A classic case

I never expected to adapt a classic as an ELT graded reader. I had spent all of my writing career on original works, and I always preferred writing something specific to finding an existing text and re-using it – though with intermediate and upper-intermediate levels, I sometimes used short extracts from writers such as Dickens or Oscar Wilde. When speaking about graded readers, I always emphasised the virtues of new original materials rather than yet another graded version of the same select bunch of classics.

Garnet’s Oracle Readers was intended to be a series of original fiction graded readers. However, after the first titles were published, I was approached to adapt three classics based on market requests, and I thought I might try it. We decided to do one book at each of levels 3, 4 and 5: Much Ado About Nothing (3), Robinson Crusoe (4) and Wuthering Heights (5). A later second batch includes Treasure Island (3) and A Tale of Two Cities (5).

For many prospective authors, graded readers are a route into publishing. In this article, I will explain what I do. It might not be everyone’s choice, but it worked for me.

Total immersion

My first advice is not to look at any other graded adaptation at all. You then have a blank sheet and no pre-judgements on how to abridge the story for ELT.

It is, however, a good idea to obtain some different versions aimed at native speakers: the book itself, an abridged audio version, if one is available, and at least one film version, preferably two. With Wuthering Heights, I also watched two TV series on DVD.

You need to familiarise yourself thoroughly with the plot by reading the original book, but you will find that film versions are useful because they necessarily abridge the events and focus on the most important, giving you pointers about what you must include and what you can omit. However, you will find that film versions often change that focus. In the book of Treasure Island, for example, it is fascinating how much intrigue, mystery and tension Stevenson builds before the characters even set out to sea. It’s a quarter of the novel! In the audio version, that is kept pretty much fully intact because it draws the listener in. The 1950 film, however, races through all that in less than five minutes and then spends its time on creaking sails and lush jungle pictures, followed by the violent action. Generally, in a book, intrigue and mystery work much better than violence.

My system doesn’t always work. The film didn’t help me with A Tale of Two Cities. The 1958 British film is ponderous and turgid, and the clipped RP speech of the actors makes it almost unintelligible, too. It’s an appalling film version at every level: script, adaptation, acting, direction, camera. Worse, they moved the revelation of the Marquis’s dirty deeds right up to the beginning, so all the big surprises were gone.

I think my publishers may have been expecting a prose adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing, but I decided to do it as a play script because you can have more fun with that in class. As with a novel, you need to know the text well. One of the reasons I accepted the project was that I had seen the play on stage six months earlier, and already had tickets to see it just two days later at The Globe in London. I had also seen the American film twice: in the cinema, and on DVD, and I studied the play many years ago at school. I bought a stage version on DVD and a further film version. Again, my advice would be to immerse yourself thoroughly in the plot before you begin writing.

The author’s voice

Working on Wuthering Heights, I fell back in love with the book. What I really admire about Emily Brontë is her ability to use dialogue, and this brings us to an important point: Where possible, when it fits structurally and lexically, you should import the actual words from the book. Sometimes do not for don’t might sound stilted, but in classics it often adds a useful tone of formality. In Treasure Island, Stevenson uses Not I rather than the more frequent Not me. Did I worry about that? Not I. It’s perfectly clear.

The first line of A Tale of Two Cities (It was the best of times. It was the worst of times) is one of the classic first lines of a novel, along with Call Me Ishmael … from Moby Dick, and the first line of Earthly Powers by Anthony Burgess (voted most arresting opening line of the 20th century): It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday, and I was in bed with my catamite when Ali announcedthat the archbishop had come to see me.

In my view, the adaptor should go with It was the best of times. It was the worst of times because by intermediate level it’s comprehensible, and, though I hate to say it, it reinforces a useful teaching contrast: best versus worst. After I had finished, I looked at another adaptation (longer and higher in level). That didn’t retain the original opening, and I wonder why not. Always respect the original authors and use them when you can. When they do something unexpected, as when Treasure Island suddenly switches narrators from Jim Hawkins to Dr Livesey, think why Stevenson did it! (Hint: In ELT terms, it also avoids the necessity for past perfect and reported speech … outside our Level 3). So, where possible, follow the author.

One exception is Charles Dickens, who is extremely irritating for adaptors because frequently he deliberately tries to be convoluted and to reveal slowly who he’s talking about. You cannot stick with him stylistically in a graded reader, and no adaptor does. Emily Brontë, though chronologically earlier, reads as a far more modern writer. The process of writing an adaptation made me like Emily Brontë and Robert Louis Stevenson more than I had before, but made me like Charles Dickens somewhat less. Be aware that you might be dissecting a favourite book to the point where its charms fade for you.

Graded language

Publishers of graded readers have lists of the vocabulary and structures that are acceptable at each level. Additional content-obligatory words are allowed, but are limited. The fact that I had designed the language grading scheme for the Oracle Readers was a great help. I knew the structural grading without having to refer constantly to the list of permitted language. When writing a reader, I always have the language list on my screen next to the document I’m working on.

