STATEMENT
When I decided on Coraline for this project, I was worried that it didn’t reflect on the course questions well enough, that I would have trouble relating it back. I’m very happy to say, I could not have been more wrong. The Beldam, aka the “Other Mother”—and the whole world she’s created—is a monster who is the perfect physical representation of several cultural anxieties, specifically possessive/abusive love, child abduction, and the idea of “uncanny.” Not only this, but the anxieties the Beldam represents aren’t the only ones the novel puts forth, with familial neglect and the fears of growing up also being prominent themes. I definitely want to emulate all these themes in my own adaptation, but I’d especially like to focus on the themes of the fears growing up and family, as they’re personal to me, as well as subject matters that are timeless, reoccurring over and over again throughout history.
In all honesty, I found it incredibly hard to find anything I did not like about this novel. I love the themes, I love the writing style, the illustrations. I spent nearly twenty minutes agonizing about it, until finally I remembered one detail that had nagged at me. See, this was actually my first time reading the novel, after years of only having seen the 2009 film adaptation. Because of this, I was surprised to find out that in the novel, Coraline never likes the other mother or the other world. She finds it off-putting, and she only returns when she absolutely has to. While this wasn’t necessarily a bad thing per se, it made the progression of the story, and Coraline’s character arc, feel a bit rushed. But then lies the question: should I change that aspect? And the answer is, I’m not sure! I’m not sure that it’s the right move, that it will in any way improve the flow of the story. What I do know is that this change worked wonderfully in the film, and I believe that taking creative license when making an adaptation is important.
Which leads me into the details of my adaptation (title still remains to be seen). I’ve decided to write a short story that is a prequel to the original Coraline novel, taking place in a small farming town in Maine as opposed to England, at Christmastime rather than summer break, and in 1904 instead of 2002. This means of course, that many of the characters are changed, as this is a prequel and not a reimagining. Obviously this will affect aspects of the story—particularly the setting descriptions, language, and characters ideals/motivations—but I don’t believe it’ll go so far as to change the central message of the story (again, the themes of Coraline are pretty timeless).
Seeing as Coraline has so many themes, it was certainly difficult to choose what I wanted my central message to be. Did I want it to keep it close to the original, or did I want to change it up? Bring my own flavor to it? Ultimately I decided to keep the original message—or at least, my interpretation of what that message is: If your view of the world is focused only on yourself, you will never see the whole picture. I’ll explore the other themes and messages that I have planned as well, but I want this to be at the heart of the story, because it’s an extremely important message, and one that speaks very true to the lesson that Coraline tries to teach. And even though this message is one that I think has been taught throughout most of human history, it pertains especially to what’s happening in the world around us right now (particularly here in America). People have begun to turn against their fellow men, and society as a whole has become obsessed only with self-preservation. It has become an issue of “us” versus “them,” and I want to challenge that ideology through this story, just as Neil Gaiman did nearly seventeen years ago. As for philosophical questions in the short story (or questions in general, really), I’d like the focus—both from me and from the reader—to be mostly on these five points: What is the reality when you get everything you’ve ever wanted? What is real self-sacrifice and why is it so important when Ruth (the main character) achieves it? What is the importance of eyes as a motif? What is the significance of the color green? And finally, why is the concept of uncanny so unsettling?
In all honesty, I found it incredibly hard to find anything I did not like about this novel. I love the themes, I love the writing style, the illustrations. I spent nearly twenty minutes agonizing about it, until finally I remembered one detail that had nagged at me. See, this was actually my first time reading the novel, after years of only having seen the 2009 film adaptation. Because of this, I was surprised to find out that in the novel, Coraline never likes the other mother or the other world. She finds it off-putting, and she only returns when she absolutely has to. While this wasn’t necessarily a bad thing per se, it made the progression of the story, and Coraline’s character arc, feel a bit rushed. But then lies the question: should I change that aspect? And the answer is, I’m not sure! I’m not sure that it’s the right move, that it will in any way improve the flow of the story. What I do know is that this change worked wonderfully in the film, and I believe that taking creative license when making an adaptation is important.
Which leads me into the details of my adaptation (title still remains to be seen). I’ve decided to write a short story that is a prequel to the original Coraline novel, taking place in a small farming town in Maine as opposed to England, at Christmastime rather than summer break, and in 1904 instead of 2002. This means of course, that many of the characters are changed, as this is a prequel and not a reimagining. Obviously this will affect aspects of the story—particularly the setting descriptions, language, and characters ideals/motivations—but I don’t believe it’ll go so far as to change the central message of the story (again, the themes of Coraline are pretty timeless).
Seeing as Coraline has so many themes, it was certainly difficult to choose what I wanted my central message to be. Did I want it to keep it close to the original, or did I want to change it up? Bring my own flavor to it? Ultimately I decided to keep the original message—or at least, my interpretation of what that message is: If your view of the world is focused only on yourself, you will never see the whole picture. I’ll explore the other themes and messages that I have planned as well, but I want this to be at the heart of the story, because it’s an extremely important message, and one that speaks very true to the lesson that Coraline tries to teach. And even though this message is one that I think has been taught throughout most of human history, it pertains especially to what’s happening in the world around us right now (particularly here in America). People have begun to turn against their fellow men, and society as a whole has become obsessed only with self-preservation. It has become an issue of “us” versus “them,” and I want to challenge that ideology through this story, just as Neil Gaiman did nearly seventeen years ago. As for philosophical questions in the short story (or questions in general, really), I’d like the focus—both from me and from the reader—to be mostly on these five points: What is the reality when you get everything you’ve ever wanted? What is real self-sacrifice and why is it so important when Ruth (the main character) achieves it? What is the importance of eyes as a motif? What is the significance of the color green? And finally, why is the concept of uncanny so unsettling?