Abington professor pens book on literary works adapted for film

Abington professor pens book on literary works adapted for film

Leonard Mustazza, distinguished professor of English and American Studies at Penn State Abington, recently had his book, "The Literary Filmography: 6,200 Adaptations of Books, Short Stories and Other Nondramatic Works," published by McFarland and Co. The book, which contains two volumes, explores how from the very infancy of the film industry, filmmakers have relied heavily upon literature as the foundation for their movie material. Well-known literary works such as Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" and Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter" were adapted to film in the silent era, and in more recent years, each of Helen Fielding's "Bridget Jones' Diary" novels were the basis for popular movies bearing the same names. A guide to English-language works that have been adapted as theatrical and television films, this volume includes fiction and non-fiction books, short stories, newspaper and magazine articles and poems.

"I worked on it for four years and the idea for the book kind of hatched from a course I was teaching on great books that were made into great films," said Mustazza, noting that "To Kill a Mockingbird," "The Godfather" and "A Beautiful Mind" are among his favorite such works. "What was really interesting was discovering to what extent the movie industry depends on written stories as opposed to original screenplays. Most of the early silent films were based on classic novels, and the use of adapted stories continues strong to this day. From one estimate, there have been as many as 20,000 books made into films worldwide."