Books into Movies, Spring 2004: Final Examination

There are two questions

Question One (85%). Identify the source of the following passages from the books we have read and then discuss the ways in which the passages were adapted for the screen. If they were not adapted or were differently adapted, suggest why this might be the case. You should examine, in the passages from the books, salient aspects of theme, character, plot development, and symbolism. Feel free to add to this list of “salient aspects” if you deem it necessary. If you can, identify the page number but remember that a simple identification counts for less than your ability to discuss book and adaptation with subtlety and precision. Even an ingenious mistake will score some points. Note that half a dozen quotations are taken from the film scripts (specifically from portions that we have discussed) not the books.

Please answer the questions in sequence (that is, if you are uncertain about one ID, leave sufficient space so that you can go back and answer that section of the question. Your answers will thus run 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 etc.). Please write only on the right hand page of each “opening” in your blue books so that I can write commentary on the left hand page. If you feel that there is a connection between different passages/films, please point them out briefly.

1          First we turned to the right but saw only more cypress and palm and saw grass, so we turned to the left, and there, far down the diagonal of the levee we could see the gleam of a car fender, and we followed it like a beacon all the way to the road.

2          Through scented twilight the girl in the white dress walked with a step as light as a morning cobweb. That evening she hadn’t a care in the world.

3          Perhaps I’ll become old, perhaps not. Perhaps something else will happen in my life, but I doubt it. When the season’s over I walk among the shrubs myself, making the most of the colours while they last and the fountain while it flows.

4 The highway median was a low-lying cloud of pink hibiscus bushes. The shoulders were banked with broom grass and sumac and sneezeweed and pennywort, and the road itself looked as if any minute it might just crack and buckle and finally disappear as things grew over it and under it, pushing the roadbed away. As it is, amazing things live on the highway now.

5          -----Righ’, lads, give us a month an’ this’ll be us.

            He let the needle down.

            -----Deadly, said Derek.

Question Two. Propose an addition to the syllabus and briefly explain your reasons. Ideally your short essay should discuss a book that has already been made into a film but you may, at a pinch, discuss a book that has yet to be made into a film or a movie that has been made from a book which you have as yet to read.