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Abstract
Adaptation has played a role in the evolution of artistic civilisation from ancient times-be it prose to stage, or poem to play, or translation from one language into another language. It has brought with it both practical and aesthetic dilemmas. Should novelistic adaptation adhere to the principle of "make it new"? Can the stage accord a finer, "truer" meaning to the work from which it was adapted? Or should the play strive to remain loyal to its source, replicating character, story and nuance as proximately as possible, albeit in a different medium?
Keywords: novel, drama, adaptation, Morpurgo, War Horse
The adaptation of novels into theatre has a long history, and not all of it illustrious. Emile Zola's willingness to entrust L'Assommoir and Nana to the hands of William Busnach, a witty socialite whose previous theatrical works had included Ali-Baba and Fleur de Thé, is perhaps foremost among the cautionary tales. We may just as readily recite stories of conspicuous success. The recent staging of Michael Morpurgo's War Horse has been met with wide critical approval, and successful stage adaptations of works as diverse as Nicholas Nickleby, The Thirty Nine Steps, The Mousetrap and The Woman in Black all testify to an artistic penchant for staging fiction that remains as buoyant as ever.
That said, the matter of adaptation has raised some interesting controversies and curious caveats. Because of their length or complexity some novels have been deemed unsuitable for stage adaptation. One critic avers that Nicholas Sparks novels "should not be [adapted], ever" ("In Defence of Hatred" 2); another believes that Günter Grass's novel Tin Drum should never be the subject of adaptation. John Patterson, with more than a little tongue in his cheek, has demanded a "ten year, worldwide moratorium on adapting novels"-though he does have a rather engaging reason for this. Too many novels nowadays, he argues, are being written and marketed with a stage or cinematic eye in mind and that works to the detriment of great novelistic writing. J. D. Salinger is sometimes mistakenly cited as an example of a novelist who committed himself to the purity of genre, having experienced the 1949 box office flop My Foolish Heart which was based on his short story "Uncle Wiggily in...