend

9
Paul Theroux, The Mosquito Coast, (First Mariner Books, 2006), 65. “-Our
technological future’s in the tiny hands of the Nipponese, and we let coolies do our
manufacturing for us. And what about those jumped-up camel drivers frantically
doubling the price of oil every two weeks?” (Ibid., 205).
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 229

Spellgood, a fanatic protestant, whose mission is trying to evangelize the

superstitious natives of Mosquito, to whom he hands out Bibles. The
contrast between the technological rationalism of Allie and the religious
fundamentalism of the Reverend Spellgood is important. In Allie, nothing
goes beyond reason; in the minister, reason hardly matters; for Allie faith
is superstition; for the Reverend, it is Science that is arrogant and Faith is
all. In this wide and clear antagonism both men are in some way
missionaries, whether for science or for religion. In the dialogue between
them, hilarious at times, the strong and sharp arguments by Allie refute the
grotesque propositions of the missionary. Allie recognizes in him his
enemy. After all, Allie takes very seriously his role of building, among
many of his other creations, the fantastic and monstrous “Fat Boy” that
makes ice. He places himself as God’s rival since God has left the world
uncompleted. “God– the deceased God– was a hasty inventor of the sort
you find in any patent office. Yes, He had a great idea in making the
world, but He started it and moved on before He got it working properly.
God is like the boy who gets its toy top spinning and then leaves the room
and lets it wobble. How can you worship that? God got bored –Father
said. I know that kind of boredom, but I fight it”10. Therefore, the task of
the man is to constantly perfect the reality given to him through the
scientific mind and work.
When Allie arrives to Jeronimo, his behaviour illustrates a confidence
in the power of action, “Jeronimo, just a name, was that muddy end of the
muddy path […]. It was hot, damp, smelly, full of bugs, and its leaves were
limp and dark green”11, full of bushes and the weeds were denser than any
jungle. But where they saw nothing more than a hard jungle, he anticipated
their disappointment, saying, with optimism and faith in technological
reason: “I see a house here. Kind of a barn there, with a workshop – a real
blacksmith’s shop, with a forge. Over there, the outhouse and plant. Slash
and burn the whole area and we’ve got four or five acres of good growing
land. We’ll put our water tank on that rise and will divert part of the
stream so we get some water into those fields […], [following a long list
regarding everything that would occur in the future]. But even Father’s
booming voice could not make Jeronimo mean more than sour-smelling
bushes in an overgrown clearing”12. After a Promethean effort –he could
go on little sleep– and pushing everyone to work, he made out of Jeronimo
a success, on his own merit, and he knew that. After the construction of a
real city in the jungle with eloquent street names –this does not appear in

10
Ibid., 233.
11
Ibid., 130.
12
Ibid., 131.
230 Chapter Fifteen

the novel, but does in the film: “Science”, “Reason”, “Progress”,

“Freedom”, among others– he focused on his great invention, the giant
ice-making machine, “Fat Boy”, his great contribution to the primitive
world of the jungle13. Allie creates Fat Boy as Dr. Frankenstein did his
creature: “He said he was making a monster. ‘I am Doctor Frankenstein!’
he howled through his welder’s mask. He called one set of pipes its lungs,
and another its poop shaft, and two tanks, “a pair of kidneys”14. It was the
temple of Science as the church was the temple of Religion for Spellgood.
Indeed, the machine called Fat Boy produced ice and the natives admired
the achievement with near-religious admiration. Nevertheless, Allie cries
out: “this is no miracle, this is thermodynamic!”. When he takes the ice to
Seville, the Indians drop onto their knees and pray the Lord’s Prayer,
before the anger and frustration of the scientific missionary: “That’s the
trouble, really, Father said. Any sufficiently advanced technology is
indistinguishable from magic”15.

13
“It was plain from where we sat that Jeronimo was a success. We had defeated
the mosquitoes, tamed the river, drained the swamp, and irrigated the gardens. We
had seen the worst of Honduras weather –the June floods, the September heat- and
we had overcome both. We had just this moment withstood an earth tremor:
nothing had shaken loose! We were organized, Father said. Our drinking water
was purified in a distiller that ran from Fat Boy’s firebox. Down there were
cornstalks, eight-and-a-half feet high, with cobs a foot long –“So big, it only takes
eleven of them to make a dozen”. We had fresh fruit and vegetables and an
incubator (Fat Boy’s spare heat) for hatching eggs. “Control –that’s the proof of
civilization. Anyone can do something once, but repeating it and maintaining it –
that’s the true test”. We grew rice, the most difficult of crops. We had a superior
sewage system and shower apparatus. “We’re clean!” And efficient windmill
pump overrode the water wheel on the ice-making days. Most of the inventions had
been made from local materials, and three new buildings were faced with Father’s
bamboo tiles. We had a chicken run and two boats at the landing and the best
flush toilets in Honduras. Jeronimo was a masterpiece of order – “appropriate
technology,” Father called it. (…) River workers were rewarded with blocks of ice
and bags of seeds.“Hybrids! Burpees! Wonder corn! Miracle beans! Sixty-days
tomatoes!” We were happy and hidden. (…) “Low visibility,” Father said. “I don’t
want to be pestered by goofball missionaries in motorboats who want to come up
here and ooze Scripture all over us”. It was now November, the weather like
Hatfield in July, and Jeronimo was home. And for this, Father said, no one had
said a prayer or surrendered his soul or pledge allegiance or dog-eared a Bible or
flown flag. We had not polluted the river. We had preserved the ecology of the
Mosquito Coast” (Ibid., 195-96).
14
Ibid., 155.
15
Ibid., 193.
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 231

This magnificent and artificial village, Jeronimo, in the middle of the

jungle, built by this great inventor contrasts with the one that Charlie and
the children possess, less artificial and more in harmony with nature. “We
did what was expected of us in Jeronimo, the usual chores. But we always
returned to the Acre to live like monkeys […]. We knew from the Acre that
it was the dry season. No one in Jeronimo knew this, or considered it
important. The gardens were still growing, but we were in touch with the
seasons: we had no inventions […]. A guava growing wild was to him an
imperfection. You had to improve it to make it edible. He said, ‘It’s savage
and superstitious to accept the world as it is. Fiddle around and find a use
for it!’ God had left the world incomplete, he said. It was man’s job to
understand how it worked, to tinker with it and finish it, I think that was
why he hated missionaries so much: because they taught people to put up
with their earthly burdens. For Father, there were no burdens that
couldn’t be fitted with a set of wheels, or runners, or a system of pulleys
[…]. We kids said that if Father saw the Acre he would have a fit, or else
laugh at us. He was a perfectionist.”16 As we notice, Allie Fox has the
classic attitude that an illustrated man would have against nature:
considering it a mere substrate for human action, and raw material for the
creative development of human beings. Nature does not have value in and
of itself; any value comes from the workings of Science, which perfects
nature and humanizes it.
This man, a child of rationalism, in love with science and progress,
seems helpless in the face of evil. After both, the failure of bringing ice to
the Indians –the ice melts on the way before it can be delivered– and the
encounter with white bandits whom he naively invites to visit Jeronimo,
Fox looks impotent when the three men armed with rifles appear. In order
to dissuade the bandits from staying in Jeronimo, Fox fakes an attack by
an army of white ants, pulls down some buildings as if to show how
dangerous it would be to stay there, but everything turns out badly. When
the bandits are locked in “Fat Boy”, they manage to destroy it while trying
to escape, and this, in turn, causes a fire that affects the whole village.
Jeronimo turns into ashes and its ruins will remain infected with
ammoniac and other chemical solutions which then poison the river,
killing the fish and all other living creatures.
Boarding a ship and leaving Jeronimo, and eventually settling down
close to the coast, has prompted a change of mentality in Ally Fox,
possibly due to the ecological crisis he has caused. “My whole way of
thinking has changed. No more chemical, no ice, no contraptions.

16
Ibid., 232-34.
232 Chapter Fifteen

Jeronimo was a mistake. I had to pollute a whole river to find that out”17.
No matter what happened he still persists in his attempt to create new
conditions of life closer to nature, and persists, too, in his obsession for
going upriver. Day by day, he looks increasingly obsessive, crazy and
arbitrary, without the wishes of his family that longs for his return to the
US. He lies to them: it is impossible to go back because America has
suffered a nuclear cataclysm and there is nothing left. “Jeronimo was
nothing compared to the destruction of the United States […] Hatfield’s
all ashes […]. In Father’s mind, the United States had been wiped out in
just the same way as Jeronimo -fire had done it, and all that was left was
smoke and a storm of yellow poison. That was what he said”18. Seeing his
father’s deception allows Charlie to understand his imperfections, as well
as how important it is to fight for his own autonomy and freedom, living
by his own terms, maturing.19 He who was the incarnation of rationality
and science has become as biased as Spellgood, and perhaps even more
cruel because he is not afraid of killing, lying, or even burning down the
missionary colony of Guampu. We will see him continue to babble wildly,
as he heads down the river, and even after he is mortally wounded.
We have laid bare the narrative structures in Weir’s films: a deep hate
and ruthless arguments against the American way of life made by an
extravagant inventor. This narrative depends on a series of opposing
concepts: fundamentalism/scientism; irrational faith/Promethean science;
technique/magic; Jeronimo/Acre; technical anthropocentrism/naturalist
environmentalism. Finally, we can see how an excessive and utopian
dream of building a village in the jungle ends in destruction and the worst
nightmare. This kind of ending violates all the canons of Hollywood. This
movie implicitly develops the whole western cultural evolution from the

17
Ibid., 274. “Toxic substances –this is no place for them. I’ll never work with
poisons again, and no more flammable gas. Keep it simple –physics, not chemistry.
Levers, weights, pulleys, rods. No chemicals except those that occur naturally.
Stable elements (Ibid., 260-61).“The fatal mistake everyone made was in thinking
that the future had something to do with high technology. I used to think it myself!
But that was before I had this experience. Oh, gaw, it was all going to be rocket
ships”. (Ibid., 324). It is interesting to note how a literary work develops in the
realm of fiction deep transformations that have occurred in the intellectual
evolution of our time, from scientificism belonging precisely to a modern
technological anthropocentrism, to an ecological posture which is closer to the
deep ecology commonly presented as postmodern.
18
Ibid., 274-75.
19
“Once I believed in Father, and the world had seemed very small and old. He
was gone, and now I hardly believed in myself, and the world was limitless” (Ibid.,
374). The film ends with this voice over.
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 233

faith in reason, the Enlightenment of the modern age to the ecological

postmodernist streams that argue the former. Given his acceptance by the
powers of Hollywood, Weir could deal with matters of great political and
philosophical significance.
Dead Poets Society achieved remarkable success and prompted several
discussions on education and the role of teachers. It is a critique of the
traditional and formal pedagogical methods present in the prestigious
boarding school for boys, Welton Academy. The eccentric and original
John Keating (Robin Williams) will be the catalyser of a pedagogical
revolution in tune with the philosophy of the revolutions by the young that
happened during the 1960s. The influence of Keating on those students
(Neil, Todd, Knox, Charlie, Meek and Pitts) will be to help them to
cultivate their own talents and not just follow conventional codes nor to
heed, too much, the demands of social prestige. He encourages them to
rebel against the conformism of the masses and to live freely following
their dreams. Keating corrects the cynical professor McAllister who thinks
Keating wants to turn the students into artists: “We are not talking artists,
George, we are talking free thinkers”. Further on, he will quote Whitman:
“But only in their dreams can man be truly free. It was always thus, and
always thus will be”. When Neil says he wants to become an actor,
Keating positively encourages him to explore that dimension of himself,
although first he should talk about that with his father. He does something
similar with Todd and the other boys.
Nevertheless, the environment and the traditions of Welton are exactly
the opposite, as seen in the film’s opening scenes. We see an older teacher
giving instructions to a student on how to behave during the solemn
ceremony of the candles. The older students enter in procession carrying
flags, with the inscription “Discipline”. Cameron takes the “Tradition”
flag (significant because of the role he will take later). Nolan, the high
school’s dean, starts his speech: “Ladies and gentleman, boys: the light of
knowledge […]. The humble light of each one of your candles that goes
through each one of you symbolizes how knowledge passes on from one to
another”. Nolan highlights the four pillars that have made Welton one of
the best schools in America: “tradition, honour, discipline and
excellence”. When Neil and his group gather in his room after the
ceremony, they will joke about the four pillars naming them as: “Travesty,
horror, decadence and excrement”. Nevertheless, such signs of rebellion
are minor due to the strict culture imposed by Nolan, the dean, Hager,
McAllister and the rest of the teachers, buttressed by the active support of
the students’ parents. Both Neil Perry and Todd Anderson are suffering
from the rules set down by their fathers. Neil, in particular, must do what
234 Chapter Fifteen

