In this issue: Mental Labor Exchange Hilbert's 20 mathematical questions for the 20th Century O/T: For Hallowe'en Today in History -- Aug 28 Hilbert's Math F.O.C. Darley Exhibit to Open September 11 Re: F.O.C. Darley Exhibit to Open September 11 Today in History -- Aug 29 Re: Today in History -- Aug 29 Re: Caroline Kirkland Book Kipling as Jack the Lad Captain Scott's Effects at Auction Television and the classics Re: Television and the classics -----------------------------THE POSTS----------------------------- Date: Fri, 27 Aug 1999 14:51:11 -0600 From: sdavies(at)MtRoyal.AB.CA Subject: Mental Labor Exchange Diana P. pointed out this post from Sharp-L: - ----- Forwarded by Diana Patterson/Academic/MRC on 08/25/99 07:57 AM ------ Martha Burns <Martha_Burns(at)BROWN.EDU> on 08/07/99 10:22:53 PM Please respond to "SHARP-L Society for the History of Authorship, Reading & Publishing" <SHARP-L(at)LISTSERV.INDIANA.EDU> Subject: Mental Labor Exchange Apropos of Bill Bell's offering from Bourdieu, while searching another topic, I came across this unusual piece in the New Orleans DAILY DELTA of February 13, 1851: "MENTAL LABOR EXCHANGE. The newest crotchet that has entered the noddles of the 'Wise men of Gotham,' New York, is the establishment of a 'Mental Labor Exchange,' -- that is, an 'institution' whose business it will be to fix a value upon all sorts of literary productions, and to aid the authors thereof in getting a decent livelihood." [END] The word "Exchange" had certain connotations for those who kept abreast of the news. A prominent story throughout that fall and winter was of the capture and trial in New York of "One-Eyed Tompkins," a notorious confidence man who sold $77,000 worth of bogus stock on the New York Stock Exchange. In fact, there were at least two stories on Tompkins in the DAILY DELTA during the week that this other little notice appeared. That's the small bit of light I can shed on the "Mental Labor Exchange." I wonder, can anyone else offer insight? By the way, one great benefit in reading papers 150 years old is that you don't have to wait months to find out what happens. Poor old Tompkins committed suicide in prison. He left a note declaring his innocence, but, by that point, no one believed him. Martha Burns Brown University - ----------------------------------------------------- - ----------------------------------------------------- - ----------------------------------------------------- Martha, when I asked permission to repost, also pointed out: One thing -- the scoundrel who committed suicide in jail was named "One-Eyed Thompson," not "One-Eyed Tompkins," as I spelled it in my post. The DAILY DELTA had it wrong. Stephen D mailto:sdavies(at)mtroyal.ab.ca
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Date: Fri, 27 Aug 1999 15:42:35 -0600 From: sdavies(at)MtRoyal.AB.CA Subject: Hilbert's 20 mathematical questions for the 20th Century David Hilbert gave a lecture in 1900, in which he proposed "fundamental questions to challenge mathematical efforts in the 20th century." I'm no mathematician, but I would like to know how well science has done in answering his questions 99 years later. I found this URL of his lecture: http://aleph0.clarku.edu/~djoyce/hilbert/toc.html Can anyone summarize our progress (simply)? Stephen D mailto:SDavies(at)mtroyal.ab.ca
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Date: Fri, 27 Aug 1999 17:05:02 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)alice.gloaming.com> Subject: O/T: For Hallowe'en Corman Creates Monster Serial For AMC Roger Corman, the famous low-budget film director behind such classic flicks as It Conquered the World, has signed on to produce and star in a 35-chapter "serial monster movie" for AMC. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the serial installments will air during the breaks between a selection of classic monster movies and specials that AMC will feature during its three-day Halloween weekend marathon. Corman will play the role of Gorman, the head of the AMC horror department, and he will be backed up by cameo appearances from his former associates at American International Pictures. Corman will also host AMC's upcoming MonsterFest '99, as well as AMC's eight-week Corman Film Festival. (for all you lovers of Corman's old Poe/Lovecraft movies, there have been quite a few this month) Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
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Date: Sat, 28 Aug 1999 00:34:32 -0400 (EDT) From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu> Subject: Today in History -- Aug 28 Interesting things that happened August 28th: Birthdays on this date: In 1828 Leo Tolstoy, writer, social philosopher (War and Peace) In 1831 Lucy Ware Webb Hayes, first lady In 1833 Sir Edward Burne-Jones, English Pre-Raphaelite painter, designer In 1889 Charles Boyer, American film star In 1906 Sir John Betjeman, poet laureate of England (Mt. Zion) In 1917 Jack Kirby, comic book artist Events worth noting: In 1837 Pharmacists John Lea and William Perrins of Worcester, England begin the manufacture of Worcester Sauce. In 1862 Belle Boyd released from Old Capital Prison in Washington, DC. In 1867 U.S. occupies Midway Islands in the Pacific. In 1884 Mickey Welsh strikes out the first 9 men he faces. In 1907 United Parcel Service begins service, in Seattle. In 1916 Italy's declares war against Germany during WW I. In 1917 10 suffragists were arrested as they picketed the White House. In 1922 WEAF in NYC aired the first radio commercial. Queensboro Realty Company of Jackson Heights paid $100 for 10 minutes of air time.
