When “a Pastoral Romance” Becomes “a Classic Love Story”: Thomas Vinterberg and David Nicholls’ 2015 Adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s "Far from the Madding Crowd"

Authors

  • Elżbieta Rokosz University of Rzeszow

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15584/tik.2020.35

Keywords:

adaptation, Thomas Hardy, Victorian novel, Thomas Vinterberg

Abstract

The article discusses the 2015 adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s 1874 novel Far from the Madding Crowd in the context of earlier adaptations of Hardy’s texts.
It focuses on the modifications introduced in the adaptation process, especially those concerning the female protagonist, Bathsheba Everdeen, aimed at making her more “modern” and balancing her independence,unusual for the 19th century, with the adaptors’ urge to make her the heroine of a romantic love story, which in Thomas Vinterberg’s film surprisingly comes to the foreground.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Bull, Sarah. 2013 (October20).“Carey Mulligan sports period costume as she starts shooting ‘revolutionary’ new take of Far From The Madding Crowd”, MailOnline http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2469171/Carey-Mulligan-sports-period-costume-starts-shooting-Far-From-The-Madding-Crowd.html

Friedman, Alan. 1966. “Innocence, Expansion, and Containment” [in:]Schweik, R. C.Thomas Hardy. Far from the Madding Crowd: An Authoritative Text. Backgrounds. Criticism. New York and London: W. W. Norton & Company, pp. 385-392.

Fuller, Graham. 2015 (Summer). “Wessex and the Single Girl Female Independence in John Schlesinger’s and Thomas Vinterberg’s Screen Adaptations of Thomas Hardy’s Far from the Madding Crowd,” CINEASTE, pp. 12-16.

Gibson, Megan. 2015 (May 18).“It’s a Madding, Madding World.A Hardy heroine gets an update,” Time, p.51.

Hardy, Thomas. 1874/1986. Far From the Madding Crowd. New York and London: W. W. Norton & Company.

Huntley, Dana. 2015 (Oct/Nov). “Far From the Madding Crowd – Thomas Hardy, Light and Sumptuous,” British Heritage, p. 67.

James, Henry.1874/1986. From the Nation, December 24, 1874 [in:]Schweik, R. C.Thomas Hardy. Far from the Madding Crowd: An Authoritative Text. Backgrounds. Criticism. New York and London: W. W. Norton & Company, pp. 367-368.

Kinkead-Weekes, Mark. 2011. D. H. Lawrence: Triumph to Exile 1912-1922. Volume 2. The Cambridge Biography of D. H. Lawrence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Lodge, David.1977.“Thomas Hardy as a Cinematic Novelist” [in:] Lance St. John Butler (ed.) Thomas Hardy After Fifty Years. London and Basingstoke: Macmillan, pp. 78-89.

Miller, Lucasta. 2015, “Far From the Madding Crowd – does the film live up to Hardy’s novel?” The Guardian,https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/apr/24/far-from-the-madding-crowd-hardys-novel

Niemeyer, Paul. 2003. Seeing Hardy: Film and Television Adaptations of the Fiction of Thomas Hardy, McFarland.

Perosa, Sergio. 2016. “Comment: Portrait of a Lady Far from the Madding Crowd”, TheHudson Review, Vol. 69, Issue 3, pp. 360-367.

Shires, Linda. 1993. “Narrative, Gender and Power in Far from the Madding Crowd” [in] Higonnet, Margaret R. (ed.) The Sense of Sex: Feminist Perspectives on Hardy”, University of Illinois Press, pp. 49-65.

Vinterberg, Thomas. 2015. Interview. Far From the Madding Crowd. “Flicks and the City Clips. Youtube.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPdbEQevsrs

Vinterberg, Thomas, Schoenaerts, Matthias. 2015. Interview. Far From the Madding Crowd. Film Society of Lincoln Center. Youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbJBZaK7Kio

Wain, John. 1965. Introduction to Thomas Hardy, The Dynasts. 1904, 1906, 1908. London: Macmillan; New York: St. Martin’s, pp. v-xix.

Welsh, James. 1981.“Hardy and the Pastoral, Schlesinger and Shepherds: Far from the Madding Crowd,” Literature/Film Quarterly (Vol 9, No. 2), pp. 79-84.

Widdowson, Peter. 2005. “The silent era: Thomas Hardy goes way down east” [in:] Wright, T.R. (ed.) Thomas Hardy on Screen, CUP, pp. 50-62.

Wright, Terry, 2005. “Hardy as a cinematic novelist”: three aspects of narrative technique.” [in:] Wright,T.R. (ed.) Thomas Hardy on Screen, CUP, pp. 8-19.

Far From the Madding Crowd (1967), dir. J. Schelsinger, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Far From the Madding Crowd (2015), dir. T. Vinterberg, BBC Films/DNA Films.

The Portrait of a Lady (1996), dir. J. Campion, PolyGram Filmed Entertainment.

Downloads

Published

2020-12-30

How to Cite

Rokosz, E. (2020). When “a Pastoral Romance” Becomes “a Classic Love Story”: Thomas Vinterberg and David Nicholls’ 2015 Adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s "Far from the Madding Crowd". Tematy i Konteksty, 15(10), 483–494. https://doi.org/10.15584/tik.2020.35