his father says, and when he shyly dares to suggest otherwise, his father
takes him out and while telling him off warns him against ever
contradicting him in public again. Patiently, Neil endures the emotional
blackmail of his father, arguing about the importance of having his son at
Harvard and pointing out the financial sacrifice they are making. Parents
send their sons to that expensive and elitist school so that they can receive
a strong education and in the future attain an important professional status
as well as a good salary.
Weir once again presents an absolute opposition between the
traditional, authoritarian and memory-based education and that which
stimulates creativity, imagination and vital spontaneity. There is no
solution that can encompass both the benefits of tradition and the fresh air
provided by the creative and renewed spirit of education. You are either
with Keating or with the rigid system imposed by the teachers. In the first
scenes we can see the usual methods employed at Welton: tedious,
monotonous and based on repetition and memory. The same goes for the
teachers: the dull monotonous noise of the chemistry teacher, the rote
learning of the trigonometry instructor, the Latin teacher making his
students repeat the declinations for the word agricola.
In contrast, we see Keating entering the classroom with self-assurance,
whistling a melody and suddenly going out of the class, but then he sticks
his head in and calls out to the disconcerted students: “Come on”. It is the
self-confidence of one who knows how to surprise and has a clear acting
talent. This is someone who can calculate the effect of his words and
gestures. When he takes them to the hall so that they can contemplate the
picture of older generations of students, Keating mumbles to them: “Carpe
diem. Seize the day, boys. Make your lives extraordinary”. He constantly
says to them: “suck the marrow out of life” and “gather ye rosebuds while
ye may”. He quotes Whitman too: “the powerful play goes on and you may
contribute a verse” and he asks the students: “What will your own verse
be?”. When he asks the students to express their own feelings about what
they read, he exemplifies these new perspectives stepping over the desk
“to look at things in a different way”. His version of the carpe diem and
exhorting them to contribute with their own verses to the “powerful play”,
encourage the students and move them to be daring. Keating uses the texts
of Thoreau20 and Whitman to drive home his point: to live life to the
fullest.

20
“I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to
practice resignation, unless it were quiet necessary… to drive life into a corner,
and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the
whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world” (Henry
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 235

In the next scene we see Keating teaching a poetry class. He asks a

student to read aloud from a classic manual, but abruptly stops the reading
and with authority asserts that the text is “excrement”. He instructs them
to rip the pages out of the book. The students look joyful doing it,
although one student, Cameron, looking confused, takes a ruler to tear the
page out with precision only because the professor has ordered it.
Keating’s method of teaching is a clear protest against the sterility of
academic erudition. The students have to learn to think for themselves.
“We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race,
and the human race is filled with passion […]. Poetry, beauty, romance,
love, these are what we stay alive for. But in these manuals there is no
passion, romance nor love. The ideas and words can change the world”.
When the students decide to resurrect the Dead Poets’ Society, Keating
leaves a copy of some lines by Thoreau in Neil’s desk: “I went to the
woods because I wanted to live deliberately. I wanted to live deep and
suck out all the marrow of life! To put to vent all that was not life … And
not when I came to die, discover that I had not lived […].” The boys hold
the society meetings where they read poetry aloud and tell scary stories,
inside an Indian cave that has a mysterious and clandestine air. When
Keating suggests living an authentic life, apart from the social
conventions, he is appealing to a primitive resource that uses poetry and
the romanticism of the primitive cultures as tools.
Keating, the charismatic teacher, successfully changes the life of a
group of students that have created the Dead Poets’ Society. But those two
opposite worlds have nothing in common: one pertains to the patriarchal
and authoritarian culture of order, with its four pillars and its traditional
pedagogical methods and lack of life, and the other is fresh, creative, and
full of vitality. There is no chance for a synthesis between them, only
confrontation and clash. Neil’s suicide, pushed by his father’s opposition
of seeing his son involved in theatre, is something exaggerated and radical,
but it makes sense if we think that as a plot it was motivated for this idea
of Weir of being attached to this a priori disjunctive narrative scheme that
we have referred to before. This fact causes at the end the expulsion of
Keating from Welton Academy. He was considered the main instigator of
what led up to the suicide tragedy. Cameron is the first of the students that
accuses him. Then he warns the other students they should do the same if
they really want to be safe. Helpless in the circumstances, Keating accepts
his dismissal. In the last scene, we see him entering the class asking Nolan

David Thoreau, Walden, or Life in the Woods (London: Chapman & Hall, 1927),
78.
236 Chapter Fifteen

if he can take his things. It is then that the once-timid Todd jumps on his
desk, followed by some of his classmates and friends, and says goodbye to
Keating triumphantly, with a military salute and with the verse: “O
Captain! My Captain!”21. Cameron does not stand up; Nolan is crazy
trying to calm the students down. An unforgettable scene and it is perhaps
one of the most defining moments in all of Weir’s films. Keating has lost
one battle, but has won the war in the hearts and lives of his students.
Certainly, there are big themes present in the story: individual freedom
versus social conformity, authentic and spontaneous vitality versus
authoritarian and repressive institutions, the importance of following
dreams and one’s own vocation in the configuration of personal identity.
Even though all of the Hollywood elements are present, the treatment
seems to be close to the disjunctive narratives characteristic of Weir’s
style, which are taken to the extreme in this film.
In Green Card, Peter Weir directs a film that is completely
representative of his style. He wrote the script and also produced it in an
Australian and French co-production by Touchstone pictures. He
conceived the project and got the funds entirely on his own, thus ensuring
that he would not be beholden to the commercial demands of another
producer: he works on his own script, controlled his own production and
obtained international funds not dependent on Hollywood22. Green Card
presents the ideal opportunity for analysing the narrative technique that we
are considering here.
Bronte Parrish (Andie MacDowell) works in the Department of Parks
and Recreation of New York as a horticulturist. She longs for renting an
elegant flat with a splendid greenhouse. George Fauré (Gérard Depardieu)
is a Frenchman seeking legal residence in the US (a “green card”), which
he can get if he marries a citizen of the United States. Anton, a mutual
friend, introduces Bronte and George, in order to fake a marriage, so they
can each get what they want: George, the green card, and Bronte, a flat
with a greenhouse that can only be rented to couples. They meet for the
first time the day of the wedding. After getting married, they take separate
ways, planning to divorce soon after. One day Bronte comes across
George in a restaurant where she has gone with her friend Phil, who works
for Green Warfare, a volunteer organization that claims the wasted lands
in the city so they can make out of them gardens for the poor people. At

21
Walt Whitman, The Complete Poems, Edith Francis Murphy, Harmondworth
(New York: Penguin, 1975), 359. “O Captain! My Captain! Our fearful trip is
done, / The ship has weather’d every rack, the Price we sought is won …” (II, 1-2).
22
“If Weir is ever to be considered as an auteur, then Green Card, could be used
in evidence” (Shiach, Films of Peter, 184).
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 237

that moment Bronte receives a phone call from a Mr. Borsky of the
Immigration Department, saying they want to verify the validity of their
marriage. Bronte comes back to the restaurant looking for George, but the
owner, who refers to him as a problem, has kicked him out. Finally she is
able to give him the message, so they can be together during the citation.
They agree that George was in Africa taking photographs and shooting
elephants, and that currently he composes ballet pieces. Nevertheless,
Borsky has doubts when he notices George confusedly looking for the
bathroom in the flat. He arranges another interview for them in the
Immigration Department. Bronte decides to prepare the interview with
George during the weekend so that they can face it with success. They will
have to learn enough about each other in order to convince the officers
they are genuinely married.
Green Card presents culture clash as a topic, as well as the theme of
cultural refinement versus vital spontaneity, civilization versus
primitivism. The first sequence of the film is a scene set in the street in
which a young African plays his drums at the subway exit. We see Bronte
buying flowers and somewhat perplexed with this music. She also passes
by in front of a food stand where a black man is moving to the reggae
music that comes from his noisy radio. The immigration phenomenon in
this multicultural New York is ever present in the film. The African music
is heard when Bronte enters the African Coffee Shop to meet George
before going to the wedding. When George arrives at the place, in a scene
that we see again in the end (and also in Witness), he looks at Bronte
through the window (symbolizing lack of communication and separation).
After the cut we immediately see the wedding scene and the newly
married couple kissing outside the City Hall and their friends tossing rice
and candies. In a travelling shot the camera shows the happy couple saying
goodbye: two married persons who know practically nothing about each
other. George says: “I’ll never forget Africa”, meaning the coffee shop. It
is a simple sequence in its narrative, but it introduces all the themes that
are present in the film: the multicultural city, the contrast between the
rough and rudimentary George and the educated and refined Bronte, the
sensual and spontaneous rhythms the city cannot ignore, the problem of
immigration, and the African motif.
When Bronte shows up for the interview with the managers of the
building, she explains that her husband is actually in Africa composing
music even though it is not true. The aggressive and inquisitive manager,
Mrs. Bird, will constantly appear in the film because she suspects
something is not right about the story that Bronte has told her. She is very
concerned about the possibility that George might play the drums inside
238 Chapter Fifteen

the flat. The sound of the drum has a permanent presence in the film. It
functions as a back score to mean either the disruption that George causes
in Bronte’s overregulated life or George’s primitive ways. In contrast with
that, we hear Mozart when Bronte is working or when she is with her
plants and trees in her greenhouse. When she walks on the streets we can
hear the annoying buzz of the police cars, horns and all the aggressiveness
of the upsetting and noisy traffic. In contrast with that ugly and discordant
world, Bronte tries to introduce beauty and promote a more natural city
through her work in Green Warfare. After the scene set in the Green
Warefare, Bronte, Phil and other friends go to the All Nations, a fashion
restaurant where she meets with George. When Phil, Bronte’s ex-
boyfriend, warns them that he does not eat meat, George immediately
asks: Why not? The reason is because “Phil cares about what he puts into
his body”. Phil protects and cares about life. He is a fine New Yorker, a
concerned activist worried about a healthy environment, while George is
seen as somebody who, in a sense, “eats life” unconcernedly. This places a
refined vegetarian in contrast to a tough meat-eater, the intellect versus
instincts, formality and social conventions against spontaneity and
pleasure.
George arrives at the flat and the porter, Oscar, says to him: “You
know, when I first saw you I thought to myself: ‘this guy just stepped out of
the jungle”. When Mrs. Sheeman and Mr. Borsky arrive at the flat Bronte
becomes nervous. George wants to take control of the situation but makes
silly mistakes: calling Bronte Betty, and showing Borsky to the bathroom
but opening two incorrect doors first.
Everything contrasts between Bronte and George: he smokes, she finds
this horrible; she prefers decaf coffee and he does not like tasteless things;
she takes care of herself with light food and prefers vegetables, he likes
meat and prefers strong and tasty foods; she has a good figure and he is
big and corpulent; she is fine and delicate and he has strong even coarse
features; she is an ecologist, an intellectual, fashionable and politically
correct, while in him lies a wild, putatively European sensuality, a natural
spontaneity and a strong passion for life. She plants gardens in poor areas
while his reaction to such endeavours is to “go outside the city if you want
to find real trees and not just delicate greenhouse products”. When they
talk about their lives before going into the immigration department so that
they can have some plausibility in their story, Bronte tells him that her
father named each of his children after a famous writer: Austen, Colette,
Eliot, and Brönte. She comes from an artistic and refined environment.
George’s life, on the other hand, is dominated by stories of car robberies
and general violence, but he feels free. On one side we have the vital
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 239

