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What was the first major modern “retelling”?
I’m reading “James,” and have been thinking about this genre of literary retellings that center the perspective of a marginal, overlooked or “othered” character.
What are the first major works in this strain? I thought of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, and Wide Sargasso Sea. Are there other earlier examples? Woolf imagining Judith Shakespeare seems like a proto-text, but that’s an essay, not an actual full novel.
Note: I’m not talking about just any works drawn from earlier stuff, like, “oh well the Aenid is a retelling of the Troy legend or Shakespeare repurposed classical and ancient stories, legends, and histories and other older source material.” I’m talking about self-consciously revisionist retellings whose conceit is centering minor characters.
#entertainment
I’m reading “James,” and have been thinking about this genre of literary retellings that center the perspective of a marginal, overlooked or “othered” character.
What are the first major works in this strain? I thought of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, and Wide Sargasso Sea. Are there other earlier examples? Woolf imagining Judith Shakespeare seems like a proto-text, but that’s an essay, not an actual full novel.
Note: I’m not talking about just any works drawn from earlier stuff, like, “oh well the Aenid is a retelling of the Troy legend or Shakespeare repurposed classical and ancient stories, legends, and histories and other older source material.” I’m talking about self-consciously revisionist retellings whose conceit is centering minor characters.
#entertainment
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