- JIM DOHERTY
> Mark,
>
> Re the following excerpt from the BOOKS
magazine
> parameters:
>
>
> template, you should note one of the characters
on
> that list, Gus MacRae, was created for a movie
script.
> When the screenplay failed (at first) to be
produced,
> Larry McMurtry novelized the script into
LONESOME
> DOVE. Ultimately, the movie WAS produced, only it
was
> for television and it became an expanded
> "mini-series," and it didn't reach the airwaves
until
> the book had been published, hit the
best-seller
> lists, won a Pulitzer, and been accalimed a
classic
> (not bad for that bastard form, the
"novelization").
> The only difference between Friday and MacRae in
terms
> of their eligibility is that the dramatic
script
> featuring MacRae, though written first,
wasn't
> produced until after the prose form was published,
and
> with Friday it was the reverse.
Jim, The only thing I could go on with that was the book was
copyright in 1985 and the mini series debuted in 1989. We
can't investigate the provenance of a work, only what
actually happened.
>
> If HAMLET or MACBETH had been written in the
20th
> Century instead of the 15th, would you really say
that
> neither of those characters was worthy of being put
on
> a list of the most important characters in the
era's
> literature because they appeared in stage
plays
> instead of books?
It would depend upon how we defined what we were categorizing
literature..
>
> And if you are willing to stretch a point for
an
> essentially visual medium like comic strips, why
not
> for film or television which, like any dramatic
form,
> begins with the written word?
>
The original list chose the Cat in the Hat to as # 39.
. (I would have taken the Grinch if I had to choose between
them.) A picture book like The Cat in the Hat is is basically
a visual medium as is a comic strip. I asked Bill earlier for
an opinion. If he thinks a character from a show that first
was produced on radio in 1949 is eligible for this list, I'll
go along. Mark
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