strength, spontaneity, instinct and soul; and on the other, the rationality
concerned for New York fashion, the politically correct, the social
concerns and the environment. The movie suggests that all those
differences in tastes, beliefs, habits, languages, cultures, families and
biographies may be overcome if love arises between the two.
It is she who begins to gradually change due to the strong influence of
Depardieu’s character. It is not a surprise that she ends up falling in love
with him. On his end, he has not changed at all. With regard to
characterizations in the film (such as Keating and Allie Fox, though in
another context), we can say that he represents the vital strength (feelings,
spontaneity, sensuality) that bursts into her life and shakes it to its
foundations. Bronte’s need of a greenhouse, her decision to live alone in a
huge flat, her asexual existence, her etiolated relation with Phil, all suggest
an unsatisfactory existence. Only somebody like George can make her life
complete and full. She starts to feel the distant rattle of drums that
represent her need for passion and feeling into her life. But she needs some
time for recognizing her deeper feelings. He woos her and with patience
he takes apart the obstacles and destroys her defenses, making her appear
cold and overly rational. When all the barriers are about to blow away, he
tosses her the macho phrase that dismisses an independent woman without
a man: “You need a good fuck”.
It is interesting to see how Weir satirizes and makes fun of what is
politically correct: the vegetarian, the artistic pedantry, the excessive
concern about the environment, and the extreme preoccupation over
health. Implicitly, it seems to be in defense of the smokers, carnivores,
individualisms, machismo over masculine refinement, natural behaviour
and not cultural artificiality. In the end, the plan fails and George has to go
back to France, but he will write to her every day so that she can visit him
in Paris. Even though the film is clichéd in some dialogues and situations,
it should be rated as a superior version of the American romantic comedy.
I do not agree with those critics that look down this film, because they
argue it is light, even frivolous. I think humour and the funny situations
camouflage the deep themes proposed. And because fiction (a fake
wedding) may become real (causing real love), reality can adopt modes of
fiction, such as in The Truman Show.
Weir’s films deal with big themes related to the human condition and
denote the persistence of novel structures in building and developing his
narrative threads. He longs for the liberation from a restrictive society
(schools, laws, urban alienation, family) and proposes a new kind of life,
different, less artificial, utopian, beyond the regular one (usually claimed
by eccentric and charismatic characters), thus questioning the meaning of
240 Chapter Fifteen

leaving the spatial and temporal limitations of oppressive reality. There are
two colliding worlds, two visions of the world in radical opposition.
Despite all this, at some moment, either for love or from historic
contingencies, those two worlds seem to approach and even touch one
another. It seems they were about to communicate and overcome their
strong differences. That is not possible and such attempts end up failing or
in deeper tragedy. For that reason, the presence of open endings is one of
the main characteristics in Weir’s filmography, as his films usually do not
have a definitive narrative closing, which allows varied reactions from the
audience that is invited to continue thinking about the film. Peter Weir
asserts: “Most of my films have been left incomplete, with the viewer as the
final participant. I don’t like the didactic approach. One is constantly left
wondering and I love it when that’s done to me in a film”23. The audience
could “contribute with one verse” to that polyphonic world Weir
introduces us to.24 He will be urged to participate rather than merely react,
to reflect rather than receive passively. In other words, the audience will
have to look for a personal interpretation rather than a definitive and
canonical one; make questions instead of just answering them.
Due to space constraints, we cannot discuss all of Peter Weir’s works.
However, this same pattern can be seen in The Year of Living Dangerously
(the clash of two cultures: primitive Indonesian with modern rationalist),
The Truman Show (which prophetically anticipates the rise of the reality
show’s format: a controlled reality which assumes the fictional narrative’s
features), or in his latest film, The Way Back, which reflects the hardships
of imprisonment in the Soviet Gulag and the difficult conquest of freedom,
wherein an angelic female character joins the odyssey and redeems the
differing worlds of the fugitives.

23
Sue Matthews, Dreams: Conversation with five directors about the Australian
Film Revival (Melbourne: Penguin, 1984), 107.
24
“While his films are overwhelmingly novelistic in their narratives, the fact that
they refuse any final meanings or interpretations and maintains a firm reserve and
questioning toward what they present gives the film both a popular place by virtue
of their conventional novelistic structure and a modernist one by virtue of its
thematic…The films get doubly sold, within an art market (world bourgeois film
festivals (Berlin, Cannes, New York), and as conventional mass entertainment”
(Sam Rohdie, “Gallipoli, Peter Weir and an Australian Art Cinema”, in An
Australian Film Reader, eds. Albert Moran and Tom O’Regan, Sydney: Currency
Press, 1985, 107; quoted by Jonathan Rayner (The films, 267).
 Narrative Strategies in the Films of Peter Weir 241

Bibliography
Clinch, Minty. Harrison Ford. A Biography. London: Holder &
Stoughton, 1988.
Matthews, Sue. Dreams: Conversation with five directors about the
Australian Film Revival. Melbourne: Penguin, 1984.
Pascal, Blas. Thoughts. Cambridge: The Harvard Classic, 1909.
Peña Vial, Jorge. La Poética del tiempo: Ética y estética de la narración.
Santiago: Universitaria, 2002
Rayner, Jonathan. The Films of Peter Weir. New York: The Continuum
International Publishing Groop, 2003.
Shiach, Don. The Films of Peter Weir: Visions of Alternative Realities.
London: Charles Letts & Co., 1993.
Theroux, Paul. The Mosquito Coast. New York: First Mariner Books,
2006.
Thoreau, Henry David. Walden, or Life in the Woods. London: Chapman
& Hall, 1927.
Whitman, Walt. The Complete Poems. Edith Francis Murphy,
Harmondworth. New York: Penguin, 1975.
 CHAPTER SIXTEEN

META-LITERATURE AND META-ART

IN THE TASTE OF OTHERS1

EDUARDO LLANOS MELUSSA

UNIVERSIDAD DIEGO PORTALES, CHILE

1. The Taste of Others: Plot Summary

The Taste of Others (Le goût des autres)2, is a 2000 French film, directed
by Agnès Jaoui, and co-written with Jean-Pierre Bacri. It tells the story of
Jean Jacques Castella, the owner of a successful steel drum factory. When
he begins exporting to Iran, he is forced –as a security measure– to hire a
driver and a bodyguard, who substantially restricts his freedom. Weber, a
manager whose professionalism and efficiency brings a similar effect on
Castella, also inhibits the business owner; nor can Castella relax at home,
as his wife is a conventional woman, more interested in her pet dog,
decorating their house, and shopping than in nourishing her relationship
with her husband. To make matters worse, Castella also has to go on a
diet.
This tedious, albeit successful, existence changes when Weber pushes
Castella to begin taking private English lessons. At an initial meeting,
Castella doesn’t get along with Clara, the teacher. He is impolite, asking
her rudely if her teaching method is “amusing” and then informing her that
he will simply let her know if he decides to take the lessons.
That same night, Castella goes to the theatre with his wife, obliged to
watch the performance of a niece who has a supporting role in the play.
There, he learns that the leading actress is Clara, the teacher he had treated

1
This chapter is part of a paper that was presented at the Congreso Internacional
de Literatura y Cine, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, 9-10 October,
2013.
2
The Taste of Others (Le goût des autres), Directed by Agnès Jaoui, 2000 (USA:
Miramax, 2012), DVD.
 Meta-Literature and Meta-Art in The Taste of Others 243

rudely that morning. He watches the play a second time and visits the
actress in her dressing room to congratulate her. Although she receives
him coldly, he manages to get an invitation to eat dinner with the group
and insert himself into Clara’s relatively bohemian world. Inserting
himself isn’t easy, as Castella knows little about theatre, music, or art (the
most frequent topics of conversation); furthermore, he makes a fool of
himself and is the butt of jokes, although he doesn’t realize it. His only
link to the group is through money. He pays the cafe tab, buys a painting
from a young painter –who had initially treated him with disdain– and
ultimately commissions a design for the façade of his factory, a project
promising considerable financial gains for the painter and set designer.
Although Castella’s mental simplicity clashes head on with the style of
both the group and Clara, his bond with her evolves thanks to his progress
in English classes, which consists of conversations in a local tea shop. In
one of these conversations, Castella reads Clara a poem –written in
rudimentary English– confessing his feelings towards her directly. She
does not return the sentiment. After this episode, he distances himself from
her, somewhat strategically.
Meanwhile, the film narrates a parallel story, that of the bodyguard
(Moreno), the new driver (Bruno), and Manie, a waitress. Manie asks
Bruno if he recognizes her, apparently recalling him from a night of casual
sex ten years before. Although Bruno’s girlfriend is temporarily living in
the United States, he and Manie get together again. But Bruno is soon
displaced by Moreno, the bodyguard. The relationship between Moreno
and Manie becomes more intense, although Moreno doesn’t totally
commit to Manie because he is bothered by her habit of selling drugs.
Finally, Bruno and his girlfriend break up via letter, while Moreno
leaves Manie, and Castella leaves his wife. Clara begins to feel attracted to
Castella and even invites him to Hedda Gabler, in which she plays the
leading role. He attends the performance.

2. The Interpersonal Plane

In this section, I will examine the styles and rules of interaction within the
film, stopping to look more carefully at certain shared patterns, in order to
understand the film as a system.

2.1. Tense and Meaningful Dialogue

Although the film is a comedy, direct humour is not its dominant
characteristic. In fact, the dialogue is almost always loaded with tension.
244 Chapter Sixteen

Of course, this doesn’t prevent the characters from displaying a variety of

styles: direct, indirect, naïve, burlesque, and even strategic. Meta-
messages often arise (intentionally or not), as do unspoken ones. Clear
examples of this occur between Manie and Moreno, the most complex
couple. There are also plenty of misunderstandings and mockery, almost
always directed at Castella.

2.2. Inappropriate interaction

Occasionally, the tension reaches alarming levels. The recurring case is
Castella’s wife, who commits various blunders, oblivious to the
discomfort caused by her words and attitudes and even less likely to try to
make up for it. She reveals more indolence than innocence, as insinuated
by the following attitudes: (1) She is fascinated by Weber’s elegance, but
praises Weber to her husband in an inappropriate way, as if seeking to
compare them, make her husband uncomfortable, and provoke his
jealousy; (2) She shows a lack of consideration for those in subordinate
roles or positions: she discourages her niece and humiliates her sister-in-
law and the driver; (3) She foolishly reminds her husband about the need
to watch his diet and to avoid both pastries and alcohol, but eats chocolate
in front of him (while claiming to be hiding it so as “not to tempt him” –
naturally, he can’t help but notice); (4) While she does have a certain
fondness for animals, this also appears to be a way of avoiding human
relationships; in fact, given her rejection of a certain wallpaper design that
includes images of horses and pigs, it is worth asking how far her fondness
extends and if she didn’t also discriminate between classes of animals; (5)
Something similar can be said about her “taste” in decorating her house:
Although her aim is to make it more “pleasant”, her decor ends up driving
Castella away (he feels like he is in a stranger’s house and accuses his wife
of transforming the house into a candy shop); (6) In essence, she is a mass
of contradictions, thereby provoking discomfort for others.

2.3. Rudeness
In several scenes, the characters take frankness to the threshold of
rudeness. Even in the opening scene, there is a tense dialogue in which the
bodyguard explicitly rejects the driver’s conversational style. Soon
thereafter, we see the protagonist (Castella) treated rudely by his wife, and
subsequently Castella himself treats the co-protagonist (Clara) with a lack
of courtesy; she will get even by responding cuttingly to the clumsy praise
 Meta-Literature and Meta-Art in The Taste of Others 245

she receives from him when he visits her backstage. Rudeness, then, is a
general phenomenon.

2.4. Between Assertiveness and Challenge

Several characters swing between legitimate self-affirmation and a certain
propensity to challenge, which sometimes lead to direct confrontation.
One does not need to look further than factory owner Castella, who
expresses his discomfort with Weber, a manager who speaks like a
politician. Weber responds in a no less direct and assertive way, telling
Castella that is why he hired him; in other words, although he knows that
he is a subordinate, he reaffirms his professional role without adjusting to
the “taste” of his boss. Another example occurs with Clara; always honest
and direct, she lives up to the meaning of her name. For his part, Moreno,
the bodyguard, is both explicit and forceful from the very first scene. Even
the timid driver ultimately confronts his boss, Angèlique.