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Date: Sat, 28 Aug 1999 05:56:59 -0700 From: Deborah McMillion Nering <deborah(at)alice.gloaming.com> Subject: Hilbert's Math My fatherinlaw is a retired mathematician and I passed your website on to him, Bob and this is his response: >This is off the cuff. I could look up some stuff on this. As you >said, in 1900 at an international conference, David Hilbert >described 20 problems. These where not just puzzles. They were >serious mathematical concepts that were unresolved at the time. >Hilbert felt that working on these problems would advance >mathematics in a significant way. > >The profesors that I studied under at Indiana University and at >Princeton was Emil Artin. I walked into an advanced calculus course >he was giving in my junior year. He was so wonderful that I took >every class he offered while I was at Indiana. He was born in 1898 >and served in the Austrian army during WWI. Then in the early 20s he >solved two of Hilbert's problems. That MADE him as a world class >mathematician. > >I heard (but do not know) that the last one was resolved about 20 years ago. Deborah Deborah McMillion deborah(at)gloaming.com http://www.gloaming.com/deborah.html
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Date: Sat, 28 Aug 1999 21:40:11 -0400 (EDT) From: LoracLegid(at)aol.com Subject: F.O.C. Darley Exhibit to Open September 11 Inventing the American Past: The Art of F.O.C. Darley will be open September 11 through November 21 at the Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. (www.brandywinemuseum.org). Organized by the prints division of the New York Public Library, this exhibition of F.O.C. Darley's works includes prints, drawings, books and photographs. The exhibition traces Darley's career from Philadelphia to New York and finally to his home in Claymont, Delaware. This underscores Darley's leading role as a major illustrator whose imagery parallels contemporary developments in American history and genre painting. A catalog of the exhibit by Nancy Finlay is available from a large online bookseller. Thackeray sketch added to F.O.C. Darley web page. Darley's sketch of William Thackeray from the Library of Congress collection has been added to our Darley Society web page. (www.focdarley.org) Carol Digel LoracLegid(at)aol.com
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Date: Sat, 28 Aug 1999 23:25:00 -0400 (EDT) From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu> Subject: Re: F.O.C. Darley Exhibit to Open September 11 On Sat, 28 Aug 1999 LoracLegid(at)aol.com wrote: > > Inventing the American Past: The Art of F.O.C. Darley will be open September > 11 through November 21 at the Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, > Pennsylvania. (www.brandywinemuseum.org). > Chadds Ford is a name closely associated with another great American illustrator, N. C. Wyeth. Do you know, Carol, if Wyeth ever expressed any views on Darley? Bob C. _________________________________________________ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ Robert L. Champ rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu Editor, teacher, anglophile, human curiosity Whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy, meditate on these things Philippians 4:8 rchamp7927(at)aol.com robertchamp(at)netscape.net _________________________________________________ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
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Date: Sun, 29 Aug 1999 00:29:22 -0400 (EDT) From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu> Subject: Today in History -- Aug 29 Interesting things that happened August 29th: Birthdays on this date: In 1809 Oliver Wendell Holmes (in Cambridge, MA), jurist, author In 1815 Anna Ella Carroll, American writer In 1862 Maurice Maeterlinck, Belgian Symbolist poet (Nobel 1911) In 1881 Valery Nicolas Larbaud, French novelist, essayist, translator In 1899 Lyman L. Lemnitzer, Marine Corps general In 1912 Barry Sullivan, actor In 1915 Ingrid Bergman (in Sweden), actor (Casablanca) In 1916 George Montgomery, actor In 1917 Isabel Sanford, actor (All in the Family, Jeffersons) In 1920 Charles Christopher "Bird" Parker, saxophonist Events worth noting: In 1862 Battle of Second Manassas. In 1864 William Huggins discovers chemical composition of nebulae. In 1877 Second president of the Mormon Church, Brigham Young, died. In 1885 Gottlieb Daimler receives German patent for a motorcycle. In 1896 Chop suey invented in NYC by chef of visiting Chinese Ambassador. In 1914 'Arizonan' is the first vessel to arrive in SF via the Panama Canal.
