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On Translating Terror, Literary Zombies, & Inevitable Metaphor
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27 October 2024 13 Days of Essays on HorrorHey, everyone! As I write this, I've completed some analyses of the differences between book and film of Frankenstein, The Fall of the House of Usher, and The Picture of Dorian Gray. But still several ahead, including works by Lovecraft, Bradbury, King, Barker, and Jackson. No surprise, successfully transplanting horror between two mediums --or we might just as well say 'Transplanting theme between two mediums'--requires more than mere plot-matching. And sure, film is a visual medium and so requires an entirely new set of techniques from prose. But how does film handle a novel's symbol, figurative language, internal struggle, tone, and have it all cohere, especially when met with a production team that has a profit formula from audiences? The first answer to my question is a negative: film (or stage play or audio drama, etc.) cannot match what prose does, and so must necessarily revise/re-see to re-discover horror; and that new discovery might well not match the original. (Unsurprisingly, this phenomenon also powers Unwoven, where even a change in structure necessarily alters meaning.) Horror seems a good test (I described it last time as an "unsettling ambiguity") because it resonates so internally. We can flash knives and splash blood, but that on its own is merely . . . danger. What is holding the knife, and when, and for what reason--those are critical questions, too. Follow along this week as I open up 13 or so films and their novels to what works and what disrupts the distance between their forms!
Spooky Story Time?I typically save my horror story reading for the Winter Solstice, but now is a good time to take nominations! I'm looking for a great story to perform:
Updates on UnwovenBook: The book has initially sold well from Waywords, though I have yet to get any solid numbers from third-party distributors, and I know many copies have sold that way. If you picked up a copy in print or eBook, thank you! (And if you haven't dropped an honest review somewhere, please do!) Still haven't gotten a copy? It's not too late, but think now about a holiday gift! (Because print-on-demand takes a minute or seven, ordering right now is a good idea!)
Supplements and Teacher Guide: The downloadable supplements remain free until the Teacher Guide comes out, but this is looking like November, now. I'm also wrestling with the Guide cost, because as the Guide is looking at 400+ pages, that puts cost at around $30 or more. Pretty prohibitive, from my view. I'm working on solutions! Audiobook: Sighed loudly (too loudly according to the specs) and resigned myself to designing and building a new audio booth inside Waywords Studio. I'll have some updates/results on that by our next newsletter! In the meantime, though, I've been playing with some more poetry in forms of verse that were not included in Unwoven. Here is the collection so far, with many more to follow!
Early Recommendation from My Reading:I'm finishing the last novel for 13 Days of Halloween now. It's Pontypool Changes Everything (1995) by Tony Burgess. Wow. Lovecraft meets Danielewski meets Derrida meets zombies. There's an excellent zombie film of this, and Burgess also wrote the screenplay, but this--outside of concept--is almost wholly difference, and far superior. From its opening lines, we are in a readerly state of aphasia; we are subjected to the disorientation that is the first stage of the coming/dawning/ politically-current plague. Because, as in the best horror, the monster is merely a signifier for the real horror. Find it used only wherever you can. And don't forget your libraries! But be careful--the novel was re-released under the same title with "Movie Version" added to it. That, I think, is a novelization of the film! (Book --> Film --> back to Book) Go for the original critter! Against 'Latin American Literature'We get so busy categorizing for ease that we forget the sloppy ideologies hiding behind our terms. What defines this? Indigenous status? Language? National borders? Author homestead? Novel setting? Nicolás Medina Mora takes offense for millions.
That isn't the only place our shorthand fails us: Thanks for subscribing! Enjoy the fun of Halloween! Steve What's Ahead?
Halloween 2023 at Waywords (*sigh*): |
Waywords Studio
Want to dig a bit deeper, stretch a bit wider, discover unique insights in your reading? So do I! That's why we literary nomads explore beyond the comfortable beach read. Subscribe for podcasts and video, fiction and poetry, essays and online courses, unexpected freebies, and ways to lever your literacy into activism! For students of all ages, educators of all kinds, and just plain out litterateurs!