2.5. From Honesty to Implication

Regardless of the assertiveness described, several characters let
insinuations slip. A good example of this is the scene in which Moreno
meets up with the driver, who introduces him to Manie. When the driver is
gone for a few minutes to answer a phone call, Moreno asks Manie if she
knows Bruno well: “No. We have sex once every ten years,” she responds.
“That leaves you time,” Moreno says, staring at her. Thus, it is not
surprising that soon thereafter Moreno begins going out with Manie, and
Bruno is displaced. Moreno and Manie later engage in other meaningful
dialogues, such as when they pretend to joke about their desire to marry
one another, or when he points out her elusive attitude: “You won’t be
messed with,” says Moreno. “Should I?” asks Manie. “No, you’re right.
Never let people mess with you,” he says unconvincingly. “Funny…”, she
replies, “you don’t sound convinced.” As this exchange reflects, these are
two tough nuts to crack, sexually attracted to one another but unwilling to
swallow their pride.

2.6. Trios, Triads and Triangular Relations

There are three love triangles: one involving Castella, Angèlique, and
Clara; a second made up of Moreno, Manie, and Bruno; and a third, made
up of Bruno, Manie, and his distant girlfriend. Likewise, there are three
non-amorous triangles: Castella, the designers, and Clara; Castella, Bruno,
246 Chapter Sixteen

and Moreno, and the trio of Castella’s subordinates: Weber, Moreno, and
Bruno (in descending order of status).

2.7. The Superficiality of Ties

Although the characters have frequent conversations, their relationships
are neither deep nor fluid. In addition, their family ties are weak, and
several couples break up: (i) Castella’s sister has been abandoned by her
husband; (ii) Castella himself finally leaves Angèlique; (iii) Bruno’s
girlfriend breaks up with him via letter; (iv) Manie discards Bruno and
immediately (almost in front of Bruno) chooses Moreno; (v) later, Moreno
will distance himself from Manie; (vi) there are even conflicts within
couples and/or break-ups in the plays in which Clara participates, as well
as in the film that Castella and his wife watch on television. In contrast,
Castella seems to value his bond with his father and sister; for her part,
Clara would like to have a child, and even the solitary Manie secretly
shares that desire.
The ways in which each couple breaks up provide an interesting
comparison. Bruno’s girlfriend ends the relationship through a letter from
the U.S. Moreno goes to visit Manie, but just as he is about to ring her
doorbell, he changes his mind, gets into his car, and leaves for good.
Meanwhile, the marriage of Castella and Angèlique, like that of Castella’s
sister, simply wears out. As a counterpart, let’s recall how each new
couple is created: Manie seduces Bruno using a trick that is ingenious but
hardly plausible, while Moreno seduces her with an audacious insinuation
(although Manie had already given signs of willingness); Castella wins
over Clara with a combination of ingenuity, playful audacity, and
authenticity; Fred (the bar owner) and the costume designer become a
couple easily, although they had known each other for some time.

3. The Intrapersonal Plane

3.1. Mid-life Crisis
Several characters experience a mid-life crisis: They are too young to be
old and too old to be young. Clara’s case illustrates this phenomenon quite
well, to the point that she says it outright: At her age, she should have her
life in order, but she doesn’t even know if she’ll be able to pay her rent.
And while the Castellas don’t have financial problems, they are
experiencing the empty nest syndrome. With their son studying abroad,
they have run out of reasons to stay together. For his part, Moreno also
 Meta-Literature and Meta-Art in The Taste of Others 247

experiences a sort of psycho-evolutionary crisis: at 45 years old, having

bedded 300 women, he has become sceptical and distrustful; nor does he
expect much from his police work (a retired detective, he has experienced
first-hand that a few good policemen or judges are no match for corruption
and power). It’s not surprising, then, that he avoids commitment and quits
his job as a detective. In short, almost all of the characters are somewhat
disoriented and at loose ends.

3.2. Immaturity and Stagnation

Most of the characters demonstrate some immaturity; although they are
able to carry on well enough with their lives, not one of them is close to
feeling fulfilled. Angèlique and Manie are the most extreme cases. The
two appear trapped in an infantile and narcissistic stage: Both have crudely
individualistic and superficial personalities and are unaware of how they
affect others. They are manipulative, but while Angèlique bullies, Manie
manipulates and seduces by being friendly with the people who buy drugs
from her. Angèlique is deceiving herself on various levels: with respect to
her marriage (not as stable as she appears to believe); with respect to her
tenderness and desire to protect animals (the corollary of which is, in her
case, a lack of empathy for humans), and finally, with respect to the
supposedly “inoffensive” personality of her pet dog (who bites a passerby
and her own sister-in-law). She only demonstrates certain sensitivity after
the unexpected separation from her husband. For her part, Manie views
herself as liberated and mocks the motivations of normal women, but at
other times confesses that she has the same desires: a home, family,
cooking. She also contradicts herself when it comes to female sexuality:
She claims that women surrender themselves more fully than men –even
when it comes to casual sex– but later says the opposite.

3.3. Inconsistencies, Collusion, and Tactics

Several supporting characters are contradictory and have a propensity for
unconsciously colluding. For example, even though Moreno has conflated
duty and the law, he continues his romance with Manaie, who sells drugs;
meanwhile, Clara’s “artistic” and “intellectual” friends who mock Castella
cultivate his friendship once they discover he has money and is willing to
spend it. Overall, there is more tactical manoeuvring than spontaneity.
248 Chapter Sixteen

3.4. Visible Contrasts/Invisible Similarities

Despite their obvious differences –which seem a veritable abyss– Castella
and Clara reveal similar latent, yet significant, attitudes. Both express what
they feel and act consequently; they are aware of their internal conflicts
and do not try to hide them. In their own way, each is self-critical. While
Clara is harsh in her self-evaluation, Castella is able to admit his mistake
to a subordinate (Weber), ask for forgiveness, and suggest that he does not
quit his job. The conclusion, then, is that Castella and Clara are more
authentic than the other characters (with the exception of Weber, whom
we examine next).

3.5. Weberian Morals

Although the manager is a secondary character, he merits special attention.
His last name, role, and personality evoke Karl “Max” Weber (1864-
1920)3, the German sociologist and philosopher who distinguished the
various forms of authority. Because he is efficient and gets things done,
this executive appears to be a Weberian example of the “bureaucrat”, and
he is one of the most honest. He holds considerable power, but doesn’t
abuse it; he earns a large salary, but works hard to ensure that things are
done well and commitments are fulfilled. In addition, it is important to him
to have an honest –not just tolerable– relationship with his boss; he
acknowledges that he was educated to “always speak like a politician”
when Castella reproaches him for that; and he doesn’t hesitate to quit his
position because he believes Castella doesn’t value or understand his
work.

3.6. Psychodrama and Internal Polyphony

As an actress, Clara illustrates well a general principle: Every human
being is, at the same time, one person and many people. The characters
that Clara plays in the theatre –and which she appears to choose
subconsciously– hint at certain continuity between person and character,
reality and fiction. Thus, the art of the actor requires discovering in one’s
own psyche some negated selves that coincide with what is represented on
stage. I will take up this psychodramatic phenomenon again in the
examination of the transpersonal plane.

3
Regarding the political changes that occurred one year before his death, Max
Weber drew a distinction between the ethics of responsibility and the ethics of
conscience (or testimony).
 Meta-Literature and Meta-Art in The Taste of Others 249

4. The Transpersonal Plane

4.1. The Theatre as School of Life
To convincingly represent each new character, an actor must engage in
self-exploration and honestly examine which personal dimension connects
with or rejects the roles played; at the same time, the process of delving
into the dramatic character increases the actor’s self-knowledge.4 In fact,
Clara is the one who seems to know herself best.

4.2. Acting and Authenticity

The previous point might suggest that there are no limits between life and
stage. However, similarity is not equivalent to identity; although theatre
and life resemble one another and there are many paths crossing between
them, this film does not subscribe to any vital aestheticism. While it is
evident that Clara needs the theatre to connect to her deepest emotions, as
soon as she returns to real life she stops “acting” and is even more genuine
and aware than others. In contrast, Manie and Angèlique –comparable to
her at least in terms of gender and age– seem more false and less
trustworthy. This is an unexpected version of the celebrated “paradox of
the comedian”; you may recall Diderot’s statement that the public wants to
feel emotion, rather than see an actor feel emotion.5

4.3. Evolution of the Protagonists

It does not seem coincidental that it is precisely Castella and Clara who
evolve the most over the course of this story. This coincidence justifies an
examination of each case and an attempt at an explanation.
Castella is an industrialist devoid of “culture”, but he is not stupid, and
in any case, he has his own taste. Moreover, his honesty is not offensive.
He could be said to evolve without betraying himself. He has postponed
his own desires and should dedicate more time to himself; he wants to love

4
On this method, see, for example, Konstantin Stanislavski, Building a Character
(London: Routledge, 1989).
5
Diderot opposes Stanislavski’s idea that in order to be convincing actors must
feel the passion being expressed or “experience” their role. On the contrary,
Diderot’s ideal actor is the mimic, who practices his craft so that it is convincing in
form, while the actor himself remains totally unmoved and in control. See Denis
Diderot, The Paradox of Acting, trans. Walter H. Pollock (London: Chatto &
Windus, 1883), in https://archive.org/details/cu31924027175961.
250 Chapter Sixteen

and be loved, and that requires loving oneself in a practical sense:

cultivating self-support, self-acceptance, and self-empathy. On the other
hand, Clara is a well-defined character: she is neither flirty, nor
duplicitous; and she is in the midst of her midlife crisis (“An unemployed
40-year-old actress; how redundant!”). To accept her feelings for Castella,
she must overcome considerable bias (in principle, her partner would be
expected to come from the cultural-artistic medium of which she is part).
She had to evolve significantly in order to finally acknowledge her interest
in Castella, who initially seemed so basic and crude.
Now, what do Clara and Castella have in common? Despite their
undeniable disparities, both are equally honest and sincere in looking at
themselves and establishing bonds. With that in mind, it might be inferred
that they ultimately felt attracted to one another.

4.4. Diversity of Other Processes

The supporting characters who manage to develop are precisely those who
do not participate so directly in the intelligentsia; thus, Fred and the
costume designer start off their romance without pretence. Likewise, the
experience with Manie enables Bruno to overcome his shyness and
ingenuity. For his part, Weber also seems willing to change and to
complement the professional evaluation of his work with a human view of
relationships; in fact, he accepts Castella’s suggestion to reconsider his
resignation, a decision he initially said was final.
On the other hand, neither the bodyguard, nor Manie could be said to
have had personally transformative experiences. Regarding Angèlique,
one might conjecture that the failure of her marriage could force her to
grow up, but strictly speaking, there aren’t many signs of that.

4.5. Stagnation versus Perseverance

Clara’s friends do not appear to evolve substantially; rather, it could be
said that their inconsistencies are exacerbated, as we will see (points 7.2
and 7.3). On the other hand, some events suggest perseverance as an
inverse pattern: Castella eventually wins over Clara, and Fred does the
same with the costume designer (who he had previously admired from
afar). In vain, Bruno practised a song on the flute, and in the final scene,
he achieves his goal. Finally, a former colleague of Moreno perseveres in
an investigation and finally captures the “big fish”, the same corrupt
person who had been the motivation for Moreno to quit police work.
 Meta-Literature and Meta-Art in The Taste of Others 251

4.6. The Need for the Other

In principle, genuine maturity means becoming aware of one’s own biases
and self-deception; that requires an “other” who serves as contrast or
provides an opportunity for testing oneself. Regarding this, the last
dialogue between Castella and Weber is illustrative; both recognize their
misunderstandings and question each other honestly, but also admit their
own responsibility. In general, it can be said that the evolution of the
characters depends on their capacity to reach out to the part of themselves
that has been rejected, denied, or disassociated.

