Miscellaneous Movie Musings

[Eliza Hodgkins 1812]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

(and why is it that books aren't remade? Why only songs and movies and plays? I don't think I've come across too many re-written novels.)

Well, there are mutliple version of the King Arthur and Robin Hood stories. That happens of course with stories that probably began word-to-mouth. There are many, many written versions of fairy tales. And there are also pastcies and derivative tales...contemporary authors writing Sherlock Holmes count as pastiches. (Suddenly thinking I'm spelling that word incorrectly, but oh well). And there are retellings of stories from the perspective of other characters, and I think those qualify as "remakes". Mary Reilly retells Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Rosencrantz and Gildenstern are Dead - a play - in its own way retells Hamlet...kinda. These types of novels are essentially telling the same story from a different perspective. Bram Stoker told the story of Dracula through a series of letters written by the various characters. If someone else wrote a story called Dracula that essentially told the same story, but in first person from Dracula's perspective, I'd put that in the same category.