Roald Dahl (1916 -1990)

This 13th of September marks the centenary of Roald Dahl's birth. Loved by millions of readers all over the world, not many people know that this Welsh children's author was also a Second World War Royal Air Force pilot and spy. He met and worked alongside Ian Fleming, who would later become James Bond's creator . As a screenwriter, Roald Dahl himself would write the script for You Only Live Twice.

His charming characters  are unforgettable. His skilful and magic stories keep the reader enthralled from start to finish. Although they are widely popular nowadays also thanks to their screen versions - like Spielberg's Gremlins,  Tim Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Danny de Vito's Matilda or James and the Giant Peach - he firmly believed in the importance of reading, and he was not always pleased with these adaptations.  "I'm probably more pleased with my children's books than with my adult short stories. Children's books are harder to write. It's tougher to keep a child interested because a child does not have the concentration of an adult. A child knows the television is in the next room. It's tough to hold a child, but it's a lovely thing to try to do."        

Henry James, Washington Square and Cervantes

Like many 19th c. Americans, Henry James (1843 -1916) grew up with that feeling that culture, beauty and sophistication lay on the other side of the Atlantic. Living in a country with no antiquity or mystery, but only with commonplace prosperity, class distinction involved travelling to the Old World to imbibe all its art and elegance; probably, just a question of snobbery. He could afford doing so and so could and did many of the upper-middle class characters in his novels.

He anchored most of his cosmopolitan writings in an idealised aristocratic Europe, focusing on personal relationships and aiming at a kind of psychological realism: The Golden Bowl, The Portrait of a Lady, The Turns of the Screw... Although Washington Square is mainly set in the New York quarter where he was born, describing his maternal grandmother's house, Austin Sloper and his daughter also cross the ocean. It is something brief, but "she failed to gather animation from the mountains of Switzerland or the monuments of Italy". A wicked father, an unscrupulous suitor and a virtuous and wronged heroine were familiar types from Victorian melodramas. This novel, which defies a happy end, was turned into the unforgettable The Heiress, starring Olivia de Havilland and Montgomery Clift; a film I watched a long time ago, and before reading the book, probably too young to understand how Catherine could resign herself to a lonely future, locking the door against the man who had once betrayed her love.

In a recent trip to New York City, I wanted to visit the place. Nowadays there is a residential neighbourhood which has developed around Washington Square Park, a green space to hang out and stage demonstrations, a park adored by the locals and a kind of sanctuary for the Beat Generation of the 40s and 50s. Strolling around, just a few metres away from the park arch, we arrived at NY University campus where, at the end of a courtyard just off the 5th Avenue, we unexpectedly met... a statue of Cervantes.

We could read it had been a present to the city from the mayor of Madrid in 1989 and, first intended to be located in the middle of Washington Square Park, the statue had been considered too fragile and they had opted for this charming alley instead. Surfing the net, we also learnt that at the end of the 19th century the small Spanish colony in New York had already made an unsuccessful proposal to raise money to donate the city a statue of Cervantes in order to improve the hostile image of Spain at that time due to the war in Cuba. The statue would finally manage to turn up a century later, but by other means and for other reasons.

Cinema and Literature: The Brönte Sisters

The interplay between literature and cinema is as old as the medium of celluloid. Transferring novels, short stories, plays, and even poetry, to the screen has always played a crucial role in popularizing literature. Books usually provide films with the raw material, with a narrative line and characters which are already described. Anyway, books leave more to our imagination and films may not be completely faithful to their plots. 

Having just watched Emily Brönte´s Wuthering Heights  may make me reread this masterpiece of elemental and universal passions. Sweeping love, hate, revenge... Set against the Yorkshire moors, a landscape as wild as the relationship of the main characters, the novel is considered the heart and soul of the romantic spirit. The film is full of really powerful scenes, one of them when Heathcliff tears Catherine´s grave open, removing one side of her coffin. Gothic elements also appear in Charlotte Brönte´s Jane Eyre and the new adaptation released a few months ago. There are persecutions, a threatening atmosphere, a gloomy manor house, madness and cruelty. But this 19th century novel also heralds a new kind of heroine, one whose independence, persistence and virtuous integrity let her triumph over class barriers to win equal status with the man she loves.

Obviously, watching a film is not the same as reading a novel. They are different aesthetic genres with different conventions. Each of them has its own language and art of seduction, but both can explain the meaning of the world, who we are and what we are like. Both have the ability of entertaining, appealing to our emotions and moving us. They are simply good allies and, however good or bad an adaptation may be, it is always good news if it sends viewers back to the literary source.

The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore (2011)

Inspired by The Wizard of Oz, Alice in Wonderland, hurricane Katrina and a love for books, The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore praises the imaginative and captivating power of stories and the magical way in which books feed our soul. It has won the Oscar Academy Award for best animated short film in 2012.

Books fill our life. Every time we open one and we get wrapped up in a good story, we are taken on a extraordinary journey. We are quickly transported into a time and place where nothing else exists. Our minds are broadened and nourished. Books are meant to educate and inspire us, to lift us from our current states of indifference. Our existence is given life only when we start reading.