5. The Ideological Plane

5.1. Taste, Biases, and Identity
Starting with the title of the film, the subject of “taste” –with all of its
polysemy– becomes quite important. On the one hand, several characters
brandish their taste as a sign of identity, and one suspects that those who
boast of good taste (especially the dilettantes of the artistic-cultural scene)
actually lack their own taste. Certainly, this reveals a deficient
individuation correlated to conformism. In short, these postmodern
dilettantes are as vacuous as Angèlique, Castella’s bourgeois wife.
In parallel, the film also draws attention to the negative effects of bias.
“It’s strange how we jump to conclusions,” someone reflects. In effect, our
biases distance us from our neighbours and our own selves, and we form
“tastes” to wave about and distinguish ourselves from the rest.

5.2. Flat Lives/Full Lives

Castella’s wife embodies the coarse bourgeois woman, lacking any
aspirations beyond consumption and decorating her house. Manie swings
contradictorily between rejecting conventional feminine aspirations
(“house, children, cooking”, she says with a certain irony) and a desire to
achieve those same bourgeois goals. The dilettantes sneer at the bourgeois
lifestyle, but long for its advantages. In short, we are witnessing various
cases of inauthenticity.
252 Chapter Sixteen

5.3. The Paradoxes of Addictions

The indolence of those involved in drugs is surprising, and the hypocrisy
of a society that legalizes other harmful substances is implied by the casual
acceptance of such a result.

5.4. Inconsistency and Presentism

Without becoming an antifeminist screed or anything like that, the film
implies a certain veiled criticism of the falseness of women’s liberation. In
that sense, it is suggestive that even the self-sufficient Manie commits
flagrant inconsistencies, as her conversational partners or circumstances
change. On the other hand, there are few couples or sons or daughters
(Castella’s only son lives abroad). In general, no one appears to project
himself beyond a short-term and unsubstantial present.

5.5. Globalized Intercultural Society

We also see signs of a global reality. For example, Weber has negotiated a
deal to export steel drums to Iran. In the case of Castella, he must learn
English, the language of world business, in order to work with the
Iranians. He ends up taking the process so seriously that he even writes his
poem to Clara in English. In addition, his son is studying in England and
Bruno’s girlfriend is living in the United States (where she is unfaithful to
him). Even the easy-going driver responds angrily to Angèlique telling her
that she should live in Disneyland (implying that such an environment
would be appropriate for her childishness).

5.6. Lack of Job Security and Degradation of Life

Although this is not a central theme, the film alludes to certain
precariousness regarding work. Indeed, Clara is forced to give English
lessons to supplement her meagre earnings as an actress; Manie works just
two or three days a week; both the driver and bodyguard have temporary
jobs (Moreno chose to quit his job as detective); finally, Clara’s artistic
friends end up working for the businessman they look down on. On the
other hand, an executive like Weber has the luxury of quitting his well-
paying position in Castella’s company, and Castella himself seems to exert
little personal effort to increase production and meet his new export
commitments. But the film doesn’t stress these contrasts; rather, it shows
the human side of the industrialist (who is often the object of stereotypes).
 Meta-Literature and Meta-Art in The Taste of Others 253

In addition to the counterpoint between the precarious nature of work

for many and the wellbeing of a few, there is the theme of crime. The
street thieves who assault Castella operate almost like a factor for
economic redistribution or a “correction” of inequality.

6. The Symbolic Plane

6.1. Symbolism around Taste
According to Clara, what is most difficult about being an actress isn’t
memorizing lines, but depending on the desire of others. Thus, there is
symbolism in the scene in which she is in the street, her back to the posters
announcing her most recent part (these levels of reality and fiction become
confused, but will have to be put in order). Castella’s possible “diabetes”
is also suggestive: he can’t give himself the “taste” of eating sweets and
must adhere to “the taste of others” (his wife also controls how strictly he
follows his diet). In general, almost all of the characters have insipid
(“tasteless”) existences.

6.2. Symbolism in Design

Flowers abound in curtains, paintings, and even in Castella and
Angèlique’s bedspread; however, Castella appears not to like them (in
fact, he waves away a man selling roses and tells his wife he is fed up with
the flowers in their house). To an extent, Angèlique’s invasive taste is yet
another indication of Castella’s subjugation. Thus it seems important when
he changes the façade of his factory, shaves his moustache, and writes his
poem in English to please Clara.
Colour green is also very present: the façade and interior of the tea
room are green. All of this green appears to evoke nature, from which the
urban environment separates itself.

6.3. Symbolism Related to the Theatre

It is also interesting that Castella must learn another language. It is as if he
had to forget all of his previous habits and learn anew how to talk, to learn
about a new world (which on the other hand is more intimate: the internal
world of his frustrations and desire to love and be loved). In fact, poetry is
another language for him. He begins the film by complaining that Racine’s
play is in verse form, but paradoxically ends up writing verses for Clara.
254 Chapter Sixteen

Also symbolic is the corset that squeezes Clara, the one she must wear
in her role as Hedda Gabler. Her liberation is precisely to be able to
breathe at her own rhythm. Something can also be said about the final
gunshot. That moment marks the death of the tragic character Clara
played, and then –but only then– is she released from her true interior
persona. Meanwhile, she also frees herself from “the taste of others”; that
is, the taste of her bohemian friends.

6.4. Animals
The pet dog and the wounded bird are also symbolic; they appear to reflect
Angèlique’s immaturity. And although Angèlique’s dog bites passersby,
she claims her pet is harmless. Likewise, she is hostile toward those she
speaks with, but fails to recognize her own aggressiveness.

6.5. Names and Last Names

Many names and last names in the film suggest other meanings. To start,
several of the names are Hispanic in origin (Bruno, Moreno, Castella); on
the other hand, Clara, Moreno and Bruno are adjectives, all referring to
visual traits. In addition, Bruno and Moreno are semantically equivalent;
describing someone as Bruno (brown) is the same as describing him as
Moreno (a semantic similarity that is reinforced when Moreno and Manie
share a bed for the first time, as the take is almost identical to that with
Bruno, who preceded Moreno in his “conquest” of Manie). In French,
Manie is a homonym of the French word for “mania” and curiously
enough, the names of the partners in each couple start with the same first
letter: Castella and Clara, Moreno and Manie. As we have seen, the last
name Weber evokes the author of The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of
Capitalism, an underlying theme of the film.

6.6. Drums
It is very symbolic that Castella’s factory produces steel drums, which are
made for containing, but which by definition are empty, ready to be filled
with anything. At the beginning of the film, there was a similar vacuum in
Castella’s existence.
 Meta-Literature and Meta-Art in The Taste of Others 255

7. The Aesthetic Plane

7.1. Art and Meta-Art
Various aspects of the film contribute to create a meta-cinematic effect, as
if we were watching a play about art. First, the protagonist is an actress
and her friends are artists, and/or intellectuals, and/or dilettantes; therefore,
their dialogues centre on culture (they allude to actors and mention
playwrights such as Strindberg, Schwab and Williams). Furthermore,
Clara acts in two plays (Berenice by Racine and Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler),
and prepares for a role in The Imaginary Invalid, by Molière, in an
intertextual allusion. Curiously, Clara’s personality is drawn toward those
dramatic characters (Berenice and Hedda Gabler), while comic nuances
appear to be absent from her life (the film does not show her acting in
Moliere’s comedy). For his part, and despite his distance from the world of
culture, Castella shares some traits with Monsieur Jourdain (Molière
character who was unaware that he spoke in prose). Both are wealthy, yet
ignorant; both seek access to an unfamiliar world (Jourdain, to nobility;
Castella, to the world of art). Thus, watching The Bourgeois Gentleman,
Castella might recognize himself in the character of Jourdain. Recall that
initially Castella is obliged to attend Racine’s play, and his displeasure
mounts when he discovers that the characters speak in verse; nevertheless,
the prosaic Castella ultimately declares his love for Clara in verse form.
But this is not an inconsistency; rather, it appears to be a sign of the
transformational influence of art and love.

7.2. The Contrast between Art and Artists

But this film does not glorify art for art’s sake. Its reflection is much more
subtle and complex, and in any case distances itself from both narcissistic
self-reference (frequent in postmodern art) and from biased anti-artistic
criticism (recurrent in the most conservative criticism). The Taste of
Others is equidistant from intra artistic discourse and the bitter judgement
of the extra-artistic world. What rises out of this equidistance is a smiling
criticism, which is simultaneously a self-criticism (the director herself is
also an actress and writer, while her spouse/co-scriptwriter is a well-
known actor; he plays the role of Castella, while she prefers the role of
waitress Manie). In brief, art counts here more than artists, whose miseries
and inconsistencies do not overshadow the grandeur of artistic work in
terms of pure creativity, just as certain novels show the human side –
256 Chapter Sixteen

perhaps too human– of some men of the church, implying that religion
transcends the defects of its representatives.

7.3. Ambivalence about the Figure of the Artist

In any case, artists do not come out well in this film and although the film
does not present a vengeful caricature, it does emphasize the incongruities.
For example, we see a young painter –the favourite of an older gay man–
who does not believe that common people can appreciate his art. And yet,
he worries that few will attend his gallery show; likewise, he looks down
on critics, but watches anxiously for them at the show’s opening and is
disappointed when they do not appear. In parallel, it is worth asking what
those ghostlike critics want to do: orient the public, make themselves
feared by artists, or put themselves above those same artists? In sum, the
art scene is stripped bare here from the inside, by two scriptwriters who
know it well, but who surely love it and in some way attempt to redeem
and reclaim it despite its shortcomings.

7.4. Life as a Dramatic Comedy

A sadly funny scene occurs when Castella suggests that the actors put on a
comedy, arguing that the public prefers entertainment to the depth or pain
of drama. His observation is not only naïve, but also a counterpoint to the
preferences of the actress he wants to win over. To top it off, the others
mock him with references to renowned playwrights, leading him to believe
they are “comic” authors. But while Castella plays the fool in this
particular scene, the larger context of the film justly redeems him, because
it is on this higher level that those mocking him are seen as the bigger
fools. In any case, the film is in principle a dramatic comedy; therefore, it
is situated between both perspectives, swinging from drama to comedy
and thereby recreating life itself.

7.5. The Dialectic of Art

The liveliness achieved by this film corresponds to certain resources such
as contrast, irony, and paradox. For example, it is ironic that while Castella
and Clara find greater intimacy in a public space such as the tea room, the
privacy of Manie and Moreno is constantly interrupted –even though they
are inside her apartment– by phone calls and visits from addicts coming to
buy their doses. Furthermore, the characters provide other paradoxes: the
person with the most “angelical” name (Angèlique) is the most aggressive;
 Meta-Literature and Meta-Art in The Taste of Others 257

the most “primitive” (Castella) is ultimately the most authentic; the

representatives of the socially critical intelligentsia are shown to be
frivolous and opportunistic; and finally, it is a secondary character who
best perceives their self-deceit (“It’s strange how we jump to conclusions,”
he says).
Something similar happens with the music in the film. It doesn’t seem
like a coincidence when, in the last scene, Bruno and other amateur
musicians are finally able to successfully play the well-known Edith Piaf
song, “Non, je ne regrette rien”? Curiously, it is the only French song in
the film, and the version played is solely instrumental.

7.6. Individuation and Personal Taste

As already mentioned, the film constitutes a sharp internal criticism of
intellectualism and dilettantism. Recall that, behind their pseudo-critical
and mocking façades, the dilettantes accept a favourable tie to Mr.
Castella, thus reflecting the venality of the intelligentsia in relation to
economic power.

