From Imagination To Images

The adaptation of books into films has always been equally frustrating and rewarding

- Jasodhara Banerjee

Science fiction writer Arthur C Clarke first sat down to watch the completed version of 2001: A Space Odyssey—for which he had co-written the screenplay, based on his short story The Sentinel—at a private premier of the 1968 film directed and produced by Stanley Kubrick. At intermission, he left the screening, in tears. For, despite having worked closely with Kubrick in the making of the film, the final cut was nothing like what he had thought it would be.

The incident was recalled and narrated by author Michael Moorcock, a friend of Clarke’s, in his introduction to the illustrated version of 2001: A Space Odyssey, published by Folio Society in 2016, and is a stark example of what can go wrong while reimagining a story in the process of translating it from one medium to another. Kubrick’s dream had clearly turned out to be Clarke’s nightmare.

Adapting books into films is, ultimately, a matter of imagination.

“Writing a book requires the imagination of the reader, while making a film requires the imagination of the filmmaker,” says film director and producer Kiran Rao. “They are two very different mediums—books and films—and have very different demands.”