Post by nolan on Jun 21, 2006 0:44:29 GMT -5
I placed a thread asking people to adapt "The Picture of Dorian Grey."
What other works do you think I should ask people to adapt for formal story prompts?
I've asked someone to fill me in on a few things regarding the copyright situation of some work. But, let me assure you guys that there's some bloody awesome stuff in the public domain that we could easily make in to awesome comic stories.
Because, lets face it, when people think comic adaptations, they think those Classics Illustrated books for kids or some really bad movie tie in. In Japan, manga adaptations of Western works have been done. And in France, this is a fairly important genre. Lets show people that comics can adapt literature every bit as well as film or the stage can.
A few things to keep in mind:
1. We either need stuff that is yours, that you own the adequate rights to (which would mean that you'd have to know the writer or have acquired the rights somehow) or work in the public domain (basically stuff before 1923, and, even then, I'd still have to do some legwork regarding things).
2. Here's what I know we can't do:
We can't do Peter Pan. The copyright to that thing is tied up and its not in the public domain in the US or UK. The UK passed some weird law that granted perpetual royalties to a hospital and some loophole was used in the US too.
We can't do ant post-1923 H.P. Lovecraft. The copyright situation around his work is really crazy, its tied up to the point wher4e the people who publish it don't even know if they really onw the rights. The pre-1923 stuff should be okay if you want to suggest that. Unfortunately (or fortunately), it seems that most of his best known stuff is post-1923.
Jayvee suggested Little Nemo. I'm trying to figure out the situation there. The comic strips are in the public domain. But there was an animated film and a video game from like 1990 that are copyrighted. And the collections of the book seem to have a copyright regarding the entire book and not jsut the supplemental materials, so if I did that, I mgiht have to do some real searching for a source. There is a chance that we may not be able to do this one.
With regard to religious scriptures: the Bible, the King James version is fine. The NIV and some of the newer ones are still copyrighted but there are a lot of English Bible translations. The Koran, well, I think I could find a public domain translation of it. NOt so sure about Hindu or Buddhist scriptures or the Popul Vuh or the Book of Mormon or something like that. But if you suggest it, ill do my best (honestly, I bet there's a public domain version of damn near all religious scripture).
3. For stuff not originally done in English, it could be tricky. As the individual translations may not be in the public domain. This might not be so much of a problem for something like Dante's Commedia (which has been translated in to English for centuries) or Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur (see above) but it could be troublesome for more obscure works that, while hundreds of years old, have only been translated in to English in the last 50 years or so.
Regarding the kinds of things you should be looking for:
4. Lets go for things that you think have the potential in some way to be strong comic book stories. So go for things that you think either have strong visuals and themes that the comic medium could bring forward in them already, or things that would easily lend themselves to this task.
5. And lets try to find things that could be taken in a number of directions and can really show off the individual voice of a given writer or artist. Some works lend themselves more easily to this then others.
Suggested so far:
Don Quixote. Jayvee. Written in like 1600. Could easily find an English translation in the public domain. There are ones dating back to like 1620.
Wizard of Oz. Suggested by Jayvee. Written in 1900. All 14 of the L. Frank Baum books are in the public domain. Unfortunately, it might need to be done in a way that is substantially different from the well known film (and probably the less well known sequel).
What other works do you think I should ask people to adapt for formal story prompts?
I've asked someone to fill me in on a few things regarding the copyright situation of some work. But, let me assure you guys that there's some bloody awesome stuff in the public domain that we could easily make in to awesome comic stories.
Because, lets face it, when people think comic adaptations, they think those Classics Illustrated books for kids or some really bad movie tie in. In Japan, manga adaptations of Western works have been done. And in France, this is a fairly important genre. Lets show people that comics can adapt literature every bit as well as film or the stage can.
A few things to keep in mind:
1. We either need stuff that is yours, that you own the adequate rights to (which would mean that you'd have to know the writer or have acquired the rights somehow) or work in the public domain (basically stuff before 1923, and, even then, I'd still have to do some legwork regarding things).
2. Here's what I know we can't do:
We can't do Peter Pan. The copyright to that thing is tied up and its not in the public domain in the US or UK. The UK passed some weird law that granted perpetual royalties to a hospital and some loophole was used in the US too.
We can't do ant post-1923 H.P. Lovecraft. The copyright situation around his work is really crazy, its tied up to the point wher4e the people who publish it don't even know if they really onw the rights. The pre-1923 stuff should be okay if you want to suggest that. Unfortunately (or fortunately), it seems that most of his best known stuff is post-1923.
Jayvee suggested Little Nemo. I'm trying to figure out the situation there. The comic strips are in the public domain. But there was an animated film and a video game from like 1990 that are copyrighted. And the collections of the book seem to have a copyright regarding the entire book and not jsut the supplemental materials, so if I did that, I mgiht have to do some real searching for a source. There is a chance that we may not be able to do this one.
With regard to religious scriptures: the Bible, the King James version is fine. The NIV and some of the newer ones are still copyrighted but there are a lot of English Bible translations. The Koran, well, I think I could find a public domain translation of it. NOt so sure about Hindu or Buddhist scriptures or the Popul Vuh or the Book of Mormon or something like that. But if you suggest it, ill do my best (honestly, I bet there's a public domain version of damn near all religious scripture).
3. For stuff not originally done in English, it could be tricky. As the individual translations may not be in the public domain. This might not be so much of a problem for something like Dante's Commedia (which has been translated in to English for centuries) or Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur (see above) but it could be troublesome for more obscure works that, while hundreds of years old, have only been translated in to English in the last 50 years or so.
Regarding the kinds of things you should be looking for:
4. Lets go for things that you think have the potential in some way to be strong comic book stories. So go for things that you think either have strong visuals and themes that the comic medium could bring forward in them already, or things that would easily lend themselves to this task.
5. And lets try to find things that could be taken in a number of directions and can really show off the individual voice of a given writer or artist. Some works lend themselves more easily to this then others.
Suggested so far:
Don Quixote. Jayvee. Written in like 1600. Could easily find an English translation in the public domain. There are ones dating back to like 1620.
Wizard of Oz. Suggested by Jayvee. Written in 1900. All 14 of the L. Frank Baum books are in the public domain. Unfortunately, it might need to be done in a way that is substantially different from the well known film (and probably the less well known sequel).