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Date: Sun, 29 Aug 1999 03:28:50 -0400 (EDT) From: Zozie(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Today in History -- Aug 29 In a message dated 8/29/99 4:30:35 AM, Bob wrote: << In 1815 Anna Ella Carroll, American writer>> My little feminist diary notes Carroll's birthday and adds: [she] helped win the Civil War with her strategy in the Tennessee campaign but was never rewarded or duly acclaimed. Anyone know anything about this? phoebe
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Date: Sun, 29 Aug 1999 11:44:49 -0400 (EDT) From: LoracLegid(at)aol.com Subject: Re: Caroline Kirkland Book jb05215(at)navix.net Ms. Digel: Good luck with your continuing research into Darley. You may already be aware that Darley illustrated the fourth edition of Caroline M. Kirkland's A New Home, Who'll Follow? (New York, C. S. Francis, 1850). You may not be aware that the Library of Congress has digitized the fifth edition, also containing the Darley illustrations, although I'm vexed that there is no way to find the illustrations except by browsing through the text, one slowly-downloading page after another. (Do a search for Caroline Kirkland at http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amhome.html.) Best-- Jana Bouma University of Nebraska-Lincoln jb05215(at)navix.net Ray, she is right the pictures are impossible to find - the book has 306 pages. I am going to try to get the book on interlibrary loan and have Bill photograph them. Jana replied to the lady at the Mystic Seaport Museum and gave her some helpful information. Great web site. Will explore it further. Think I'll start pulling together Civil war stuff and go after all those civil war recreators. What do you have in that line? Carol
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Date: Sun, 29 Aug 1999 15:10:41 -0400 (EDT) From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu> Subject: Kipling as Jack the Lad Biography nowadays often reads more like an extended tabloid story than anything that resembles a just consideration of a man or woman's life. Take the case of the new bio of Rudyard Kipling, which presents the great writer's story to us with, seemingly, the intention of spicing him up. I don't know if Kipling actually did the things recounted here--it is always a mistake to suppose that any writer's knowledge comes from personal experience (note, for instance, _The Red Badge of Courage)--but I would at least like to believe that Kipling did have the unusual effect on the movies attributed to him here. The review is from the Times of London. Bob C. August 29 1999 BRITAIN His dark side: Kipling wrote a tale of seduction that inspired the first film 'vamp' Kipling, brothel creeper and opium smoker, was inventor of the It girl Richard Brooks Arts Editor THE vamp and the "It girl" had the most unlikely creator. Rudyard Kipling, author of The Jungle Book, Kim and the poem If, is often regarded as a strait-laced Edwardian imperialist - but a new biography claims that he had another, far more exotic side. "He is a much racier writer than he is given credit for," said Andrew Lycett, whose Rudyard Kipling is published next month. Prostitutes, opium dens and sexual deviancy are not what readers associate with Kipling, but a film based on one of his poems was considered so offensive that it was banned and never shown in Britain. A Fool There Was, a 1915 silent film based on Kipling's The Vampire, produced the original "vamp". Theda Bara became the screen's first sex symbol, starring in the seedy tale of a businessman who abandons his family for drink and narcotics after seduction by a demi-mondaine. Kipling wrote the poem about his cousin, Philip Burne-Jones, an artist who had loved and been spurned by Mrs Patrick Campbell, a famous actress of the time. Kipling felt sorry for Burne-Jones - who depicted himself in one of his paintings as a miserable youth, lying on a bed straddled suggestively by a wild-eyed woman. Kipling was inspired to pen The Vampire in revenge. The respectable parents of devotees of Mowgli and Baloo the bear would have been shocked to know that Kipling's ability to write about drugs and loose women came from personal experience. Kipling, born in India, came as a child to England, where he lived unhappily for some time with a foster family. He returned to India in his teens as a journalist. "He smoked opium and frequented local brothels," said Lycett. Several short stories, such as On the City Wall, Beyond the Pale and Without the Benefit of Clergy, have detailed descriptions of houses of ill repute. "I'm sure he must either have been to them or have had an Indian mistress," says Lisa Lewis, former chairman of the Kipling Society. On the City Wall refers to the "squabby Pluffy cushions" in the Lahore brothel and describes a prostitute in intimate detail. The origin of the "It girl", later made more famous by Clara Bow, the film star, came from another of Kipling's works, Mrs Bathhurst, set in South Africa. Kipling visited the country often. In the short story, linked with poems and published in 1904, Kipling writes of the "special quality" of a barmaid: "Tisn't beauty, so to speak, nor good talk necessarily. It's just It. Some women'll stay in a man's memory once they walk down the street." Lycett believes this is the first reference to an It girl, which a century later still describes a woman with allure. "Kipling had this very romantic side, too," says Lewis. "People who don't really know his work think of him as a rather formal writer. In fact, he had an incredibly powerful subconscious, which he called the demon. It was a poetic muse." Kipling's love life clearly influenced his work. Lycett found letters between the author and Isabella Burton, wife of an Indian officer. The witty, philosophical Burton was fictionalised as Mrs Hauksbee in The Education of Otis Yeere, but the great unrequited love of Kipling's life was Florence Garrard, the artist, whom he nearly wed just before marrying the American Caroline Balestier. Although their marriage lasted until his death in 1936, Lycett believes it was not happy. A daughter died as a child in 1899 and Kipling partly blamed his wife for not looking after her properly when she caught a cold that worsened. They lost a son in the first world war, which depressed them both deeply, although Kipling remained a great advocate for England in war. Despite his popular acclaim, Kipling, a close friend of George V and a relative of Stanley Baldwin, the prime minister, remained modest about formal recognition. Although a solidly Establishment