Clueless, an updated, Americanised version of an 18^(th) C. English novel of manners, shares many of its precursor’s characteristics but also significant differences. The 1995 creation of Amy Heckerling as an appropriation of the plot of Jane Austen’s novel Emma. Heckerling does a magnificent performance of bringing Emma back to life in 20^(th) Century America. Heckerling was cashing in on a major revival of Austen in the mid 1990s as about five different adaptations of Austen’s novels were released within a two year period.

Comparative Literature # When looking at two or more forms of narratives we need to establish the similarities and differences in a number of areas. All literature has much in common, yet it may differ in outward forms depending on when it was written and the text type or genre used to create meaning. Some are adaptations, some are transformations while others simply borrow the plots and recreate them in new situations and settings.

Chaucer – Raimi # I. Context & Subject Matter # **The Pardoner’s Tale Circa 1350 – 1400 Written by 1387. Medieval institutions were under attack: Feudalism challenged by rising merchant class Chivalry by brash upstarts. Church dominant but in decline because of: Schism between Rome and Avignon… English Bishop’s loyalty to English King. Corruption rife – wide spread. Friars openly hated – (Chaucer fined for having beat a Friar. Self-absorbed, self-indulgent, decadent Death a common open occurrence and often personified in Literature of the time.

Emma and Clueless # Clueless is the 1995 creation of Amy Heckerling as an appropriation of the plot of Jane Austen’s novel Emma. Heckerling does a magnificent performance of bringing Emma back to life in 20^(th) Century America. Heckerling was cashing in on a major revival of Austen in the mid 1990s as about five different adaptations of Austen’s novels were released within a two year period. Initially Clueless was considered just another vacuous Teenpix with a limited lifespan, however its appropriations of Austen’s Emma, gave it sustenance and developed its cult following and a status as a worthy text.

Originality # As Tennyson put it, “we are part of all we have met”, and all people through the ages are products of their conditioning – we are cultural constructs. E.S. Turner in The Shocking History of Advertising (1968) “A bride is not a young woman on the edge of a great adventure; she is a conditioned consumer, who by buying the right cosmetics and the right brassiere has captured her man, and who, when she returns from her honeymoon, will go into the grocer’s and automatically recite those branded names that have been dinned into her ears for the last twenty years”.

Transformations # Nothing is original; every idea comes from somewhere . According to Jean-Luc Godard, “It’s not where you got it from, it’s where you take it to”. Every thought we have comes from somewhere – either inspiration or vicariously from someone else. It is not original, but derivative. The former is rare while the latter risks the danger of theft called plagiarism. One of the earliest writers in the Middle English, Chaucer, remarked with amusing diffidence:

Comparison: Hamlet Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead # According to Martin Esslin, the major difference between Absurdist and conventional drama is that in conventional drama the audience is anticipating the action, wondering what will happen next; while in an absurdist play the audience is mainly caught up in wondering what is happening now. Context and background: # The values of the 17th century and its violence and dramatics are juxtaposed with that of the 1960’s postmodernism existentialism and absurdism through the transformation of Hamlet to RNG, with indications to influences upon society from the respective eras in which the texts were composed.

date: 2021-02-10T22:36:25+11:00 title: “Comparison Chaucer Pardoner’S Tale Raimi Simple Plan” weight: 15 tags: [] toc: true Comparison of Blade Runner and Frankenstein # Comparative Literature # When looking at two or more forms of narratives we need to establish the similarities and differences in a number of areas. All literature has much in common, yet it may differ in outward forms depending on when it was written and the text type or genre used to create meaning.