Novelists/scenarists: Four Case Studies of Writers Adapting Their Own Fiction to Film (Wright, Nabokov, Dickey, Didion)

This dissertation presents a series of case studies in which the original authors were centrally involved in adapting their own works of fiction to the screen. The four adaptations examined are Richard Wright's Native Son, Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita, James Dickey's Deliverance, and Joan Didion's Play It As It Lays. The works chosen are all serious and complex modern novels by major novelists. In each case, the writer undertook the writing of the principal screenplay for the film adaptation of his own work. The films that resulted were all adaptations which earned critical merit and some degree of popular success. The central issue dealt with is the extent to which the writer's involvement in the adaptation was responsible for this success. In each case, I trace the progress of the adaptation from novel through surviving script drafts and other documents to completed film as a means of shedding light on this issue. The evidence in three cases (the exception being Didion) points clearly to the conclusion that each novelist was overly committed to an original or ideal conception of his own work and was too inexperienced in the visual and technical mechanisms of filmmaking to produce a successful adaptation.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

English

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2014

Author dc:creator

• Kiernan, Maureen Brigid

• Literature, American

Identifier

(UMI)AAI8502203

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/69438