figure, he declined the post of poet laureate and refused a knighthood and the Order of Merit, although he accepted the Nobel prize for literature in 1907. "He was very reticent about himself, as his own memoirs, which were published immediately after his death, show," says Michael Smith, secretary of the Kipling Society. Smith is not as convinced as Lycett that Kipling led quite such a licentious life in India: "Kipling might have exaggerated a bit to friends, though I know he did want to understand what went on in the bazaars of India, rather than the British clubs." Lycett emphasises in his book, published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson, that Kipling had a greater range as a writer than is generally accepted. He said: "He could and did write just as well about the brothels of Lahore as the gardens of Sussex" - where he bought a house, Batemans, which was his home until his death. Much of Kipling's writing may be considered out of fashion today, and many of his views thought politically incorrect, but the popularity of his works has endured. If, Margaret Thatcher's favourite poem, was written in 1910, but was recently voted the nation's favourite poem by BBC viewers. _________________________________________________ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ Robert L. Champ rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu Editor, teacher, anglophile, human curiosity Whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy, meditate on these things Philippians 4:8 rchamp7927(at)aol.com robertchamp(at)netscape.net _________________________________________________ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
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Date: Sun, 29 Aug 1999 15:14:25 -0400 (EDT) From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu> Subject: Captain Scott's Effects at Auction The great explorer's effects are going on sale at Christie's. Here is the story, once again taken from the Times of London. Bob C. Captain Scott's lost relics go to auction Jon Ungoed-Thomas LOCKED away in a suitcase in a bank vault for more than 50 years, they are the poignant relics of Captain Robert Scott's doomed expedition to the South Pole. Now displayed for the first time, the artefacts comprise one of the most significant collections of exploration memorabilia ever assembled in Britain and are expected to fetch at least ?200,000 at auction next month. The death of Scott and his fellow explorers in the frozen wastes of the Antarctic in 1912 has become fixed in the British psyche as an epic tale of bravery in the face of adversity. They trudged all the way to the South Pole to claim it for their country - only to find that Roald Amundsen, the Norwegian explorer, had beaten them by a matter of days. As Scott and his dejected men tried to make their way back, the rations ran low. "I am just going outside, and may be some time," said Captain Laurence Oates, with memorable understatement, as he stepped out of Scott's tent, frostbitten and dying of gangrene. The items to be sold at auction at Christie's include Scott's green-glass goggles, his leather-bound diary, a Union Jack, brass compass, Bible, linen food bags - and even a crumbling ration biscuit. "This is the most wonderful material because it is so evocative of the expedition and so closely associated with Scott," said William Mills, of the Scott Polar Research Institute in Cambridge. Most of the items have not been seen since they were returned to Kathleen, Scott's widow. The explorer's son, Sir Peter, the renowned conservationist, later placed the belongings in a bank vault in a battered brown case. They will now be auctioned on September 17 in a sale that will include 130 lots relating to polar exploration. Demand is such that even the broken Huntley & Palmers biscuit is expected to fetch more than ?1,000. It is wrapped in greaseproof paper bearing the words "Antarctic Biscuit Captain Scott's Expedition 1910". "Every item is important because they each in their own way tell this most extraordinary story," said Nicholas Lambourn, associate director at Christie's. "Antarctica has opened up as a tourist destination and people have become increasingly interested in past expeditions." In the last entry in his journal, Scott, the son of a brewery owner, wrote: "We shall stick it out to the end but we are getting weaker, of course, and the end cannot be far." Eight months later, a search party discovered Scott, who died in his tent with two of his comrades. His belongings were scattered around him and his left hand was stretched over the body of one of his friends. Several of the items now due to be auctioned were recovered from the tent, while others were found at the expedition's Cape Evans base camp. A silk Union flag, believed to have been taken to the South Pole and to have adorned Scott's table for his last birthday meal, is expected to fetch more than ?10,000. Also on sale is Scott's sledging flag, which was flown at the South Pole and later recovered from the spot where Scott died. It is embroidered with his family motto: "Ready Aye Ready". Among his personal possessions are a silver hip flask and watch, his green canvas sledging satchel, a metal matchbox and two briar pipes. Equipment for the expedition is also to be auctioned, including a packet of needles, eight linen ration bags, a thermometer and a tin containing part of the Primus stove that heated their last meal, before the fuel ran out. The Scott family has kept some of the explorer's most treasured possessions, but believe it is the right time to sell some mementos of the expedition. "There comes a time when the belongings of one's forebears, famous or not, should be dispersed," said Lady Scott, Sir Peter's widow. _________________________________________________ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ Robert L. Champ rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu Editor, teacher, anglophile, human curiosity Whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy, meditate on these things Philippians 4:8 rchamp7927(at)aol.com robertchamp(at)netscape.net _________________________________________________ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
