Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird" has remained somewhat restrained in terms of popularity, but those who know about it know the modern legend it is. That Harper Lee never wrote another book in her life, and never pushed the book beyond its initial years might have contributed to that. Firstly, debut novels often begin their journeys with little efforts from the publishers or promotion teams. The hype only starts from #2, at which Mrs Lee made no attempts at. Secondly, some bibliophiles might scoff at an author with 1 book in their oeuvre - they need a new God to worship. Hence the book remains an esoteric masterpiece.
The book came in 1960. A movie adaptation followed in 1962; the perspective and details in the book itself made it easy to turn it into one. It won 3 Oscars, and another couple of nominations. But having read the book, I can only complain at how loosely tied the movie adaptation was - I bet everybody would - after all there are people who will perceive the book better, esp. the Americans to whom the events would bear a familiarity from their perspective. Events were muddled up to keep things linear. Introductions and discoveries were pruned off. Time frames were messed around. Characters stayed generic and under-developed: Scout felt a pesky helpless runt, Jem's coming-of-age seemed trivial and Atticus was a shadow of what he was in words. The trial seemed a frivolous affair, so did Boo-Radley. Was I asking too much?
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1 comment:
haven't seen TKAMB but i think Fountainhead's adaptation too suffered from the problem or in fact burden of carrying a baggage too heavy, to put it simply, i found it lame and bland and the lady who played Dominique Francon.... she nothing less than 'lakdi ka fatta' with moving legs......
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