ENG 3114 Spring 2025 - Flynn

Since its conception, the cinema and its filmmakers have constantly drawn from literary sources to create narratives in the new medium. In this course, we will study classic and contemporary theories of film adaptation, borrowing as well as breaking from the concept of fidelity to create a space to explore how film engages with literature, and how literary stories are deformed and reformed through the medium of film. We will examine a variety of text-to-film adaptations and explore their wider adaptation “networks." Subsequently, we will also consider how some literature was influenced by film, or adapted itself by “seeing cinematically,” before the cinema even fully evolved. Films (and their relevant source texts) for study may include: adaptation, Alice in Wonderland, Blade Runner/2049, The Birds, The Fantastic Mr. Fox, The Killers, Nosferatu, Rashomon, Romeo + Juliet, Rope, Suspiria, etc.