Kafka’s The Metamorphosis Redux

In recent years, the graphic novel genre has become popular. Compared to the regular comic book, graphic novels are novels with the same twists and turns of plot as the traditional novel forms in fiction, science fiction and fantasy with the story told through graphic illustration (aka comic drawings.)  And the length of a graphic novel can be as long as a traditional novel.  Many authors have transformed literature classics into graphic novels.  For example, Manga, THE name in Japanese anime, has a new series of Shakespeare’s plays written by Adam Sexton.  I purchased MacBeth, and this version of the play is not meant for your average eight year old.  Sexton’s MacBeth adapted to Manga is really meant for adults.  Other Manga versions of Shakespeare’s plays by Adam Sexton are:

Hamlet
Romeo and Juliet
Julius Caesar

Manga published all of these plays, including MacBeth, in February of 2008.  I think it’s a great idea and wonderful way promote Shakespeare to the general public.

Another excellent graphic novel is Fun Home by Alison Bechdel.  This book really isn’t fiction–it’s autobiography, but it reads like fiction because Bechdel presents her personal story in comic book form.  The comic book light Bechdel throws on the serious topics she presents in this book lighten the mood and make this autobiography disguised as fiction fun to read.

And of course, there is the classic Maus by Art Spiegelman.  For those readers unfamiliar with this book relates the history of one man’s experience in the Holocaust.  Jews are depicted as mice and the Nazis are depicted as cats.  Other nationalities are represented as animals as well.  Per Wikipedia, the reason for using the graphic novel form to relate the history of the holocaust and tell his father’s story of survival is this:

The use of animals may also be used in order to detach the reader from real life. This may have been done to appeal to a younger generation of readers, yet still telling a story of survival and death during the holocaust. But instead of fully detaching the reader from the book, he shows a human aspect by illustrating how his father tells his story and by showing the emotions and relationships of the characters throughout. –Maus, From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I have also read elsewhere that Spiegelman’s use of animals to depict people provides detachment so that people who read this story are shocked out of their usual assumptions about stereotypes. Using mice and cats causes readers to pay more attention to the story. I think of his use of animals to tell his father’s story of survival as a splash of cold water: why mice? Why cats? And so on. This curiosity draws the reader into the story to find out the answers to these questions.

So all of the above brings me to Peter Kuper’s adaptation of Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis.  Random House published this version of Kafka’s classic in August 2003.  Kuper uses the graphic novel form to bring an interesting spin to The Metamorphosis.  I have not read this version yet, but I stumbled on the following link and I am intrigued.  Check out Franz Kafka’s THE METAMORPHOSIS adapted by Peter Kuper. This link takes visitors to Random House’s promotional site of the book and presents the visitor with a short introductory movie version of the story. Keep the sound on while you view the movie–the music adds an extra creepy feel to the story (at least for me it did.) If you visit the site, let me know what you think.  Some people really like the preview of the book and other people believe it’s a travesty–that Kuper destroys Kafka’s The Metamorphosis.  So far, I find the idea intriguing, creative, and refreshing.  If I can get a copy of this book, I will definitely review it.

Embrace Your Inner Reading Dork

For those of you who cannot have enough book and reading clubs to belong to or book forums to post to here is yet another: LitMinds: A community of readers, authors, and indie bookstores. According to their introduction to LitMinds:

LitMinds is a community of people who are enthusiastic about reading, sharing their book endeavors with others, connecting with authors and independent booksellers, and participating in literary events and activities. Through our website, blog, and community-based events and activities, LitMinds is constantly discovering new ways to celebrate reading and enrich the reading experience. –From the vision statement at LitMinds.

I checked out the forum boards which are categorized by fiction, non-fiction, short reads, etc.  Unfortunately, the boards don’t seem to be too active.  However, it also seems that this site is fairly new–the copyright date is 2007 so maybe it’s just a matter of getting the word out.

Now, I’m going to go read!

