Adaptation studies thrive amongst the complex and fertile interactions of writing, theatre and film. Disciplinary boundaries, professional territorialism and critical conventions often impede our access to the truth about those cultural relationships. Deborah Cartmell’s new book provokes us to dismantle barriers, disown vested interests and think again about the written and spoken word and their screen manifestations. Using the transition ... Read morefrom silent to sound movies as a test-case, Cartmell demonstrates, with erudition, acumen and penetrating theoretical insight, that screen adaptations need to be explained by their economic, political, social and cultural entanglements, and not as separable ‘works’ of literature, drama or film.
Graham Holderness, Professor of English, University of Hertfordshire, UK
Deborah Cartmell makes an important and foundational contribution to the growing scholarship that brings a film historical approach to adaptation studies. Organised around the introduction of sound to cinema and considering a range of film adaptations–from Shakespeare to children’s literature–Cartmell focuses her study on the marketing and promotional material of the films and considers them in relation to film critics’ ambivalence about the new technology and literary critics’ anxiety about mass-produced culture. Adaptations in the Sound Era clearly articulates the importance of this decade for establishing the expectations for and debates about fidelity that have dominated adaptation studies ever since, making it a must-have for anyone who studies film adaptation in any period.
Shelley Cobb, Associate Professor of Film and English, University of Southampton, UK
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