I have also worked with other schemes, and the publishers have insisted on a print copy of the structure list and headwords, rather than an electronic one. My advice is always to try to get an electronic one … by the time you get to 2,000-word lists, COMMAND-F for finding if a word is on the list or not is much faster than searching through a hard copy. It is irritating to have to keep checking, but the more you do so, the less you will need to. Referring carefully to the list has other advantages. In one story I wrote, I employed a variety of complicated ways to avoid using the word bury, but on re-reading the list when I had finished, I found it was there anyway.

Familiarise yourself with whatever scheme you are being asked to follow. In one scheme I wrote for, foot and ball were in the word list, but football counted as an additional word. The Oracle Readers scheme allows logical guessing, so that if both elements are in the list and the compound is transparent, it doesn’t count as an extra word.

Oracle Classics has a 1,000-headword count at Level 3, and 40 additional words are allowed, which will be glossed. Some writers adapt very tightly and use only (say) 18 extra words. I always want the full 40 because I believe that graded reading should both expand vocabulary and enhance the students’ ability to approach new words. As an editor, I’m not a fanatic about this. I would accept, say, 37 to 43 additional words without arguing. I have written for another scheme where 30 additional words means 30. With this particular publisher, you cannot argue that 31 works better. Somy advice would be to use the full allocation of additional words.

I would also recommend what I term ‘enrichment’. Write tightly, finish the book and then read the word list again, thinking which words (among those you didn’t use) might enrich what you’ve done. For example, when Treasure Island was finished, I read the 1,000-word list again and identified 11 good words that could potentially go into the story. I found places for nine of them seamlessly, and it improved the story. So use as much of the basic list as you possibly can.

Deviating from the story

Don’t be too faithful. With Treasure Island I decided I could change a few proper nouns, For example, Stevenson has two sailors called Tom. One is Tom Morgan, an important pirate. The other is Tom, a sailor who is murdered by Long John Silver. I had listened to the heavily abridged audiobook for native speakers,and it really confused me. So I just changed the murdered one to Jack. Why not? Later, they find the skeleton and remember the man’s name was Allardyce. Is it worth the students trying to pronounce that, even if only mentally? It appears just once. I thought not. I changed it to Carter. At another point, they recall Captain Flint’s last request to Darby McGraw. I cut the McGraw.

The abridged Talking Classics series for native speakers is a useful resource. It was originally part of a series of magazines, but many of the better stories have been reissued. You can listen to audio in the car early in the writing process. In this particular series, they used first-rate actors as readers, but cut the text very heavily indeed. In nearly all cases, I found they messed up bits of theplot as a result. So that’s a warning for the ELT adaptor: you can make changes, but not changes that screw up the plot!

Such heavily-abridged versions bring up another issue. In the interests of creating a digestible two-hour telling of the central points, they often cut great swathes of the story entirely. I feel an obligation to cover most, if not all, of the original plot, but in a simplified way. Otherwise, I am concerned that those students who might go on to study the original book later will have a false impression.

Don’t get fanatical about précis. Sometimes, the adaptor has to add text to the original. For example, Dickens can say simply that it was 1775, then show Charles Darnay causing horror in court by suggesting that one day George III. You might need to add that 1775 was the year that the American Revolution began. It would be a good idea to put the words General in front of George Washington and King in front of George III. Maybe ‘the American general’ and ‘our king, King George III’. However, remember that Charles Darnay in 1775 did not know that Washington would be the first president.

You will get insights into the author. Robert Louis Stevenson is brilliant on ending chapters on dramatic cliff-hangers. A lot of adventure writers are good, but he’s really good. You also get so close that you notice plot faults. Treasure Island has a really mighty one. OK, who am I to judge one of the ten most-frequently translated and most popular books of all time worldwide? But I will. On the ship, all the guns are moved to the back so the pirates can’t get at them. When the good guys escape the ship, they take all the guns, but those they cannot carry are ‘thrown into the sea’ to prevent the pirates getting them. In the next scene, the pirates are attacking the stockade, armed to the teeth with muskets and multiple pistols. So where did those guns come from, Mr Stevenson? I originally wrote They threw the guns into the sea, decided I shouldn’t reproduce a plotting fault, and went back and took that line out.

Illustrations

Finally, it is vital to know the illustrations in detail before the final edits are made to the text. For one thing, there might be differences, especially if you are using art you did not commission. If art is being commissioned, make sure the brief sent to the artist matches what you have put in the text. If art comes from another source, you may need to tweak the text to match. In Wuthering Heights, we used illustrations from a published graphic novel. In Robinson Crusoe, we used beautiful 18th-century engravings. So, the text of Treasure Island might mention Squire Trelawney’s new blue and gold jacket. But is it blue and gold in the picture? In the picture, a pirate’s sword is dramatically slicing into the doorframe of the house, but the adaptation hasn’t mentioned that. It might as well. Is there something prominent in the illustration that you have not mentioned? Get it in.

Adaptation of classic fiction is more enjoyable than I expected, and the discipline of working with strictly controlled vocabulary and structure is valuable for any subsequent ELT writing. It is highly recommended for teachers who would like to become published writers.

Peter Viney is the co-author of Streamline, Grapevine, Main Street, Handshake, Survival English, IN English, Fast Track to Reading and many video courses, including A Weekend Away / A Week By The Sea. He is currently working on a heavily-illustrated ebook on British and American English. Email: peterviney@wordpress.com