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Date: Sun, 29 Aug 1999 15:21:56 -0400 (EDT) From: Robert Champ <rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu> Subject: Television and the classics Here in the States we count on English television to bring us exempla of good taste and civility, which are in short supply on American tv and in the movies as well. (Unfortunately, we send the English our worst dreck.) Not everything always goes smoothly with English television, however, as the following article from the Times of London (my third replication from that publication in one day!) tells us. The article also gives us some intimation of what is coming up in the future. Bob C. August 29 1999 TELEVISION Are adaptations of the classics trying to be too modern? The BBC gave up on a 'comic' David Copperfield, and now ITV is in trouble for daring to reinvent Fagin, reports SALLY KINNES ? Hardly kosher: Robert Lindsay and Sam Smith in Oliver Twist Old favourites in a new twist More frocks on the box It takes a lot to ruffle the well-starched petticoats of television costume drama. Usually, it's only the enormous cost that raises a painted eyebrow or two. But there's a new whiff of gossip in the air. Over the past few months, the rows behind the scenes have threatened to be the main event. Last year, the BBC announced with pride a new production of David Copperfield, to be shown this Christmas. Within 12 months, it was all going wrong: script, writer, cast and schedule. The project was delayed so badly, there was a moment when it looked as if the BBC might celebrate Christmas in January. John Sullivan had been chosen to adapt the new version. The creator of Only Fools and Horses, he is the most successful comedy writer of his generation. The wheeler-dealer Del Boy (David Jason), and his put-upon Rodney (Nicholas Lyndhurst) were the comic creations of the 1980s. Throughout the decade, their Christmas specials were the focal point of the tele-feast. So when Sullivan told BBC1's controller, Peter Salmon, that he wanted to do Copperfield, and that Jason (as Micawber) and Lyndhurst (as the ever-so-'umble Uriah Heep) were part of his casting plans, it must have seemed the perfect Christmas cracker. As a way of bringing a mass audience to a literary adaptation, it would be hard to think of a more saleable comic trio. But Copperfield, for all its popularity, is not exactly a laugh-a-minute romp, and faces fell when the script came in. Though the BBC will no longer discuss it, and Sullivan isn't returning calls, both cite "creative differences". But according to a BBC insider, Sullivan delivered a late script that the BBC couldn't make. It was also said to be too funny, and not traditional enough. Sullivan left the project, and Jason's other commitments meant he was no longer available. A new writer, Adrian Hodges, was brought in, who wrote the new script in six weeks. Meanwhile, in what was widely seen as a snub to the BBC, Sullivan took an idea for a series based on Micawber to Yorkshire Television, with whom he now has a "first-look" deal. Yorkshire is the company for whom Jason makes the hugely successful A Touch of Frost, so the assumption is that he will play Micawber after all. It was just the sort of embarrassing interlude the BBC could have done without. With rows over the new director-general, the licence fee and the perceived weakness of BBC1, it has been open season on the corporation all year. The last thing it needed was any suggestion that it was losing its grip on a BBC staple such as period drama. But the genre has also been giving them grief over on ITV. Alan Bleasdale was commissioned to adapt Oliver Twist, but has been causing a furore for having his artistic way with a much loved text. Chief among his perceived crimes is to take the Jewishness out of Fagin. Contrary to some reports, Bleasdale doesn't go quite so far as to make Fagin a Gentile, but neither is he the shrivelled old Jew Oliver encounters in the book. Instead, he is a magician who took to crime when his magic failed. All this has caused no end of trouble. The playwright Steven Berkoff wants to "Save Our Fagin", and Bleasdale's attempts to clean up Fagin's image have been called "illiterate", "phoney", and "part of the milksop blandness of Blair's Britain" in the press. Fagin, sly old weasel that he was, would have been amazed at the number of his newfound friends. Bleasdale, however, has been completely taken aback. "Sometimes I don't see the bowler coming towards me. I knew they were going to murder me over GBH. I knew the politics of that would cause a stink. But I never expected it over this. I was shocked." In Hollywood, where they can ask for an interview with Edith Wharton (died 1937) without so much as a blush, they would be baffled. Currently in the middle of a love affair with the classics, Hollywood will twist any tale until it can raise a buck. Sometimes the attempt crashes around its ears. It will take more than Robert De Niro to convince anyone that Great Expectations belongs in contemporary LA. Similarly, in 10 Things I Hate About You, The Taming of the Shrew perhaps gains little by being relocated to Padua High. But Leonardo DiCaprio's stylish and original Romeo + Juliet worked a treat, as did the contemporary take on Jane Austen's Emma, Clueless. "It doesn't matter in a film," says David Pirie, who adapted Wilkie Collins's The Woman in White for the BBC. "You can set Jane Austen in an American mall, and nobody notices. But working for television, especially for the BBC, you're expected to be traditional." British television audiences have become used to a rich diet of big books, lavish budgets and faithfully rendered scripts. Schooled on the BBC's children's and adult's classic serial in the 1960s and 1970s, dazzled by Granada's Brideshead Revisited and The Jewel in the Crown in the 1980s, they have been ruined with riches in the 1990s, with Pride and Prejudice and Our Mutual Friend, to name but two. If the latter was particularly faithful to the book, it was because the adapter, Sandy Welch, had been brought up on the BBC's Sunday-afternoon serials. There is always a tension between what writers want to do, however, and what audiences are prepared to allow. Nominated for a Bafta, The Woman in White earned Pirie reviews as good as any he's ever had. But he changed plenty, and it was noticed. "Radio Times got a number of letters saying, 'How dare he? He should just have given us the text.' For a small and vocal minority, I feel that is all they want." Not that it is always up to the writer. Carlton's forthcoming adaptation of Lady Audley's Secret has been moved forward 10 years from the original because of the clothes. "The costumes of the time [1860] look like furniture," says Donald Hounam, the scriptwriter. "It would have been difficult to give it the lurid tone we were after if we had had everyone moving around on castors." Then there is the input of the co-production company, which