This book brings film adaptation of literature to bear on the question of how nineteenth-century imperial ideologies of progress continue to inform power inequalities in a global capitalist age. Not simply the promotion of general betterment for all, improvement in the British colonial context licensed a superior “master race” to “uplift” its colonized populations—morally, socially, and economically. This book argues that, on the one hand, film adaptations of nineteenth-century novels reveal the arrogance and coercive intentions that underpin contemporary notions of development, humanitarianism, and modernity—improvement’s post-Victorian guises. On the other hand, the book also argues that the films use their nineteenth-century source texts to criticize these same legacies of imperialism. By bringing together film adaptation, postcolonial theory, and literary studies, the book demonstrates that adaptation, as both method and cultural product, provides a way to engage with the baggage of ideological heritage in our contemporary global media environment.

A Theory of Adaptation explores the continuous development of creative adaptation, and argues that the practice of adapting is central to the story-telling imagination. Linda Hutcheon develops a theory of adaptation through a range of media, from film and opera, to video games, pop music and theme parks, analysing the breadth, scope and creative possibilities within each. This new edition is supplemented by a new preface from the author, discussing both new adaptive forms/platforms and recent critical developments in the study of adaptation. It also features an illuminating new epilogue from Siobhan O’Flynn, focusing on adaptation in the context of digital media. She considers the impact of transmedia practices and properties on the form and practice of adaptation, as well as studying the extension of game narrative across media platforms, fan-based adaptation (from Twitter and Facebook to home movies), and the adaptation of books to digital formats. A Theory of Adaptation is the ideal guide to this ever evolving field of study and is essential reading for anyone interested in adaptation in the context of literary and media studies.

“Hamlet” by Olivier, Kaurismäki or Shepard and “Pride and Prejudice” in its many adaptations show the virulence of these texts and the importance of aesthetic recycling for the formation of cultural identity and diversity. Adaptation has always been a standard literary and cultural strategy, and can be regarded as the dominant means of production in the cultural industries today. Focusing on a variety of aspects such as artistic strategies and genre, but also marketing and cultural politics, this volume takes a critical look at ways of adapting and appropriating cultural texts across epochs and cultures in literature, film and the arts.

From David Lean's big screen Great Expectations to Alejandro Amenábar's reinvention of The Turn of the Screw as The Others, adaptations of literary classics are a constant feature of popular culture today. The Bloomsbury Introduction to Adaptation Studies helps students master the history, theory and practice of analysing literary adaptations. Following an introductory overview of major debates and concepts, each chapter focuses on a canonical text and features: - Case study readings of adaptations in a variety of media, from film to opera, televised drama to animated comedy show, YA fiction to novel/graphic novel. - Coverage of popular appropriations and re-imaginings of the text. - Discussion questions and creative exercises throughout to guide students through their own analyses. - Annotated guides to further reading and viewing plus online resources. - The book also includes chapter overviews and a glossary of critical terms to give students quick access to key information for further study, reference and revision. The Bloomsbury Introduction to Adaptation Studies covers adaptations of: Jane Eyre; Great Expectations; The Turn of the Screw; The Great Gatsby.

Intercultural Screen Adaptation offers a wide-ranging examination of how film and television adaptations (and non-adaptations) interact with the cultural, social and political environments of their national, transnational and post-national contexts. With screen adaptations examined from across Britain, Europe, South America and Asia, this book tests how examining the processes of adaptation across and within national frameworks challenges traditional debates around the concept of nation in film, media and cultural studies. With case studies of films such as Under the Skin (2013) and T2: Trainspotting (2017), as well as TV adaptations like War and Peace (2016) and Narcos (2015 - 2017), Intercultural Screen Adaptation offers readers an invigorating look at adaptations from a variety of critical perspectives, incorporating the uses of landscape, nostalgia and translation.

This surprising study draws together the disparate fields of postcolonial theory and book history in a challenging and illuminating way. Robert Fraser proposes that we now look beyond the traditional methods of the Anglo-European bibliographic paradigm, and learn to appreciate instead the diversity of shapes that verbal expression has assumed across different societies. This change of attitude will encourage students and researchers to question developmentally conceived models of communication, and move instead to a re-formulation of just what is meant by a book, an author, a text. Fraser illustrates his combined approach with comparative case studies of print, script and speech cultures in South Asia and Africa, before panning out to examine conflicts and paradoxes arising in parallel contexts. The re-orientation of approach and the freshness of view offered by this volume will foster understanding and creative collaboration between scholars of different outlooks, while offering a radical critique to those identified in its concluding section as purveyors of global literary power.

Shanghai in the 1920s and 1930s—"the Paris of the Orient"—was both a glittering metropolis and a shadowy world of crime and social injustice. It was also home to Huo Sang and Bao Lang, fictional Chinese counterparts to Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. The duo lived in a spacious apartment on Aiwen Road, where Huo Sang played the violin (badly) and smoked Golden Dragon cigarettes as he mulled over his cases. Cheng Xiaoqing (1893–1976), "The Grand Master" of twentieth-century Chinese detective fiction, had first encountered Conan Doyle’s highly popular stories as an adolescent. In the ensuing years he played a major role in rendering them first into classical and later into vernacular Chinese. In the late 1910s, Cheng began writing detective fiction very much in Conan Doyle’s style, with Bao as the Watson-like-I narrator—a still rare instance of so direct an appropriation from foreign fiction. Cheng Xiaoqing wrote detective stories to introduce the advantages of critical thinking to his readers, to encourage them to be skeptical and think deeply, because truth often lies beneath surface appearances. His attraction to the detective fiction genre can be traced to its reconciliation of the traditional and the modern. In "The Shoe," Huo Sang solves the case with careful reasoning, while "The Other Photograph" and "On the Huangpu" blend this reasoning with a sensationalism reminiscent of traditional Chinese fiction. "The Odd Tenant" and "The Examination Paper" also demonstrate the folly of first impressions. "At the Ball" and "Cat’s-Eye" feature the South-China Swallow, a master thief who, like other outlaws in traditional tales, steals only from the rich and powerful. "One Summer Night" clearly shows Cheng’s strategy of captivating his Chinese readers with recognizably native elements even as he espouses more globalized views of truth and justice.