What are you reading now?

[Ian Thumwood]

I finished A River Runs Through It-it’s only 160 pages -and then we immediately watched the movie. This is the only instance I can recall of a movie being vastly superior to the book that it is supposedly based upon. Besides the cinematic splendor of Montana, the screenplay makes the plot more coherent and puts some flesh on its bones. And while not ignoring the intricacies of fly fishing, it at least subordinates it to the plot, whereas the book takes the reverse approach. The very young Brad Pitt is superb, and Tom Skerrit shines as the father, who is a relatively minor character in the book

I think that there are a quite a few books which have been "improved" on the screen. The first example is Le Carre's "The Night manager" which had a better plot and a far more sophisticated and compelling ending. By and large, I thnk that books have been better. I have to say that, with Westerns, they more likely reflect their own era of filming as opposed to what was effectively Victorian America. Wheneever I have seen black and white photos of the Wild West, the people always seem to wear clothes that doesn't fit or sport hats which look decidely uncool. On top of that, the films never show cowboys with hige moustaches either!

I think that the most interesting books in relation to their film adaptations are Ian Fleming's "James Bond" novels. In my opinion they are absolutely fascinating. The best film was "YOu only live twice" yet I would argue that the book is one of the worst pieces of fiction put to paper. When they made the film, the story was jettisoned and the screen play was written by Roald Dahl. By the same token, I think that the best two book are "From Russia with Love" and "On her majesty's secret service." Both films fail to live up to the books with the former being filmed in a mad rush which is why it now seems one of the weakest of the films. The reference to difference books in the films is also quite interesting with the most recent taking it's end fro, "You only live twice" wth the poisonous plants in the castle. On top of this, I feel that Fleming was a writer who was quickly bored with his creation and sought to try all sorts of different options in later books. I think "The spy who loved me" is fasctinating as it is essentially quite feminist and takes the story from the point of view of a woman who encounters James Bond. The film has nothing to do with the book. in "The man with the golden gun" Fleming changed tack and produced something more racy which reflected the swinging sixties. I would also day that the short stories are fascinating as the James Bond character in those is different to the full novels , producing a nore hard-edged and ruthless edge that I feel Daniel Craig nailed spot on. The James Bond books are endlessly fascinating . The best efforts use a lean and economic style of prose whereas I think some of the books reflect the 1950s and not the 1960s that most people assume. I am always intrigued as to how film directors take the limited scope of the Bond novels and run with it albeit I still feel that William Boyd's "Solo" is probably the most original interpretation of this character , reflecting a spy who is increasingly out of sorts as the 1960s merges in to the 1970s. i just feel that James Bond is an excellent character to riff on.

[LMcD]

I still feel that William Boyd's "Solo" is probably the most original interpretation of this character , reflecting a spy who is increasingly out of sorts as the 1960s merges in to the 1970s

I've never been a fan of the books, and the last James Bond film I saw was 'Thunderball', but my admiration for William Boyd led me to try 'Solo' and I'm pleased to say I enjoyed it enormously.

[Ian Thumwood]

I've never been a fan of the books, and the last James Bond film I saw was 'Thunderball', but my admiration for William Boyd led me to try 'Solo' and I'm pleased to say I enjoyed it enormously.

I have read a few of the Bond novels by other authors and think that Anthony Horowitz came closest to capturing the voice of Fleming. However, I am a massive fan of William Boyd (I would put both "Love is blind" and "The Blue afternoon" into my Top Ten of modern fiction) and just felt that it was an extremely original take on 007. What is odd is that Fleming never placed Bond in Africa ij any of his books from recollection and that the continent has rarely featured in any of the films either. I love the idea of Bond starting to become marooned by the passage of time as he entered a more liberal decade as well as struggling to cope in a totally unfamiliar environment. From recollection, the ending was pretty good too and opened up the possibility of a further outing under Boyd's pen. "The Romantic" is currently sitting on my book case and I am looking forward to reading this over the Christmas.

I always find with William Boyd that there is a veneer of realism in his books yet this is always set off by dark humour and characters who tend towards the eccentric. Although he is very different, I sometimes feel that William Boyd is almost Dickensian in the way he populates his novels with unusual people. "Solo" never seems to get mentioned as one of Boyd's best but I think this book is as good if not better than some of Fleming's finest.

[LMcD]

[QUOTE=Ian Thumwood;n1293226]

I always find with William Boyd that there is a veneer of realism in his books yet this is always set off by dark humour and characters who tend towards the eccentric. Although he is very different, I sometimes feel that William Boyd is almost Dickensian in the way he populates his novels with unusual people.

This is certainly true of 'On The Yankee Station', which was the first of his books that I read.

[richardfinegold]

I have never read a Bond novel, by Fleming or anyone else. I am quite the fan of Anthony Horowitz and I like his take on the Sherlock Holmes stories in “Moriarity”. I never thought the Fleming Bond novels were anything more than drugstore pulp, but this is an impression, not supported by experience. So which Bond novel should I try?
I am a quarter way through Killers Of The Flower Moon, and greatly enthralled. It will be fascinating to compare it with a Scorsese treatment

[Jonathan]

The proof copy of my first novel, The Ventos Conspiracy, volume 1: Solitude. This will be out before Christmas and will be on Amazon, initially as a paperback and later, as a Kindle book. I've tried to attach a copy of the cover but it's not behaving on my phone...

[Hitch]

Octopussy is a fine short story. If it weren't for the pulp fiction association of James Bond, it might have found its way into a few anthologies.