has its own audiences to consider (adapting the classics is so expensive, they are now impossible to make alone). The BBC's partner for its forthcoming Madame Bovary is the Boston-based company WGBH. "They sent a note saying, 'No nipples, please,' " says Heidi Thomas, who has adapted the Flaubert classic about a provincial adulteress. Thomas speaks for many when she says she feels a duty to the author. "I worry that Flaubert will come back and haunt me and say, 'So what was going on when you put in that scene in the woods?' " But changes have to be made, none the less. For all their traditional roots, classic adaptations are getting much sharper and more up to date. "In Pride and Prejudice, we put in things that weren't in the book, like the scene with Darcy swimming at the lake," says Sue Birtwistle, the producer. "We talked long and hard about it, but we felt it was reasonable to show he was a young man who had these responsibilities of running an estate and occasionally must have wanted a moment to himself. Nobody seemed to mind." When it's really convincing, nobody does. At the BBC, they are keeping their nerve. They've yanked Copperfield back from the brink, and like parents who were once panicking at not finding the right Christmas present, are now confident they've pulled it off. Just reading the cast list is like unpacking a Christmas stocking: Maggie Smith, Bob Hoskins, Ian McKellen, Nicholas Lyndhurst, Paul Whitehouse and Dawn French. The masterplan at BBC1 is now to alternate 19th-and 20th-century classics, but nobody could accuse it of not being prepared to take risks. In the pipeline is a contemporary version of Crime and Punishment by Tony Marchant (who did Great Expectations), moved from St Petersburg to the UK. It's a brave thing for a mainstream channel to do. "This year we've given three 19th-century novels the big BBC treatment - Copperfield, Bovary and Wives and Daughters," says Jane Tranter, head of BBC1 serials. "Then we're moving into the mainstream with two 20th-century adaptations - a Kingsley Amis, and two Nancy Mitfords melded as one. We would like to do more, but with 20th-century books, the rights are very difficult to get. If Graham Greene were available, for instance, we would hoover him up." Purists may be relieved to hear that Greene is safely out of reach, but those with green ink should prepare to fill their pens now. Bleasdale is doing plenty to worry them. On Oliver Twist, he has come up with what Hollywood would call a "back story", breathing life into characters barely sketched in. In the book, the explanation of Oliver's origins are squashed into a single chapter, almost at the end. New relations and family feuds arrive with every paragraph. Bleasdale has taken the chapter, smoothed it out into a coherent narrative, and put it where it belongs chronologically, at the beginning of the story. "By putting it at the beginning, I'm giving it an absolutely straight narrative drive and not having to use the panic of coincidences you find in the book. Dickens had got himself into a corner. This was his first important novel, he was only 24, and writing in monthly instalments gave him no chance to rewrite. He was also just about to start something else. "I've always found Monks [Oliver's half brother] fascinating. We have a son who became epileptic in adolescence. I had always wanted to explore what I felt about that without making it a personal story. So the fact that Dickens had written about an epileptic character in Monks gave me the release I had wanted. There's no disrespect here. There's not even arrogance. The changes I've made have been made out of the necessity to craft seven hours of drama out of a book that was written in monthly instalments." Bleasdale is unrepentant, and he's probably right. For all the furore, his adaptation may well turn out to be the most faithful of all. And what's more, he's planning another one, so if you don't like the sound of this one, steel yourself. Though he won't reveal what it is, another 19th-century masterpiece is already in his sights.* More frocks on the box Wives and Daughters, BBC1, November 1999 Elizabeth Gaskell's final unfinished novel, adapted and completed by Andrew Davies, arguably the best in the business. Reunites Davies, a former Eng Lit lecturer, with his former pupil and producer on Pride and Prejudice, Sue Birtwistle. Expect a happy ending, with a twist about how it's achieved. Stars Bill Paterson, Michael Gambon, Francesca Annis and Justine Waddell. Madame Bovary, BBC1, 2000 Gustave Flaubert's novel about a woman's quest for self-fulfilment, adapted by Heidi Thomas. For her, Emma Bovary is "a Thomas Hardy character, caught in an Alan Bennett world" and the book's subject is "the corrosive nature of human unhappiness". At the BBC, the script got a reputation for being a racy read as copies went missing. Stars the Australian actress Frances O'Connor; directed by Tim Fywell. Gormenghast, BBC2, early 2000 This adaptation of Mervyn Peake's fantastical novel has been years in the planning. Twenty-two-year-old Jonathan Rhys Meyers heads an all-star cast that includes Ian Richardson, Christopher Lee, Stephen Fry and Spike Milligan. Adapted by Malcolm McKay. The Railway Children, ITV, 2000 Adapted from E Nesbit's children's classic by Men Behaving Badly writer Simon Nye, "a very tender writer" according to Carlton's director of drama, Jonathan Powell. The Turn of the Screw, ITV, probably Christmas Henry James's brilliant ghost story, adapted by Nick Dear. Stars Pam Ferris, Jodhi May and Colin Firth. _________________________________________________ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ Robert L. Champ rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu Editor, teacher, anglophile, human curiosity Whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy, meditate on these things Philippians 4:8 rchamp7927(at)aol.com robertchamp(at)netscape.net _________________________________________________ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
