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Movies That Authors Liked

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A couple weeks ago I posted an article about movies based on books that the authors hated. Today I found an article by Cracked that lists movies that the authors thought improved their books.

One of those was Fight Club in which the ending was changed. The movie focused more on the romance angle which Chuck Palahniuk said he was going for but somehow got sidetracked.

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Another one was The Mist, a novella by Stephen King. He actually had a happy ending for once but the movie changed all that. To avoid spoilers, I’m not going to go into the ending of the movie (you can watch it below if you like), but wow! It so Stephen King, it’s hard to believe he didn’t write it.

Read the full article here.

Words We Owe to William Shakespeare

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shakespeare_option_2William Shakespeare wasn’t too concerned about grammar. In fact, he “invented” over 2200 words that had never been used before. Some of the words that we use now can be attributed to him.  Some examples are:

ADDICTION: OTHELLO, ACT II, SCENE II

“It is Othello’s pleasure, our noble and valiant general, that, upon certain tidings now arrived, importing the mere perdition of the Turkish fleet, every man put himself into triumph; some to dance, some to make bonfires, each man to what sport and revels his addiction leads him.” – Herald

BELONGINGS: MEASURE FOR MEASURE, ACT I, SCENE I

“Thyself and thy belongings are not thine own so proper as to waste thyself upon thy virtues, they on thee.” – Duke Vincentio

UNCOMFORTABLE: ROMEO AND JUIET, ACT IV, SCENE V

“Despised, distressed, hated, martyr’d, kill’d! Uncomfortable time, why camest thou now to murder, murder our solemnity?” – Capulet

Read the full text here at mental floss

Authors Who Hated Movie Versions of Their Books

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7-18-2013 9-53-08 PMI was surprised to learn that some of my favorite movies that were based on books were actually hated by the authors. One of those is The Shining. Stephen King felt like Kubrick didn’t grasp the sheer evil of the hotel and instead looked for the evil in the characters. He also didn’t think that Jack Nicholson showed that Jack Torrance was not crazy until he was influenced by the Overlook Hotel.

While I thought many of the earlier movies based on Stephen King’s books were poorly made, I thought The Shining was the first one that did a fairly good job. That doesn’t mean I liked the movie as well as the book. I do believe that the book is better 99% of the time.

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imagesAnother author who wasn’t happy with the movie version of his book was Winston Groom. He felt that Hollywood omitted plot points from Forrest Gump and that some of the language and sex were “sanitized.”

Read about more unhappy authors on Mental Floss.

Reading Boosts Your Brainpower

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large_open_bookA new study published in the journal of Neurology tested 294 people on their cognitive abilities. In addition, they were asked to remember how frequently they performed activities such as reading, writing, or playing chess. These people also donated their brains after they died.

What was found was that some of the people who did brain-stretching activities, such as reading, did not show outward symptoms of Alzheimer’s, even if their brains showed physical signs of the disease. 

Another thing that the study showed was that it’s never too late to start reading. The rate of cognitive decline was lowered by 32 percent in people who started frequently doing brain-stretching activities later in life when compared to those reported average amounts of mental activity.

Read more here

Weird Books

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6-21-2013 12-43-05 PM

Here’s a practical guide for the style-challenged masses. Who wouldn’t want to mix sequins and fringe, stars and argyle, or knee socks and short-shorts like Liberace?

 

6-21-2013 12-42-45 PMThere are actually 2 of these books by two different publishers. One is an illustrated hardcover lift-the-flap guessing game for children ages 1 to 3. The other is included in Wayne Lynch’s photographic series of books, which include the posed posteriors of “hippos, rhinos, bighorn sheep, pin-tailed ducks, and more.”

 

6-21-2013 12-42-26 PMThis is, unfortunately, not an illustrated coffee table book, but a cleverly titled collection of marketing advice essays.

Mental Floss has more weird titles listed here.

 

Classic Books Original Titles

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6-14-2013 7-59-34 PMA lot of classic books had different original working titles. For example, George Orwell’s 1984 was originally titled The Last Man in Europe. 

William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury was originally named Twilight.

Margaret Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind was going to be Tomorrow Is Another Day, Not In Our Stars, Tote the Weary Load, or Bugles Sang True.

William Golding’s Lord of the Flies was originally titled Strangers From Within.

Twenty more original titles can be found here.