7.7. Diverse Merits

The quality of the script is remarkable (each scene is justified and connects
to the greater whole), and it is also condensed quite well in the film’s title.
The performance of the actors is convincing in almost all cases. The
locations seem chosen to contrast privacy (Castella’s home, Manie’s flat,
backstage) and places where roles and masks are adopted (factory, stage,
gallery, cafe, tea room). In addition, the film addresses a universal theme,
but through a simple story whose characters hold our attention because
they reflect who we are. Those who find some kind of happiness must first
individuate themselves, and this involves discovering or developing their
own tastes, as well as their profound and unsatisfied needs, rather than
changing their desires. At the same time, discovering one’s own “taste”
means overcoming the mechanical invocation of “the taste of others” who,
in only what seems to be paradoxical, also lack their own genuine taste, as
all are dependent on others for their views in a similar way. In general, the
film almost doesn’t show individuals as such; rather, it is full of subjects
caught in a net of self-complacencies, complicities, and falsehoods.
258 Chapter Sixteen

8. Towards Meta-Learning
Having explored the film practically from beginning to end, I think further
comprehension can be found by reflecting on universal issues. Here I pose
some questions that seem relevant, and offer responses that are plausible:

1. How is it possible that Castella and Clara become attracted to one

another? Perhaps the notion that opposites are attracted could be invoked
metaphorically here. Inversely, it could be argued that, deep down, they
have similar personalities: both are fairly frank and honest. The preceding
hypotheses are opposites, but are not at all mutually exclusive, and when
they are combined a reasonable explanation emerges: Perhaps the
differences correspond to a more superficial level (something like what
Mony Elkaïm calls the “official program”), while their similarities operate
at a deeper level (what Elkaïm calls the “world map”)6. Perhaps attraction
is produced in a unique and peculiar way in each person; for example,
Clara could be attracted by a certain confidence exuded by Castella, that
curious combination of ingenuity and astuteness, and/or his capacity for
learning and/or his autonomy and/or his perseverance and/or his stability.

2. Did Manie and Bruno really sleep together before, although he

didn’t remember it? Before responding, it is worth recalling certain facts:
Bruno seems too inexperienced, not a polished roué or womanizer, to have
forgotten a good-looking person (and who ten years earlier must have been
even more attractive). In fact, Bruno didn’t even remember her name,
although he tells himself it would be difficult to forget it. It doesn’t seem
very likely that Bruno “forgot” because he had been drunk (as Manie
suggests), as we hardly see him drink at all; thus, given that Manie sells
drugs, she must be accustomed to deceiving. In addition, he seems fairly
naïve, and thus could be “easy prey”. There are signs that she was seeking
to change worlds, and Bruno represents a bridge to another life. In
conclusion, it seems probable that this was a trick played by Manie to
entangle the naïve Bruno.

3. Considering what the characters learn, can we as spectators attain a

vicarious meta-learning? As a response, I offer the following observations:
Castella transcends the “required” learning when he becomes motivated by
winning over his teacher. Apart from the aforementioned, Castella can

6
Mony Elkaïm, If You Love Me, Don’t Love Me: Undoing Reciprocal Double
Binds and Other Methods of Change in Couple and Family Therapy, trans. Hendon
Chubb (USA: J. Aronson, 1997).
 Meta-Literature and Meta-Art in The Taste of Others 259

anticipate a horizon for using the knowledge he will acquire (not only will
he be able to interact better with his Iranian counterpart, but he may even
visit his son in England). His progress with English boosts Castella’s self-
esteem and even reinvigorates him. The teacher is both competent and
attractive to the student. The discipline of guided study matches Castella’s
self-directed learning since the classes are personalized and take place in a
tea room (an informal but motivating context).

4. Can we also vicariously learn something else about learning and

education? With his solid preparation, Weber is efficient and autonomous;
this leads him to act guided by his conscience rather than to please his
superiors. As has been mentioned (point 4.5), perseverance and motivation
greatly favour learning.

The examples previously given are exercises of indirect but conscious

learning. If readers so desire, they may ask themselves additional
questions and respond to them on their own.7 But my work ends here…

Bibliography
Diderot, Denis. The Paradox of Acting. Translated by Walter H. Pollock.
London: Chatto & Windus, 1883.
Mony Elkaïm. If You Love Me, Don’t Love Me: Undoing Reciprocal
Double Binds and Other Methods of Change in Couple and Family
Therapy, trans. Hendon Chubb. USA: J. Aronson, 1997.
Stanislavski, Konstantin. Building a Character. London: Routledge, 1989.
The Taste of Others (Le goût des autres). Directed by Agnes Jaoui. 2000.
USA: Miramax, 2012. DVD.

7
Here are some possible questions: [I] Why does Clara invite Castella to the
opening night of Hedda Gabler? [II] What happens when the characters put their
hearts in play? Do they gain or lose clarity, and at what level? [III] The director/co-
scriptwriter of the film is the daughter of a psychotherapist. Does that influence the
film in some way?
 CONTRIBUTORS

Francisca Ignacia Apey Ramos works at Universidad Diego Portales,

Santiago, Chile. She holds a BA in Literature with a concentration in
Screenwriting at Universidad Finis Terrae, Santiago, Chile. She is
currently taking a Master’s Degree in Editing and Publishing at
Universidad Diego Portales in exchange with Universitat Pompeu Fabra,
Barcelona, Spain.

Paula Baldwin Lind is a researcher and Associate Lecturer at the Institute

of Literature, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile. She holds a
BA in English Literature (Catholic University of Chile), a Master of
Studies in English 1550-1780, University of Oxford, England, and a PhD
in Shakespeare Studies from The Shakespeare Institute at the University of
Birmingham, England. Some of her recent publications include: “Chilean
Translations of Shakespeare: Do they Constitute a National Shakespeare
Canon?, in Tradução em Revista 12: “Shakespeare’s Plays in Translation”
(janeiro-junho 2012), Río de Janeiro, Brasil. She has co-translated with Dr
Braulio Fernández Biggs, William Shakespeare’s The Tempest (Santiago:
Editorial Universitaria, 2010), and Twelfth Night (Santiago: Editorial
Universitaria, 2014) into Spanish.

Carmen Sofía Brenes is Full Professor at the School of Communication,

Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile. She is a PhD in
Communication, School of Communication, Università della Santa Croce,
Italy. She has published numerous articles, such as “The Practical Value of
Theory: Teaching Aristotle’s Poetics to Screenwriters”, Communication
and Society, vol. XXIV, fasc. 1, 2011, pp. 101–118. She is also the author
of Recepción poética del cine. Una aproximación al mundo de Frank
Capra, Roma: Edusc, 2008.

Patrick Cattrysse teaches narrative studies and adaptation studies at the

Antwerpen Universiteit (Belgium), the Université Libre de Bruxelles
(Belgium) and the Emerson College European Center (the Netherlands).
He holds a Master in Roman Languages and a PhD in Letters and
Philosophy from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven; Belgium. His
doctoral thesis is entitled: “L’adaptation filmique de textes littéraires. Le
 Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film 261

film noir américain.” He is the author of, most recently, “Descriptive

(Adaptation) studies: naming and epistemological issues”, in Cinema
Journal, 2014 and Descriptive Adaptation Studies. Epistemological and
Methodological Issues, Antwerpen: Garant Uitgevers, 2014.

Braulio Fernández Biggs is Associate Professor and current Director of

the Institute of Literature, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile.
He obtained an MA in Literature at the University of Chile and a PhD in
Literature at the Catholic University of Chile. He has published several
articles and books, such as: “Antigone in the Southern Cone of Latin
America”, with Joaquín García-Huidobro, Ágora. Estudos Clássicos em
Debate 15 (2013), 231-264, Calderón y Shakespeare: los personajes en La
cisma de Ingalaterra y Henry VIII, Madrid: Iberoamericana Vervuert,
Biblioteca Áurea Hispánica, 2012, and has co-translated with Dr Paula
Baldwin Lind, William Shakespeare’s The Tempest (Editorial Universitaria,
2010), and Twelfth Night (Editorial Universitaria, 2014) into Spanish.

Marta Frago, Senior Lecturer at the Department of Film, TV & Digital

Media, University of Navarre, Spain. She has an MA in Writing for Film
and Television Sequential Program, University of Los Angeles California
(UCLA Ext.), a Degree in Communication Studies from the University of
Navarre, and a PhD in Communication, University of Navarre, Spain. She
has published numerous articles on film studies: “Reflections on film
adaptation from an iconological approach”, Comunicación y Sociedad,
vol. 18, n. 2 (2005), 49-81. She is the author of Leer, dialogar, escribir
cine. La adaptación cinematográfica de Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Eunsa:
Pamplona, 2007.

Juan José García-Noblejas is Emeritus Professor at the School of

Communication, Università della Santa Croce, Italy. He has a PhD in
Communication, University of Navarre, Spain. Some of his recent
publications include: “Identidad personal y mundos cinematográficos
distópicos”, Comunicación y Sociedad, vol. XVII, fasc. 2, 2004, 73–88
(English version: “Personal Identity and Dystopian Film Worlds”,
http://bit.ly/1bsvcRV), Comunicación borrosa. Sentido práctico del
periodismo y de la ficción cinematográfica, Pamplona: Eunsa, 2000 and
“Alice nel paese dei mondi possibili. I telegiornali come specchi opachi”,
in Federica Bergamino, ed., Alice dietro lo specchio. Letteratura e
conoscenza della realtà, Ed. Sabiniae, Roma, 2013, 39-86.
262 Contributors

Ismael Gavilán Muñoz is a poet, essayist and academic. He teaches at the

Institute of Literature, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile, and at
other universities in Chile. He currently supervises the Poetry Workshop at
La Sebastiana Cultural Centre run by the Pablo Neruda Foundation in
Valparaíso, Chile. He obtained an MA in Chilean and Latin American
Literature at the University of Chile and is a PhD candidate in Chilean and
Latin American Literature at the same university. As a poet, he has
published Llamas de quien duerme en nuestro sueño (Ediciones Nuevo
Reyno, 1996), Fabulaciones del aire de otros reynos (Ediciones Altazor,
2002) and Raíz del aire (Editorial Antítesis, 2008). His most recent book
of poems is Vendramin (Valparaíso: Altazor, 2014).

Diego Honorato E. teaches Contemporary Philosophy and Aesthetics at

Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile. His academic degrees
include a BA in Spanish Literature and Linguistics, a BA in Philosophy,
both obtained at Universidad Católica de Chile, and a PhD in Philosophy
from Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland. He has recently published “La
Dicotomía ‘Mito’ y ‘Razón’ a la luz de la historiografía antigua y
moderna” [The dichotomy ‘myth’ and ‘reason’ in the light of ancient and
modern historiography], in Historia, Memoria y Narración, Paola Corti
B., Rodrigo Moreno J., José Luis Widow (eds.), Altazor, 2011, 165-178,
and “Classical Scholarship Today: Geoffrey E. R. Lloyd’s Methodological
Principles”, The European Legacy, 2014, Vol. 19, 4, 485-491.

María Ignacia López Duhart, Lecturer and Academic Coordinator at the

Institute of Literature, Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de Chile. She
holds a BA in Social Sciences and Humanities, a BA in Hispanic
Literature, and an MA in Literature, Pontificia Universidad Católica de
Chile. She is a PhD candidate in Literature at the Pontificia Universidad
Católica de Chile. She is the author of “Poesía paisajera en Poemas del
País de Nunca Jamás: morfologías y sentidos del entorno”, in Teillier
Crítico, Braulio Fernández Biggs and Marcelo Rioseco, eds., Santiago: Ed.
Universitaria, 2014, 113-126.

Eduardo Llanos Melussa, Academic and researcher in the Psychology of

Communication at Diego Portales University, Santiago, Chile. He is a
Psychologist and writer. He is a doctoral candidate in Psychology and
Education at the University of Granada, Spain. He has published several
collections of poems, such as Contradiccionario (Santiago, 1983), which
includes several works that had already obtained the first prize in different
poetry competitions (Ariel, 1978; Literatura Juvenil, 1978 and 1982;
 Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film 263

Gabriela Mistral, 1979; Juegos Florales de Valdivia, 1982). He also

obtained Premio Iberoamericano (1984), Premio Latinoamericano Rubén
Darío (1988), Premio Centenario Gabriela Mistral (1989) and Premio
Pedro de Oña (1990). In 1995 he published Porque escribí, a critical
anthology of Enrique Lihn (Editorial Fondo de Cultura Económica). His
Antología presunta (FCE, 2003) was awarded the Premio Altazor (2004).
Other publications include prologues and research articles on Chilean
poets such as Nicanor Parra, Gonzalo Rojas, and Jorge Teillier.

