Est-ce un homage?
March 28th, 2007 by Kathleen Bolton
I’m a big Charlotte Bronte fan. Jane Eyre is book Number One in my pantheon, with Lord of the Rings and Emma tied for a distant second. Since I’m a fan, I keep up with the Bronte fan blogs (they exist, yo) so I can get the latest gossip on film adaptations and all things Bronte.
So imagine my dismay when the blogmeister for the very cool Bronteana blog, shared this little nugget:
“How Nancy Drew Saved My Life. Or how to succeed in publishing without really trying. Answer? Copy Jane Eyre.
“Not only is Jane Eyre (in a severely stripped form) the official template for some publishing houses specializing in serial romances, but it is a favourite novel to be just plain ripped off. No copyright, no problem.
“The following is a summary of “How Nancy Drew Save my Life” by Lauren Baratz-Logsted:
“In her fourth novel, Baratz-Logsted, author of The Thin Pink Line (2003), offers the charming tale of a literature-loving nanny. At 23, Charlotte Bell has just had her heart broken by the married man she unwisely fell in love with. She decides to take another position, as nanny for the American ambassador in Iceland. Once she takes up residence in the large, creaky house and meets her imperious, forbidding employer, Edgar Rawlings, she can’t help but feel like literature’s most famous governess, Jane Eyre. But Charlotte turns to Nancy Drew (channeling the girl detective) for help investigating the more puzzling aspects of her situation, such as the silence surrounding Edgar’s mysteriously absent wife and the strange laughter she hears coming from behind a closed door. To make matters worse, Charlotte is starting to fall for Edgar, whose engagement to an Icelandic ice queen seems imminent. Readers who appreciate classic love stories will enjoy the old-fashioned dialogue and Charlotte’s fanciful imagination.Kristine Huntley
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Yikes!
We don’t bash authors at WU. Hell, we’re all trying to make it in this crazy business. Every single writer of fiction knows that they stand on the shoulders of giants when they create their own work. No one writes in a vacuum. But I think this kerfuffle brings up an interesting question: where does the author draw the line between writing a homage to a classic and using it as a template?
Helen Fielding successfully negotiated this line in her immensely popular Bridget Jones books. Fielding loosely based Diary on Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, but no one could mistake the scruffy Bridget for Lizzy Bennet. Fielding was careful to take Austen’s plot points and, with a wink, misdirect the reader. The result was a wacky ride and the birth of a new genre: chick lit.
More recently, teen-sensation Chris Paolini, in his novel Eragon, cut a little closer to what’s acceptable. Long-time readers of fantasy will recognize every one of the genre’s tropes in the story of the innocent country boy who becomes a dragon rider and saves his world from the dark forces trying to engulf it. There are elves, too. But Paolini was a kid when he wrote it. He did what all beginning writers do: imitate. Through imitation comes our own style and voice. Most of the time, no one wants to buy the stuff we write during this phase. Paolini got lucky.
Back to Baratz-Logsted’s book. Since I haven’t read it, I’m going to give her and her work the benefit of the doubt. But I’m going to take extra care in my current wip to make sure I’m dipping into a fresh well.
Where do you think the author should draw the line? I’m interested in hearing opinions, especially since the trend in using characters from the classics seems far from over.
People seem unable to resist squeezing as much success/money/fame from a winning concept as they can. How many versions of Cinderella are there out in the world? I have to admit that I haven’t read Jane Eyre (ooh, I’ll be whacked for that), so I can’t comment on Baratz-Logsted’s story. But the inside flap text is now available for Deathly Hallows, and I wanted to share part of it with you. I’ll tie this back in to your post, Kath.
Anyone else thinking that sounds an awful lot like Frodo Baggins–his impossible task, finding strength to complete the task he has been given (I swear those words were in a trailer), and leaving the warmth, safety and companionship of The Shire? Despite structural similarities, though, I doubt anyone would call JKR an idea stealer. There are ways to spin a concept to make it truly your own.
Thanks for the benefit of the doubt, Kathleen. I respect my readers and expect them to be intelligent, so it never occurred to me that they wouldn’t recognize my book as a re-visioning of the classic Jane Eyre. The things the other blog points to - using a faulty link, I might add - as indication of copying, like deliberately using the name Charlotte Bell and having other characters’ names begin with the same letters as characters in JE, hardly seem to me to be evidence of plaigirism. On the contrary, in Jane Smiley’s Pulitzer Prize winning and National Book Award winning novel A Thousand Acres, she uses the very same device, only this time using Shakespeare’s King Lear as her source material. I wasn’t very far into it when I realized Larry was Lear, Ginnie and Rose were Goneril and Regan, and so forth. Rather than thinking Smiley a plaigirist, I thought she was brilliant: taking something old and giving it a new twist…just as Shakespeare himself did time and time again. It is, as I say, a literary technique known as re-visioning. Now, I’m no Shakespeare, nor am I a Smiley, but I think if you stop and think about this, you’ll realize there’s a vast difference between an author giving the intelligent reader every clue to see what she’s doing and an author trying to pull the wool over readers’ eyes ala Kaavya Viswanathan. Just my two cents.
Thanks for giving us your perspectives, Lauren. There is a BIG difference in writing a story with a sly wink and outright plagiarism, as you rightly pointed out. Bronte fans are passionate about JE, so dipping into that well can cut both ways.
Teri, I’m going to pretend I didn’t see that you haven’t read Jane Eyre yet. Stuffing fingers over eyes, lalalalalala…
Therese, I am aghast. Simply aghast. Well I may have been influential in causing you to read PRIDE AND PREJUDICE so I hope JANE EYRE will not be far behind.
Yes, you and Kath definitely helped open my eyes to P&P!
Can’t I blame my high school English teachers for this lack in my education? C’mon. Do I really have to add more books to my teetering tbr list?
Oh, I suppose I must.
My first comment was eaten up by the internet…
Returning to my original post, I realise how badly I expressed myself! Truly, I did not intend so sharp a criticism. It is a fascinating issue you raised, and one which I have not done a lot with recently. Since I have begun reading about film adaptation, my thoughts have been displaced by new theories which tend to place literary adaptations beyond the pale. This has brought me back to my senses somewhat and merits more discussion (and so, I will probably return the favour and reference you in a new thread).
Also, I will try to correct the false impressions I gave with my initial post.
It really is a fascinating area for literary criticism. How film and popular fiction adaptors take the classics and reinvent, refashion, elide certain plot points the original authors deemed important at the time but mystify us today can provide endless fodder. They’re a snapshot of OUR preoccupations (I’m thinking of the new sexy BBC adaptation of Jane Eyre).
Thanks for linking to us! I’m going to be interested to hear what your readers think, too.