Dickens on Screen [Hardcover]

John Glavin (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 5, 2004 | ISBN-10: 0521806526 | ISBN-13: 978-0521806527

Television and movies, not libraries or scholarship, have made Charles Dickens the most important unread novelist in English. In addition to the millions of people already deploying the word "Dickensian" to describe their own and others' lives, many more who have never read Dickens are familiar with the term. They know of him because they have access to over a century of adaptations of his works for movies and television. Including an exhaustive filmography, this work will be an invaluable resource for students and scholars.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Raises a number of issues that are pertinent to the many debates that center around the translation of nineteenth-century fiction into film more generally..." Kate Flint, Studies in English Literature

"For such a reader, this book offers a fresh and, at times, irreverent perspective on the complex interactions between film and literature...Glavin's collection lays a strong foundation upon which to build." Dickens Quarterly, Cara Lane, University of Washington

Book Description

Television and film, not libraries or scholarship, have made Charles Dickens the most important unread novelist in English. It is not merely that millions of people feel comfortable deploying the word 'Dickensian' to describe their own and others' lives, but that many more people who have never read Dickens know what Dickensian means. They know about Dickens because they have access to over a century of adaptations for the big and small screen. Dickens on Screen, includ ing an exhaustive filmography, is an invaluable resource for students and scholars alike.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 238 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press (January 5, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521806526
• ISBN-13: 978-0521806527
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,140,034 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Miscellanious Collection of Writings about Dickens on Screen, January 12, 2004

By 

Tsuyoshi (Kyoto, Japan) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Dickens on Screen (Paperback)

"Dickens on Screen" is a miscellanious collection of writings about the film/TV adaptations of Dickens, of which contents go as below:

INTRODUCTION: John Glavin
PART I
1 "Dickens, Psycoanalysis and film: a roundtable": Gerhard Joseph
PART II
2 "David Copperfield' home video": John Bowen
3 "David Lean's 'Great Expectations'": Regina Barreca
4 "'Great Expectations' on Aurtralian television": John O. Jordan
5 "Dickens' 'The Signalman' and Rubini's 'La Stazione'": Alesandro Vescovi
6 "Bill Murray's Christmas Carol": Murray Baumgarten
7 "Screen memories in Dickens and Woody Allen": Robert M. Polhemus
PART III
8 "Writing after Dickens: the television writer's art": John Romano
9 "Directing Dickens: Alfonso Cuaron's 1998 'Great Expectations'": Pam Katz
10 "Playing Dickens": Miriam Margoyles
PART IV
11 "Cinematic Dickens and uncinematic words": Kamilla Elliott
12 "Dickens, Eisenstein, film": Garrett Stewart
13 "Orson Wells and Charles Dickens 1938-1941": Marguerite Rippy
14 "'David Copperfield (1935)' and the US curriculum": Steve J. Wurtzler
15 "Dickens, Selznick, and 'Southpark'": Jeffrey Sconce
16 "Tiny Tim on screen: a diabilities perspective": Martin F. Norden
PART V "Dickens composed: film and television adaptations 1987-2001": Kate Charnell Watt and Kate Lonsdale

Because of the space, I do not write here any in-depth summery of each writing. I only add that:
1) PART I is a record of conversations by the people from three fields (film, Dickens, psychoanalysis), including contributors, done after their watching the clip of Lean's "Oliver Twist."
2) PART 2 and 4 cover the various topics about Dickens and films. The titles are, however, sometimes misleading (# 6 essay is actually not about this talented American actor). The final results vary from impressive to mediocre (the fate of any kind of essay collection). Some are quite insightful, but I am afraid some others indulge in academic theries (call it a sea of jargon). See the title, pick it, and give it a chance.

PART 3 is most interesting (to me), but, alas! not so long. In # 9 Pam Katz tells us the inside story of how Cuaron's modernized version came to be what it is now, with several comments from the director himself. It is quite fascinating to know that Ms Paltrow's Estella was supposed to have a job (what was it? Read and find it.) And the interview with the great Margoyles is not to be missed, who gives a quite frank (and often funny) accounts of her visions about Dickensian world, and her works (she is famous for playing one Dickensian character on stage, and you know who).

The last PART 5 is a filmography, but sadly, it is not perfect. I do not lament the loss of "Ms. Scrooge" ("A Chrismas Carol" of PC era). But I was shocked to see they omit 1922 Jackie Coogan version of "Oliver Twist" from the list when they use one of its stills on the book jacket! This must be remedied right now. And unaccountably, while # 16 essay refers to the 1935 version "Scrooge," the filmography again forget to record it. And please remember, the 1997 verions of "Oliver" stars Elijah Wood, one of the stars of "LOTR." (Haven't they seen this fantastic trilogy yet?) Michael Pointer's superb filmography (or IMDB) is still indispensable.

The collection, to me, lacks the central topic, or pivot on which the whole book should be constructed, being too miscellanious. Some part are great, I am sure, but I still do not know why they made this collection. Maybe my lukewarm reaction reflects the difficulty of writing about the two types of media -- book and film -- at the same time.