Comic-book "Pride and prejudice" by Nancy Butler as an adaptation of Jane Austen’s novel

Abstract

Comic book adaptations of classics have become more and more popular as a genre of mass culture. No wonder, that their creators turned to such a cult author as Jane Austen. In the article, the reasons of the interest to her novel Pride and prejudice by the mass culture, as well as by Butler, who wrote the script for the adaptation, are investigated. The types of the major transformations of the original are defined and the reasons of their introduction, either caused by such genre features of comics as dynamism, visual orientation, segmentation etc., or by the nature of mass literature are described. The comparative analysis of the novel and its adaptation shows that the adaptation lacks the specific style characteristic of Jane Austen’s work as the author’s commentary is reduced to its minimum. The description of everyday life, the psychological depth and plot complexity are contracted all the attention is focused on the love line, the episodes and characters not connected with Darcy — Elizabeth relationships are omitted. The portraits of the characters are drawn in the grotesque “Marvel” production style, which simplifies the characters making them “flat”. However, the adaptations of literary classics become a good way of popularization of the “high-brow” literature: the readers’ responses show that more than 60% of them felt urged to read the novel after getting acquainted with its adaptation.