Mónica Maffía, actress, theatre director, translator and academic. She is

the founder of the Theatre Group FyL (Philosophy and Literature) from
the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. She graduated as a Bachelor of
Arts (Honours) at Middlesex University and is a PhD candidate in
Literature at the Universidad del Salvador (USAL), Argentina. She is also
régisseuse from the Instituto Superior de Arte from Teatro Colón and a
member of the Pen International Centre in Argentina. She obtained the
“Mayor Teatro del Mundo (UBA) Prize” for her Spanish translation of
Edward III, by Shakespeare, the first Latin American translation of the
play, published by Ediciones Corregidor. She has recently published the
first Spanish translation of Dido, Queen of Carthage by Christopher
Marlowe, which has been performed in Buenos Aires.

Jorge Peña Vial is Full Professor and current Dean of the Faculty of
Philosophy and Humanities at the Universidad de los Andes, Santiago de
Chile. He obtained a BA in Philosophy and a PhD in Philosophy, both at
the University of Navarre, Spain. He has published numerous articles and
several books on topics related to anthropology, fiction and film studies,
such as: Imaginación, símbolo y realidad (1987), Levinas y el olvido del
otro (1997), Poética del tiempo: ética y estética de la narración (2002), El
mal para Paul Ricouer (2009), Ética de la libertad (2013).

Ángel Pérez Martínez, Researcher and Coordinator of the Humanities

Division at the Research Centre, Universidad del Pacífico, Lima, Perú. His
academic degrees include: BA in Philosophy, FTPCL, Lima, Perú, MA in
Hispanic Philology, Instituto de la Lengua Española del CSIC, Madrid,
and PhD in Literature, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain.
Among his recent publications, it is worth highlighting: El buen juicio en
el Quijote, Valencia: Pretextos, 2005, El Quijote y su idea de virtud,
Anejos de la Revista de Literatura. Madrid: CSIC, 2012. He also won the
Amado Alonso International Prize for Literary Criticism (Navarra, 2004)
and El Barco de Vapor Children’s Literature National Award (Lima,
264 Contributors

2009). Furthermore, he’s the author of four children novels: Memorias

secretas de un librero (2003), Perengrín XXVI (2006), Píshiaka (2009)
and El ladrón de monosílabos (2009).

Carolina Rueda is Assistant Professor of the Film and Media Studies

Program at the University of Oklahoma, USA. She holds a PhD in
Hispanic Languages, Literatures, and Cultural Studies from the University
of Pittsburgh, and specializes in Latin American Cinema. Some of her
publications include: “Aesthetics of Dystopia Blindness from Novel to
Film”, in World Literature Today (May, 2015); “Carlos Bolado’s Bajo
California: Crossing Borders and Dislocating the Western Tradition”, in
The Western in the Global South (Routledge, 2015); “Memory, Trauma,
and Phantasmagoria in Claudia Llosa’s La teta asustada” (Hispania,
2015); and “Mise en abyme, parodia y violencia en La última cena de
Tomás Gutiérrez Alea” (Apuntes Hispanos, 2008).

Eleni Varmazi is Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Communication,

Department of Cinema and Television, Bahçeúehir University, Turkey.
She obtained a BA in Philosophy at the Aristotle University of
Thessaloniki, Greece, a MA in Media Studies at the New School for Social
Research, New York, USA, and a PhD in Media and Communications,
University of Athens, Greece. Her recent publications include: “A Film
about Time”, in Balkan Survey 1994-2013, D. Kerkinos (ed.), Thessaloniki
International Film Festival Publications, Athens, 2013, 67-69, and Still
Carré, Thessaloniki: University Studio Press, 2010.
 INDEX

NOTE: Most of the entries correspond to authors of literary works and

adaptations of those to cinema, short films, and TV series. In addition,
names of film directors, critics, and experts in the field of film and
adaptation studies and, in some cases, their seminal publications have been
included.

When the reference appears only in a footnote, the page number is

followed by n.; when it appears only in the bibliography, it is followed by
b.

Adorno, Theodor 161 Poetics xiin., 43b., 55,

Aeschylus 63 58n.,77b., 114, 124b., 136b.,
Oresteia 63 178.
Agger, Gunhild 172n., 179 Asimov, Isaac 122
Albersmeier, Franz-Josef 99 Auerbach, Erich 114, 124b.
Alejos Grau, Carmen-José 209n., Auster, Paul xviii, 157-62.
213b. In the Country of Last Things
Álvarez López, Esther 161b. 157, 159-60, 162b.
Álvarez, Santiago xx, 206-9 Lulu on the Bridge 157-58,
El sueño del pongo xx, 203, 162b.
204n., 209, 211n., 213b. Mr. Vertigo 157, 158n.,162b.
Anderegg, Michael A. 90, 95b. Smoke 157, 159, 162b.
Anderson, Stephanie 104 The Book of Illusions 158,
Andrews, Julie 104 162b.
Apey Ramos, Francisca 156, 260 Bachelard, Gaston 80, 95b.
Arguedas, José María xx, 202-12, Bacri, Jean-Pierre 242
213b. Baldwin Lind, Paula 79, 82n., 95b.,
“La agonía de Rasu Ñiti” xx, 260
203, 207n., 208, 213b. Barenboim, Daniel 100-2
“El sueño del pongo” xx, 203- Baxter, Charles 163n., 179b.
4, 209-10, 212-13. Bell, Philip 8, 23b.
Aristotle xiin., xviii, 9, 10n., 15, Benjamin, Walter 157, 161n., 162b.
19n., 31n., 40n., 43b., 55, Bergman, Ingmar 102, 104, 111b.
58n.,b., 70-71, 77b., 114, 124b., Linterna Mágica 102n., 111b.
131-32, 136b., 148, 173n., 174. Hour of the Wolf 102, 104
Nicomachean Ethics 173n. Bertalanffy, Ludwig von 3
Blackburn, Simon 9n., 10n., 14n.,
17n., 18n., 23b.
266 Index

Blank, Les 184, 193n., 196n., 197, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
200 46
Burden of Dreams 184, 193, Chatman, Seymour 51n., 52, 59b.,
195-196, 198, 200b. 96b.
Bluestone, George 49, 50, 59b. Chaumeton, Etienne 21, 23b.
Novels into Film 49, 59b. Cinema d’auteur xx, 216-7
Bodeen, DeWitt 89, 95b. Cirlot, J. Eduardo 91, 96b.
Borde, Raymond 21, 23b. Clinch, Minty 241b., 224n.
Borg, Alma 102 Conrad, Joseph xvii, 126-30, 133n.,
Boyum, Joy Gould 49, 56, 59b. 134-5
Bradbury, Ray 122 Heart of Darkness xvii, 126,
Branagh, Kenneth xvi, 79-80, 86, 127n., 128-30, 133, 135
89-95, 97b., 98b., 165, 175 Coppola, Francis Ford xvii, 126,
Hamlet xvi, 79-80, 86, 89-90, 12830, 132, 134-5, 136b.
91n., 97b. Apocalypse Now xvii, 126, 128-
Henry V xvi, 79-80, 86, 89, 92- 9, 132-3, 135
94, 98b. Cornejo Polar, Antonio 202, 203n.,
Bratman, Michael 3 213b.
Brenes, Carmen Sofía xiii, 145, Cortázar, Julio 156
151n., 154b., 260 Bestiario 156
Brook, Peter 81-2, 95, 96b. Craik, T.W. 86n., 92n., 97b.
Brock, Jeremy 145 Crowl, Samuel 90-93, 96b.
Brideshead Revisited 145, 147- Dassin, Jules xv, 73-76
8, 151n., 153-4 Phaedra 73-4, 76
Buchman, Lorne 93, 96b. A Dream of Passion 73-5, 76
Burgon, Geoffrey 146, 152 Davidson, Donald 3
Cacoyannis, Michael xv, 66-71 Davidson, John E. 200b.
Electra 66-7 Davis, Andrew 145
The Trojan Women 66-8 Brideshead Revisited 145, 147-
Iphigenia 66-9 8, 151n., 153-4
Cahir, Linda Costanzo 129, 135b. De Certeau, Michel 80-1, 96b.
Callon, Michel 3 De Musset, Alfred 123
Cartmell, Deborah 53, 59b. De Romilly, Guy 64, 77b.
Casetti, Francesco 52 Depardieu, Gérard 219, 236, 239
Castells, Manuel 3 Derrida, Jacques 25-7, 32n., 35, 38,
Cassuto, Leonard 164, 170, 179b. 40, 43b., 48
Cattrysse, Patrick 2, 3n., 13n., 20n., De Saussure, Ferdinand 3
22n., 23b., 48n. Dessen, Alan 87, 96b.
Cervantes, Miguel de xvii, 122 Detienne, Marcel 36n., 43b.
Chamberlain, Muriel E. 192, 200b. Diderot, Denis 249, 259b.
Chamberlain, Richard, 223 The Paradox of Acting 249n.,
Chandler, Raymond 163-4, 170, 259b.
172 Dobson, Michael 84n., 96b.
“The Simple Act of Murder” Doherty, Kevin 147, 154b.
163 Du Pré, Jacqueline 100-1
Chapple, Freda 99n., 111b. Dufrénoy, Michel Jérôme 123
 Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film 267

Dutton, Richard 87n. 155b., 163, 165n., 167n., 171n.,

Ebert, Roger 147 178n., 179b., 261
Eco, Umberto 51, 55n., 59b., 171, Gaudreault, André 52
179b. Gavilán Muñoz, Ismael 137, 262
Egan, Gabriel 84, 85n., 96b. Genette, Gérard 48n., 52, 59b.
Eliot, T.S. xvii, 128-130, 135, 146 Palimpsestes 48n., 59b.
The Hollow Men 128 Gibson, Rex 84, 96b.
The Sacred Wood and Major Gill, Christopher 40n., 43b.
Early Essays 130n. Gluck, Will 46
Tradition and the Individual Annie 45
Talent xvii, 129, 130n., González, Ana Marta 168n., 179b.
135b. Goodman, Nelson 8n., 9, 14, 23b.
Elkaïm, Mony 258, 259b. Goodwin, Michael 193n., 200b.
Erne, Lukas 88, 96b. Graham, Daniel 15-6, 23b.
Euripides 63, 66-8, 70, 73-4, 77 Granger, Derek 145
Electra 63, 66 Greg, W. W. 85n., 96b.
Hippolytus 73 Grimm Brothers 18
Medea 70, 73, 76-7 Cinderella 18
Orestes 63 Güiraldes, Ricardo 182n., 183
Iphigenia at Aulis 63, 66 Don Segundo Sombra 182n.
Iphigenia at Tauris 63 Gurr, Andrew 81-2, 83n., 84, 85n.,
The Trojan Women 66-7 87n., 96b.
Even-Zohar, Itamar 2, 3, 21n., 23b. Haidar, Julieta 211n., 213b.
Ferber, Michael 91, 96b. Hart, Jeffrey P. 146, 155b.
Fernández Biggs, Braulio 126, 260- Hatchuel, Sarah 83, 93-4, 97b.
1 Heidegger, Martin xiv, 27n., 40
Fernández Retamar, Roberto 209, Hellman, John 129-30, 136b.
213b. Henriksson, Krister 268
Film noir 21, 23b., 165, 24b. Henslowe, Philip 85, 96b.
Fitzpatrick, Tim 88, 96b. Heraclitus 7, 9-10, 15-6
Forbrydelsen (The Killing) 165, Heras, Guillermo xvi, 99
170 Hernández, Miguel Ángel 140n.,
Ford, Harrison 219, 224-5, 227 144b.
Forshaw, Barry 171n., 179b. Herzog, Werner xix, 183-5, 191-
Foucault, Michel 48 200
Frago, Marta xiii, xviii, 45, 57n., Aguirre, the Wrath of God 193,
59b., 147-8, 155b., 261 194n., 199, 200b.
Franco, Jean 199, 200b. Conquest of the Useless
Frank, Nino 21, 23b. 192n.,194, 195n., 196n.,
Gadamer, Hans-Georg xiv, 27, 40, 198, 201b.
42 Fitzcarraldo xix, 182-4, 191-5,
Gallegos, Rómulo 182n., 183 197-200, 201b.
Doña Bárbara 182n. Hetzel, Pierre-Jules 123
García-Noblejas, Juan José xiii, Hill, W.E. 11-3, 15
56n., 59b., 148, 149n., 151n., “My Wife & My Mother-in-
Law” (drawing) 11
268 Index

