In his 1976 book-length essay, The Devil Finds Work, James Baldwin asserts that the practice of adaptation enacts “considerable violence to the written word.” Is it possible to adapt a text without performing violence against the source material? Is the violence of adaptation limited only to the “written word” of a novel? Are novels more than their words? Are adaptations more than violations? What does it mean to adapt Black novels in particular?

Over four weeks, we will explore and refine these questions together.

This mini-course invites students to consider the economic, political, and cultural phenomenon of literature-to-film adaptation and its implications for Black writers and their novels, as well as readers and moviegoers.

Each week, students will read a novel and watch its adaptation.

In addition to these primary texts, students will receive supplemental readings. These optional readings will include film reviews and key scholarship on literature and film adaptation, such as passages from George Bluestone’s 1957 Novel in to Film, Barbara Tepa Lupack’s 2002 Literary Adaptations in Black American Cinema, and Monica White Ndounou’s essay “Playing with Fire: Black Women’s Literature / White Box Office.”

Full syllabus available upon registration.