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Date: Sun, 29 Aug 1999 12:54:43 -0700 From: Marta Dawes <smdawes(at)home.com> Subject: Re: Television and the classics Can't wait to see a new adaptation of "The Railway Children" and "Turning of the Screw". I wonder how long it will take to get to the US? Marta Robert Champ wrote: > > Here in the States we count on English television to bring us exempla of > good taste and civility, which are in short supply on American tv and in > the movies as well. (Unfortunately, we send the English our worst dreck.) > Not everything always goes smoothly with English television, however, as > the following article from the Times of London (my third replication from > that publication in one day!) tells us. The article also gives us some > intimation of what is coming up in the future. > > Bob C. > > August 29 1999 TELEVISION > > Are adaptations of the classics trying to be too modern? The BBC gave up on a > 'comic' David Copperfield, and now ITV is in trouble for daring to reinvent > Fagin, reports SALLY KINNES > ? > Hardly kosher: Robert Lindsay > and Sam Smith in Oliver Twist > > Old favourites in a new twist > > > More frocks on the box > > It takes a lot to ruffle the well-starched petticoats of television costume > drama. Usually, it's only the enormous cost that raises a painted eyebrow or > two. But there's a new whiff of gossip in the air. Over the past few months, > the rows behind the scenes have threatened to be the main event. > > Last year, the BBC announced with pride a new production of David > Copperfield, to be shown this Christmas. Within 12 months, it was all going > wrong: script, writer, cast and schedule. The project was delayed so badly, > there was a moment when it looked as if the BBC might celebrate Christmas in > January. > > John Sullivan had been chosen to adapt the new version. The creator of Only > Fools and Horses, he is the most successful comedy writer of his generation. > The wheeler-dealer Del Boy (David Jason), and his put-upon Rodney (Nicholas > Lyndhurst) were the comic creations of the 1980s. Throughout the decade, > their Christmas specials were the focal point of the tele-feast. So when > Sullivan told BBC1's controller, Peter Salmon, that he wanted to do > Copperfield, and that Jason (as Micawber) and Lyndhurst (as the > ever-so-'umble Uriah Heep) were part of his casting plans, it must have > seemed the perfect Christmas cracker. As a way of bringing a mass audience to > a literary adaptation, it would be hard to think of a more saleable comic > trio. > > But Copperfield, for all its popularity, is not exactly a laugh-a-minute > romp, and faces fell when the script came in. Though the BBC will no longer > discuss it, and Sullivan isn't returning calls, both cite "creative > differences". But according to a BBC insider, Sullivan delivered a late > script that the BBC couldn't make. It was also said to be too funny, and not > traditional enough. > > Sullivan left the project, and Jason's other commitments meant he was no > longer available. A new writer, Adrian Hodges, was brought in, who wrote the > new script in six weeks. Meanwhile, in what was widely seen as a snub to the > BBC, Sullivan took an idea for a series based on Micawber to Yorkshire > Television, with whom he now has a "first-look" deal. Yorkshire is the > company for whom Jason makes the hugely successful A Touch of Frost, so the > assumption is that he will play Micawber after all. > > It was just the sort of embarrassing interlude the BBC could have done > without. With rows over the new director-general, the licence fee and the > perceived weakness of BBC1, it has been open season on the corporation all > year. The last thing it needed was any suggestion that it was losing its grip > on a BBC staple such as period drama. But the genre has also been giving them > grief over on ITV. Alan Bleasdale was commissioned to adapt Oliver Twist, but > has been causing a furore for having his artistic way with a much loved text. > Chief among his perceived crimes is to take the Jewishness out of Fagin. > Contrary to some reports, Bleasdale doesn't go quite so far as to make Fagin > a Gentile, but neither is he the shrivelled old Jew Oliver encounters in the > book. Instead, he is a magician who took to crime when his magic failed. > > All this has caused no end of trouble. The playwright Steven Berkoff wants to > "Save Our Fagin", and Bleasdale's attempts to clean up Fagin's image have > been called "illiterate", "phoney", and "part of the milksop blandness of > Blair's Britain" in the press. Fagin, sly old weasel that he was, would have > been amazed at the number of his newfound friends. Bleasdale, however, has > been completely taken aback. "Sometimes I don't see the bowler coming towards > me. I knew they were going to murder me over GBH. I knew the politics of that > would cause a stink. But I never expected it over this. I was shocked." > > In Hollywood, where they can ask for an interview with Edith Wharton (died > 1937) without so much as a blush, they would be baffled. Currently in the > middle of a love affair with the classics, Hollywood will twist any tale > until it can raise a buck. Sometimes the attempt crashes around its ears. It > will take more than Robert De Niro to convince anyone that Great Expectations > belongs in contemporary LA. Similarly, in 10 Things I Hate About You, The > Taming of the Shrew perhaps gains little by being relocated to Padua High. > But Leonardo DiCaprio's stylish and original Romeo + Juliet worked a treat, > as did the contemporary take on Jane Austen's Emma, Clueless. > > "It doesn't matter in a film," says David Pirie, who adapted Wilkie Collins's > The Woman in White for the BBC. "You can set Jane Austen in an American mall, > and nobody notices. But working for television, especially for the BBC, > you're expected to be traditional." > > British television audiences have become used to a rich diet of big books, > lavish budgets and faithfully rendered scripts. Schooled on the BBC's > children's and adult's classic serial in the 1960s and 1970s, dazzled by > Granada's Brideshead Revisited and The Jewel in the Crown in the 1980s, they > have been ruined with riches in the 1990s, with Pride and Prejudice and Our > Mutual Friend, to name but two. If the latter was particularly faithful to > the book, it was because the adapter, Sandy Welch, had been brought up on the > BBC's Sunday-afternoon serials. > > There is always a tension between what writers want to do, however, and what > audiences are prepared to allow. Nominated for a Bafta, The Woman in White > earned Pirie reviews as good as any he's ever had. But he changed plenty, and > it was noticed. "Radio Times got a number of letters saying, 'How dare he? He > should just have given us the text.' For a small and vocal minority, I feel > that is all they want." > > Not that it is always up to the writer. Carlton's forthcoming adaptation of > Lady Audley's Secret has been moved forward 10 years from the original > because of the clothes. "The costumes of the time [1860] look like > furniture," says Donald Hounam, the scriptwriter. "It would have been > difficult to give it the lurid tone we were after if we had had everyone > moving around on castors." Then there is the input of the co-production > company, which has its own audiences to consider (adapting the classics is so > expensive, they are now impossible to make alone). The BBC's partner for its > forthcoming Madame Bovary is the Boston-based company WGBH. "They sent a note > saying, 'No nipples, please,' " says Heidi Thomas, who has adapted the > Flaubert classic about a provincial adulteress. > > Thomas speaks for many when she says she feels a duty to the author. "I worry > that Flaubert will come back and haunt me and say, 'So what was going on when > you put in that scene in the woods?' " But changes have to be made, none the > less. > > For all their traditional roots, classic adaptations are getting much sharper > and more up to date. "In Pride and Prejudice, we put in things that weren't > in the book, like the scene with Darcy swimming at the lake," says Sue > Birtwistle, the producer. "We talked long and hard about it, but we felt it > was reasonable to show he was a young man who had these responsibilities of > running an estate and occasionally must have wanted a moment to himself. > Nobody seemed to mind." When it's really convincing, nobody does. > > At the BBC, they are keeping their nerve. They've yanked Copperfield back > from the brink, and like parents who were once panicking at not finding the > right Christmas present, are now confident they've pulled it off. Just > reading the cast list is like unpacking a Christmas stocking: Maggie Smith, > Bob Hoskins, Ian McKellen, Nicholas Lyndhurst, Paul Whitehouse and Dawn > French. > > The masterplan at BBC1 is now to alternate 19th-and 20th-century classics, > but nobody could accuse it of not being prepared to take risks. In the > pipeline is a contemporary version of Crime and Punishment by Tony Marchant > (who did Great Expectations), moved from St Petersburg to the UK. It's a > brave thing for a mainstream channel to do. "This year we've given three > 19th-century novels the big BBC treatment - Copperfield, Bovary and Wives and > Daughters," says Jane Tranter, head of BBC1 serials. "Then we're moving into > the mainstream with two 20th-century adaptations - a Kingsley Amis, and two > Nancy Mitfords melded as one. We would like to do more, but with 20th-century > books, the rights are very difficult to get. If Graham Greene were available, > for instance, we would hoover him up." > > Purists may be relieved to hear that Greene is safely out of reach, but those > with green ink should prepare to fill their pens now. Bleasdale is doing > plenty to worry them. On Oliver Twist, he has come up with what Hollywood > would call a "back story", breathing life into characters barely sketched in. > In the book, the explanation of Oliver's origins are squashed into a single > chapter, almost at the end. New relations and family feuds arrive with every > paragraph. Bleasdale has taken the chapter, smoothed it out into a coherent > narrative, and put it where it belongs chronologically, at the beginning of > the story. > > "By putting it at the beginning, I'm giving it an absolutely straight > narrative drive and not having to use the panic of coincidences you find in > the book. Dickens had got himself into a corner. This was his first important > novel, he was only 24, and writing in monthly instalments gave him no chance > to rewrite. He was also just about to start something else. > > "I've always found Monks [Oliver's half brother] fascinating. We have a son > who became epileptic in adolescence. I had always wanted to explore what I > felt about that without making it a personal story. So the fact that Dickens > had written about an epileptic character in Monks gave me the release I had > wanted. There's no disrespect here. There's not even arrogance. The changes > I've made have been made out of the necessity to craft seven hours of drama > out of a book that was written in monthly instalments." > > Bleasdale is unrepentant, and he's probably right. For all the furore, his > adaptation may well turn out to be the most faithful of all. And what's more, > he's planning another one, so if you don't like the sound of this one, steel > yourself. Though he won't reveal what it is, another 19th-century masterpiece > is already in his sights.* > > More frocks on the box > > Wives and Daughters, > BBC1, November 1999 > Elizabeth Gaskell's final unfinished novel, adapted and completed by Andrew > Davies, arguably the best in the business. Reunites Davies, a former Eng Lit > lecturer, with his former pupil and producer on Pride and Prejudice, Sue > Birtwistle. Expect a happy ending, with a twist about how it's achieved. > Stars Bill Paterson, Michael Gambon, Francesca Annis and Justine Waddell. > > Madame Bovary, > BBC1, 2000 > Gustave Flaubert's novel about a woman's quest for self-fulfilment, adapted > by Heidi Thomas. For her, Emma Bovary is "a Thomas Hardy character, caught in > an Alan Bennett world" and the book's subject is "the corrosive nature of > human unhappiness". At the BBC, the script got a reputation for being a racy > read as copies went missing. Stars the Australian actress Frances O'Connor; > directed by Tim Fywell. > > Gormenghast, > BBC2, early 2000 > This adaptation of Mervyn Peake's fantastical novel has been years in the > planning. Twenty-two-year-old Jonathan Rhys Meyers heads an all-star cast > that includes Ian Richardson, Christopher Lee, Stephen Fry and Spike > Milligan. Adapted by Malcolm McKay. > > The Railway Children, > ITV, 2000 > Adapted from E Nesbit's children's classic by Men Behaving Badly writer Simon > Nye, "a very tender writer" according to Carlton's director of drama, > Jonathan Powell. > > The Turn of the Screw, > ITV, probably Christmas > Henry James's brilliant ghost story, adapted by Nick Dear. Stars Pam Ferris, > Jodhi May and Colin Firth. > > _________________________________________________ > @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ > > Robert L. Champ > rchamp(at)polaris.umuc.edu > Editor, teacher, anglophile, human curiosity > > Whatever things are pure, whatever things are > lovely, whatever things are of good report, if > there is any virtue and if there is anything > praiseworthy, meditate on these things > Philippians 4:8 > > rchamp7927(at)aol.com robertchamp(at)netscape.net > _________________________________________________ > @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ > > > > > > > > ------------------------------ End of Gaslight Digest V1 #92 *****************************