Homer 120, 130 Kinski, Klaus 195, 197

Honorato, Diego 25, 262 Knox, Bernard 67n., 69, 70n., 78b.
Hooper, Tom 45, 54, 57-8, 59b. Koepnick, Lutz 194
Les Misérables 45, 54, 57-8, Konchalovsky, Andrei xvi, 99, 105,
59b. 108, 111b.
Hosley, Richard 88, 97b. Duet for One xvi, 99, 101-4,
Hugo, Victor 54, 57 111
Les Misérables 58 Lassgård, Rolf 165
Husserl, Edmund 40 Latour, Bruno 3
Hutcheon, Linda xi, xiin., 46n., 47- Lefebvre, Henri 81, 97b.
8, 59b., 91, 92n., 97b. Leitch, Thomas 46-8, 53, 59b.
A Theory of Adaptation 46n., Lévi-Strauss, Claude 52
47, 59b., 92n., 97b. Lipp, Jeremy 105
Ibsen, Henrik xxi, 255 Llanos Melussa, Eduardo 242, 262
Hedda Gabler xxi, 243, 254-5, Longman, Stanley Vincent 82, 97b.
259b. López Duhart, M. Ignacia 202, 262
Ichikawa, Mariko 81, 83n., 84, 87, Lorenz, Chris 4-6, 24b.
96b. Losey, Joseph 111
Ives, David 103 Luhmann, Niklas 270
Venus in Fur 102 MacDowell, Andie 236
Jackson, Russell 90n., 96b. MacKenzie, Mary Margaret 43
Jagger, Mick 195 MacKinnon, Kenneth 67-8, 70,
Jakobson, Roman 17, 24b. 71n., 72-3, 78b.
Jarrold, Julian xviii, 146-7, 150 McDonald, Marianne 67, 73, 76n.,
Brideshead Revisited xviii, 78b.
146-7, 152-4 McDonnell, Thomas P. 145, 155b.
Jaoui, Agnès xxi, 242, 259b. McFarlane, Brian 51, 52n., 59b.,
The Taste of Others xxi, 242, 89n., 97b.
255, 259b. Maffía, Mónica 99, 263
Jenkins, Henry 45n., 59b. Mamet, David 154, 155b.
Johnson, Charles 167n., 179b. Mankell, Henning xviii, xix, 163,
Jost, François 52 165, 168, 169-70, 173-4, 176,
Joyce, James 130 180b.
Ulysses 130, 156 Villospår 168
Jowett, Benjamin 28n., 29, 33, Mann, Thomas xviii, 137-8, 140-1,
34n., 36, 37, 44b. 143
Kael, Pauline 90, 97b. Death in Venice xviii, 137-8,
Kahneman, Daniel 4, 24b. 140-1, 143
Kastan, David Scott 84, 97b. Doktor Faustus 141, 143
Kattenbelt, Chiel 99n., 111b. Marner, Terence St. John 104n.,
Kempinski, Tom 100, 104n., 105-6, 105n., 111
109, 111 Martínez-Lage, Miguel 127n.,
Duet for One xvi, 99-101, 103- 136b.
4, 110-11 Méliès, George xvii, 49, 114
Kerridge, Jake 173n., 180b. Cendrillon 49
Kinder, Marsha 134, 136b. Metz, Christian 51, 60b.
 Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film 269

Milius, John 128, 130 Polo, Leonardo 166n., 172n.,

Mitry, Jean 137-8, 144b. 174n.,180b.
Molière xxi, 255 Polanski, Roman 102, 103
The Imaginary Invalid xxi, 255 Carnage 102
Mortimer, John 145, 155b. Prokofiev, Sergei 100n.
Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus 102, Peter and the Wolf 100
111b., 238 Propp, Vladimir 52
Die Zauberflöte 102n., 111b. Protagoras 10
The Magic Flute 102 Prüm, Karl 99
Mullaney, Stephen 84, 97b. Rachet, Guy 64, 78b.
Müller, Jürgen 99 Racine, Jean xxi, 73-4, 253, 255
Naremore, James 48n., 53, 60b. Berenice xxi, 255
Neale-Silva, Eduardo 188, 189n., Rayner, Jonathan 217, 240n., 241b.
201b. Renaud, François 40n., 43-44b.
Nicolelis, Miguel 3 Reza, Yasmina 102
Nieto Caballero, Luis Eduardo Richardson, Toni 104, 111b.
200n., 201b. Ricoeur, Paul xiii, xiv, 27, 31n., 40-
Nordic Noir 163-5, 167-8, 170, 2, 44, 56, 60b., 148-9, 175,
171n., 172-5, 179 180b.
O’Flynn, Seobhan 91, 92n., 97b. Cinq études herméneutiques
Olsen, M. 147 175n., 180b.
O’Reilly, Mollie Wilson 147, 155b. “Le mythe” 167n., 180b.
Papas, Irene 69 Time and Narrative I 31n., 44b.
Parsons, Talcott 3 Rivera, José Eustasio xix, 182-191,
Paech, Joachim 99 192n., 197-99, 201b.
Partenie, Cătălin 40n., 44b. La vorágine xix, 182-4, 186,
Pascal, Blas 22n., 241b. 188-91, 192n., 199, 200
Pasolini, Pier Paolo xv, 70-3, 76, The Vortex 189n., 200n., 201b.
78b. Robards, Jason 195
Pasternak Slater, Ann 87n., 97b. Rockmore, Tom 40n., 44b.
Pavel, Thomas 56, 60b. Rodríguez, Ileana 182, 185, 201b.
Pavis, Patrice 99, 111b. Rohdie, Sam 240n.
Pécora, Paulo 203, 213b. Román, José 138n., 144b.
Pérez Martínez, Ángel 114, 263 Romera, José 99n., 111b.
Peña Vial, Jorge 216, 241b., 263 Rowling, J. K. 46
Perus, Françoise 187, 191, 201b., Rueda, Carolina 182, 264
Pieldner, Judit 94, 97b. Ryan, Marie-Laure 48, 60b.
Plato xiv, 9, 15, 25-7, 30-5, 37-8, Sánchez Noriega, José Luis 162b.
40-2, 43b., 44, 140, 142, 167 Saint-Gelais, Richard 48, 60b.
Cratylus 41b. Sanders, Julie 56, 60b.
Phaedrus xiv, 25, 27-8, 30, Schikaneder, Emanuel 102n., 111b.
34n., 35, 37, 39n., 41-3 Die Zauberflöte 102n., 112b.
The Laws 34n., 41 Schlesinger, John 111
The Statesman 41 Scott, Anthony Oliver 147
Timaeus xiv, 33n., 41, 42 Seger, Linda 97b., 163n., 180b.
Seneca 73-4, 77
270 Index

Schwab, Werner xxi, 255 La agonía de Rasu Ñiti xx, 203,

Shakespeare, William xvi, 26, 46n., 205, 212, 214b.
79-95, 96-98b., 260-3 Taylor, John R. 72, 73n., 78b.
Cymbeline 82, 84 Taylor, Neil 32n., 97b.
Hamlet xvi, 86n., 87, 89, 91, Theodorakis, Mikis 66
94, 97b. Theroux, Paul 217, 227, 228n.,
Henry V xvi, 79-80, 86n., 87, 241b.
92n., 97b. Thomson, Leslie 34n., 96b.
Macbeth 26-7 Thompson, Ann 32n., 97b.
Othello 82 Thoreau, Henry David 234-5, 241b.
The Merchant of Venice 82 Walden, or Life in the Woods
The Winter’s Tale 84 235n., 241b.
Sherlock 46 Tisoc, Julieta 211n., 213b.
Shiach, Don 218n., 236n., 241b. Tolkien, J.R.R. 115
Sidetracked xix, 163, 168, 175 The Wizarding World of Harry
Silverstone, Roger 170, 180b. Potter 46
Skinner, David 147, 155b. Toury, Gideon 2-4, 24b.
Skolimowski, Jersey 111 Ullmann, Liv 102
Sobran, Joseph 145, 146n., 155b. Vanoye, Gould 56, 60b.
Socrates 27-30, 32-5, 37, 41n. Vargas, German E. 132, 136b.
Sophocles 63, 66, 70-1 Vargas Llosa, Mario 202, 203n.,
Electra 63 207, 208n., 210, 214
Oedipus at Colonus 70 Varmazi, Eleni 62, 264
Oedipus Rex 70-3 Vernant, Jean-Pierre 65, 78b.
Stafford, Hildred 171n., 176n., Verdi, Giuseppe 185
180b. Ernani 185
Stanislavski, Konstantin 163n., Verne, Jules xvii, 114-24, 125b.
180b., 249n., 259b. Aventures de trois Russes et de
An Actor’s Work: A Student’s trois Anglais dans l’Afrique
Diary 163n. australe 117
La construcción del personaje Cinq semaines en ballon 117
180b. De la Terre à la Lune 114, 116-
Steier, Saul 128, 133, 136b. 7
Steiner, George xvii, 56-7, 58n., Deux Ans de Vacances 117
60b., 131, 136b., 138-9, 144b., Hector Servadac 116, 118,
149n., 155b. 119n., 124b.
Real Presences 56n., 60b., La journée d’un journaliste
131n., 136b., 149n., 155b. américain en 2889 122
Stern, Tiffany 84n., 85, 87n., 97b. Les cinq cents millions de la
Stewart, David 155b. Bégum 122
Stewart, Garrett 128-9, 131, 134, Les Enfants du capitaine Grant
136b. 117
Strindberg, Johan August xxi, 255 Le Tour du monde en quatre-
Tamayo San Román, Augusto xx, vingts jours 117
203, 205-9, 212, 214b. Michel Strogoff 117, 119,
120n., 121, 124b.
 Telling and Re-telling Stories: Studies on Literary Adaptation to Film 271

Un capitaine de quinze ans Dead Poets Society 217, 233,

117, 121n. 235
Une ville flottante 122 Gallipoli 224
Robur-le-Conquérant 123 Green Card 217, 236-7
Paris au XXe siècle 123-4 Picnic at Hanging Rock 217,
Vingt mille lieus sous les mers 221
116-7, 121n. Michael 220-1
Villagómez, Alberto 203n., 214b. The Cars that Ate Paris 217
Vinciguerra, Thomas 146n., 155b. The Last Wave 217, 222-3
Vineberg, Steve 152, 155b. The Plumber 217, 224
Virgil 120n., 149 The Mosquito Coast 217, 224,
Visconti, Luchino xviii, 137-8, 227, 228n., 230n., 241b.
140-1, 142-3, 144b. The Truman Show 239-40
Death in Venice xviii, 138, 140- The Year of Living Dangerously
1, 144b. 224, 240
Viti, Fabio 133n., 136b. Witness 217, 219, 224, 237
Vlastos, Gregory 41n., 44b. Wells, Stanley 84n., 96b.
Von Sacher-Masoch, Leopold 103 Whelehan, Imelda 53, 59b.
Venus in Furs 103 White, Hayden 31n., 44b.
Von Sydow, Max 102, 104 White, Nicholas P. 41n., 44b.
Wallander (series) 164-5, 168, 170, Whitman, Walt 233-4, 236n., 241b.
174-5, 178-9, 180b. “O Captain! My Captain!” 236
Waugh, Evelyn xviii, 145, 148, Wiles, David 79, 83, 97b.
149n., 153-4, 155b. Williams, Robin 219, 233
Brideshead Revisited xviii, 145, Williams, Tennessee xxi, 255
147, 149-50, 153-4, 155b. Winslet, Kate 273
Weber, Karl Max 248 Wolf, Rilla 104
Weir, Peter xx, 216-8, 220-7, 232- Worthy, Kim 133n.
6, 239-40, 241b. Wrathall, Mark 40n., 44b.