Sir Francis Bacon: Renaissance Man

Check out the The Essays of Francis Bacon 1601. Sir Francis Bacon, philosopher, writer, and historian held a number of official offices during the reigns of Queen Elizabeth I and King James I, such as: Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England (“Francis Bacon – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.” Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. 30 Sep. 2008 .) During Queen Elizabeth’s reign, Bacon fell into and out of her favor at regular intervals (so it seems.) However, Bacon received more consistent good favor from King James I. Ahhh–the life of a courtier. A tricky business.

Bacon is also known for promoting and defending the scientific revolution. He developed “. . .a complex methodology for scientific inquiry which is often called the Baconian method.” (“Francis Bacon: free web books, online.” eBooks@Adelaide: Free Web Books, Online. 30 Sep. 2008 .) For biographical information, please see this link at Wikipedia. This link will also provide a detailed explanation of the Baconian Method. While the article about this method is not cited, it was the best explanation I could find. I tried to find another source that explained the Baconian Method, but I could only find basic dictionary definitions that were circular. For example, something like: The Baconian Method is the fore-runner to today’s scientific method. Not very helpful.

Anyway, the first link listed at the beginning of this post is an index to Sir Francis Bacon’s writings. I hope you find it interesting and useful.

This Link Cataloged
The Essays of Francis Bacon 1601 is cataloged on the Literature page of The Reading Room.

The Sunday Salon September 28, 2008

Well, today I did a little reading, a little blog maintenance, and a little whatever. I’ve been searching for “quality” poetry sites, but they seem to be hard to find. If you know of any, please let me know. Also, I’ve been taking a look at Second Life a virtual world where you can build anything and be anyone.  Well, what was the first place I went to?  You guessed it:  The library! Lol!  The University of Cleveland (I think that’s who it is) has a virtual site on Second Life and there seem to be other virtual libraries as well. I also saw ads about Stephanie Meyers newest book. Go figure.

Blacklin’s Weekly Find From 3QuarksDaily 9/28/08: 50 Greatest Villians In Literature

This week’s selection of Blacklin’s Weekly Find From 3QuarksDaily is the article: 50 Greatest Villians In Literature. Please see the end of this excerpt for the link to The Telegraph.co.uk to read this piece (originally published on September 20, 2008) in its entirety.

Compiling a list of the 50 Greatest Villains in Literature, without too much recourse to comics and children’s books, proved trickier than we’d imagined – but gosh it was fun. It’s perhaps the nature of grown-up literature that it doesn’t all that often have villains, in the sense of coal-black embodiments of the principle of evil. And even when it does, it’s not always so easy to tell who they are. Is God the baddie, or Satan? Ahab, or the white whale? Yet even writers as subtle as Vladimir Nabokov have spiced their work with a fiend or two. And here they are. We hope you’ll furnish a few more we missed. These are the best of the worst: bloodsuckers, pederasts, cannibals, Old Etonians…the dastardliest dastards ever to have lashed damsel to track and waited for a through train.

“Who’s bad?” Michael Jackson asked. “They are,” we can at last, with confidence, reply. SL

48 Shere Khan from The Jungle Book stories, by Rudyard Kipling

His name and character, if not his physical appearance or his species, are based on a Pashtun prince. And there is something refreshingly simple about his aims: to eat Mowgli. To this end he sows dissent among wolf pack (enough alone to get him down to the eighth circle of Dante’s hell) and causes Mowgli all sorts of trouble. TC

47 Long John Silver from Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson

The former sidekick of the pirate Captain Flint (for whom his parrot is named) may have one leg, but he is physically brave, likeable and a natural leader of men, especially after he kills one who won’t join his mutiny. Switches sides whenever he can, and gets away in the end. AMcK

46 Moriarty from The Final Problem, by Arthur Conan Doyle

Got a chair at one of our smaller universities after his work on the Binomial Theorem, but the criminal strain in his blood won out. The “Napoleon of Crime”, motionless “like a spider at the centre of his web”, until his fall in Switzerland, may be called James. Or that may be his brother. AMcK
Posted by Azra Raza at 06:42 AM 3QuarksDaily on September 27, 2008.

Many people have added their own villians in the comments section to this article at The Telegraph.co.uk which makes for interesting reading as well.