Books into Movies is a major event for libraries. I have an entire tag for it. But how does a book go from the page to the screen? That is something we know a lot less about.
The other day, LitHub shed some light on this question with this article: The Man Who Reads Books For a Living (One Every Two Days)
The "man" in question Clarke Speicher and the writer who sat down with him is Julien C. Levy. From the intro of the article:
When Clarke Speicher (spike-er) asked how I liked the screen adaptation of Train Dreams, Denis Johnson’s novella following the solitary logger Robert Granier in the early 20th-century American West, he was actually asking whether it measured up to its source material. That is, after all, the question about adaptations. Still, it felt loaded. If it had been anyone else, I would’ve felt at liberty to prattle without worrying whether I’d arrived at any kind of thesis. That I love the book was beside the point. I felt caught out because it was Clarke doing the asking. But he isn’t an author, screenwriter, director, producer, critic, agent, or editor. He isn’t a journalist or influencer.
Clarke is something much more specific and much rarer: a professional book reader who evaluates literature specifically for screen adaptation. So after a few seconds of mealy-mouthed equivocation about Train Dreams, I came to my senses and flipped the question back on him. A few drinks later, we were talking about his profession, how it works, and what adaptation really means.
Click here to read the rest of this fascinating article.
Share it on your socials and website as well. Do you have lists of Books to Screen titles? Add this link there as well. This is an article your patrons will be interested in as well. When we anticipate our patrons' wants, we demonstrate our worth.
No comments:
Post a Comment