Did you know that D.W. Griffith wanted to film the same way as Charles Dickens penned novels? Or that Leo Tolstoy sought to write like camera films? Cinema and literature are two separate disciplines but have a fascinating range of intersections and interconnections. Theirs is a relationship that has produced so many masterpieces, with cinema being a nascent art and therefore, drawing plenty of inspirations from literature as well as theater, visual arts, and other cultural forms. Image source: York.ac.uk Cinema and literature create a wide imaginary world out of both the written word and imagery. On-screen literature, however, isn’t just about adapting existing books, but also creating a new literary style that zeroes in on an aspect of an author’s life, adopts specific cinema directions or cinematographies, or formulating an entirely new aesthetic that readers and filmgoers alike would appreciate. There are plenty of classic examples of how the two complement each other --- “Gone with the Wind,” “To Kill a Mockingbird,” “Out of Africa,” “Dr. Zhivago,” and “The Godfather” are great examples. Recently, there are “The Great Gatsby,” “Memoirs of a Geisha,” and “Atonement.” What should be emphasized is that literary studies today don’t really make distinctions between film and literature, but instead recognize them as integral parts of artists’ forms of expression and how they try to make sense of the world. If books need words and sentences, movies demand to make concrete imagery through the screen to provide a whole experience. Adaptations are a way to connect the two of them and push the boundaries. Image source: Pixabay.com John Eilermann from St. Louis, Missouri, is currently in college pursuing a degree in Comparative Literature. It is his goal to develop an understanding of literary compositions regardless of boundaries such as language, culture, and tradition. More reads like this here.
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