I'm going to go ahead and ruin the suspense: no.
Now for a "proof" of sorts. This is totally a rough draft, and I'm going to be figuring it out as I go. So take "No" as my hypothesis and see where I end up!
1) What is a "retelling" in literary-speak? I'll go to google:define for an answer.... "Tell (a story) again or differently." More specifically "(Retelling) A detailed oral or written recitation of a text, including setting, major and minor events, characters, and plot." And another interpretation of the word "retell": "(retelling) restating, after reading, what happened in a story, or the main ideas in a nonfiction text. Retellings are often used to measure a student’s level of text comprehension and interpretation."
Ok. We've narrowed this down a bit. I'm going to use the more specific definitions I found, picking out some key words to focus on: setting, major and minor events, characters, and plot. Plot seems especially important in this one, so I'm going to assume that a summary of an origianal text and a summary of the text's retelling should be similar or identical.
Let's poke at this with a few minimally contentious examples.
a) The Little Mermaid (Hans Christian Anderson vs Disney)
Hans Christian Anderson (via Wikipedia's initial summary) "... about a young mermaid willing to give up her life in the sea and her identity as a mermaid to gain a human soul and the love of a human prince."
Disney (via IMDb) "A mermaid princess makes a faustian bargain with an unscrupulous seahag in order to meet a human prince on land."
CONCLUSION: Ok, so the religious/soul bit changed, and the ending is different (in the fairytale she turns to foam but gets a soul, in the Disney version she gives up her family and gets the prince). But overall, lots in common. A decent retelling.
b) Beauty and the Beast (French folktale vs Disney)
French folktale: Really, the Disney version is remarkably similar. Important elements: Exchange of one hostage (the father) for another (Belle); after enduring long imprisonment, Belle begs to leave, is given a time frame in which to return, fails to do so, discovers that in her absence the Beast is near death, rushes back to him, and turns him back into a human through a profession of her love.
Disney (via IMDb) "Belle, whose father is imprisoned by the Beast, offers herself instead and discovers her captor to be an enchanted prince."
CONCLUSION: Lots of added characters (Gaston, the servants in the castle), but really these are incredibly similar. Definitely a retelling.
c) Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (book vs movie)
Does this one really need to be gone over? Suffice to say that the Boy Who Lived is sent to a wizarding school, meets his two best friends, his headmaster/mentor, his nemesis.... you know. The whole nine yards. All the same in both.
CONCLUSION: Only a retelling in that the mediums are different and the movie is severely condensed in comparison to the book.
I'm stopping here and waiting for a little feedback.
These are OK examples. I look forward to your dealing with the meat of the analysis.
ReplyDeleteOkay, Hil, detailed response as promised: I like the way you're breaking this down methodically. I think it's a very good tactic, going to the dictionary especially cements your case.
ReplyDeleteHOWEVER I'm going to disagree with you already here (what?!). Those three examples are all retellings, but they're much more literal adaptations than the definition of retelling I would use to describe LK. The relationship of Lion King and Hamlet is much closer to 10 Things I Hate About You and Taming of the Shrew, or Apocalypse Now and Heart of Darkness. It uses some elements of the basic plot and some elements of the basic themes to accomplish a substantially different purpose.
We will see how I feel about Part Ii
I wrote a long comment, then it didn't post! Here's a short test.
ReplyDeleteReproducing some of my vanished post:
ReplyDeleteIMHO, TLK is not a retelling of H. Yes, they share a set of story elements (fratricide, usurpation, avunculicide) but so do many other stories. I'd find a listing of some of those more compelling than some of the Disney adaptation examples.
There are so many bodies on stage at the end of H that the director has to carefully block to keep about to be dead characters from tripping over already dead characters and running into actively dying ones. TLK's circle of life just doesn't match up. As A.C. said, some same elements, but different purpose.