Quote:
Originally Posted by Bookpossum
Obviously, anything like that has to be done very well indeed. I think Jean Rhys and Tom Stoppard both did so, because each work complemented and enhanced the original classic. The fact that Rhys's book and Stoppard's play have each become modern classics in their own right attests to how good they were.
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I think you nailed it with this. The risks of a direct appropriation of an author's characters and setting are high.
gmw mentioned
Death Comes to Pemberley upthread, a book we both thought was dreadful. But if the author can pull it off, the rewards are commensurately greater than if they'd adapted the material. There's a symbiosis that both enhances their own work and can be enlightening about the source material, also.
Bringing it back around to
Jane Eyre, I think the various revisionist takes on the story, including
WSS,
The Madwoman in the Attic and even the comic strip I linked to above help keep a work new. I also personally like anything that raises awareness about the undercurrents in a story, in light of advanced mores. Viewing Rochester (Heathcliff, Rhett Butler and so on) as a romantic hero can be dangerous, especially to a young girl. Ideally, the reader can hold both thoughts and see it for the romance it was intended and how it fails under scrutiny according to modern sensibilities.
And, as
BookCat said, it's all for fun.