[Ian Thumwood]

I think that the best Bond novels are "Casino Royale", "On her majesty's secret service" and "From Russia wih love." In my opinion, all three exceeding my expectations but the last is fascinating because Bond does not appear until about one third of the way into the book as the plot is about how the Russians conspire to assassinate him. The book is much better than the film. The same can be said for "the spy who loved me" which is effectively about an insurance scam which is thwarted by James Bond who appears in the last quarter of the book. Some of the others have elements where they show their 70 year age but the whole notion of them being "pulp" is perhaps off-set by the fact Fleming is an economic writer. The writing is very lean. The short stories are fascinating because the character of James Bond seem different to the novels and is effectively just an unemotional killer. Some of the books like "You only live twice" and "Moonraker " are pretty dire but the short stories are a marked contrast and are a bit better. They just recall incidents as opposed to a significant plot.

Horowitz does a brilliant job of capturing Fleming's voice in "Trigger mortis" but I have to say William Boyd was the most creative in dealing with James Bond. The attraction fof the Bond stories is that Fleming was often trying to drop his character in different scenarios or unfamiliar territory. In some ways, I think you could compare him to Zola who did the same and who was equally inconsistent. That said, I think that at his worst, Fleming could be dreadful.

[Padraig]

I am reading this year's Booker Prizewinner, Prophet by Paul Lynch. Set in the Republic, Dubliners are rocked by an extremist takeover, and fear rules when free speech becomes dangerous. The book has its distinct literary style, including the lack of direct speech. I have just completed chapter 5 (yes, there are chapters) and I can feel the fear and tension experienced by the characters.

The novel is a nice companion for the 2018 Booker Prize, Milkman by Anna Burns, another dystopian story this time from Northern Ireland, and again with a distinctive stream of consciousness style. Milkman is a brutal tale of paramilitary control in certain areas of Belfast, not without romance, humour and anger, and was a most satisfying read in its time.

I recommend both books.

[smittims]

Re-reading King Lear in my favourite edition, the New Penguin Shakespeare, edited by TJB Spencer and Stanley Wells, I was struck by the change in price of these books in their various reissues over the years. My copy , with a fine cover picture by David Gentleman, was 85p in 1982, but my Richard II in the 2008 reissue was £8.99!

[richardfinegold]

The proof copy of my first novel, The Ventos Conspiracy, volume 1: Solitude. This will be out before Christmas and will be on Amazon, initially as a paperback and later, as a Kindle book. I've tried to attach a copy of the cover but it's not behaving on my phone...

What is it about?

[richardfinegold]

Re-reading King Lear in my favourite edition, the New Penguin Shakespeare, edited by TJB Spencer and Stanley Wells, I was struck by the change in price of these books in their various reissues over the years. My copy , with a fine cover picture by David Gentleman, was 85p in 1982, but my Richard II in the 2008 reissue was £8.99!

What features in different editions of Shakespeare make them noteworthy?

[Jonathan]

What is it about?

It's a science fiction novel, basically, an ordinary man finds himself embroiled in a conspiracy involving the planetary government and runs away to the supposedly uninhabited planet which is at the centre of it. Volume 2 (Confrontation) will be out next summer and book 3 (Paradox) the next year (when I've finished writing it!). Hope this helps

[smittims]

Well, richard, one could write a book to answer your question,and indeed this has probably been done by more learned minds than mine. Editing Shakespeare is a lifetime's occupation.

Briefly,this is because, although the plays are clearly masterpieces of inexahustible fascination and human significance, there are so many mysteries about exactly what the author intended at so many points. For instance,there is no known surviving autograph of any of the plays, and the various forms in which they have come down to us suggest clearly that changes were made, though we lack information as to the nature and extent of the changes when , why or by whom. King Lear, for example , survives in two versions , one a quarto from 1608, which , though published in the author's lifetime, has no clear provenance, and a Folio from 1623, which, though printed after his death was published by two of his former colleagues. There are discrepancies between the two texts, but neither is clearly 'better' than the other. Other plays display other problems. Macbeth seems to have some scenes missing: characters refer to something that happened earlier which is not in the text. Pericles, long thought to be a pirated text, is now considered to have been a collaboration between Shakespeare and George Wilkins,the author of a contemporary novel on the same story. In most cases we lack clear facts about how the texts reached their surviving states. And ironically , the 1623 Folio, which was meant to establish a standard text, and which is the only surviving versionof about half the plays, presents innumerable textual problems, largely because we don't know what editing Hemmings and Condell did to their sources, nor where they got them.

So the editor needs to research such subjects as the practice of printing and proofreading in Jacobean England, the extent to which authors collaborated, the changes made when a play was revived with or without the author's involvement, and so on. He needs also to know a lot about knowledge, beliefs and ethics of the time, to understand why Shakespeare makes his characters say sometimes puzzling things.

Different editors will have different approaches and different theories about all these things . And they will be influenced by their own beliefs about Shakespeare and his intentions. Here is further uncertainty, since he has very skilfully concealed from us his own private moral, ethical and spiritual beliefs. He left no interviews nor exlapanations, as recent authors have done. If his plays were simple and their surviving text definitive, there would be no need of editions. That this is not so is the start of an endless search.

[Pulcinella]

When setting examination questions on King Lear (as my partner does), although the exam syllabus specifies the edition (Alexander, I think), he usually has to be VERY careful that any passage to be commented on is 'common' to several editions in case a different edition has in fact been used (the paper is an international one, so the recommended edition might not be readily available in all the countries where the exam is sat).