Spicing Up the Classics
Thursday, November 19th, 2009
John Gardner and Gregory Maguire rewrote the classics from different perspectives with the best sellers Grendel and Wicked in order to make literature more interesting and provide unseen angles for the reader. As Bucky Carter (EN/SANE World) points out in his review of Kid Beowulf and the Blood-Bound Oath:
It builds interest in the original text by honoring it but playing with it; it builds student motivation to read the original without necessarily having that as its ultimate goal. Those who read Fajardo’s revisionist romp (Kid Beowulf) may be moved to the canonical poem Beowulf or John Gardner’s Grendel because they’ve developed a love for the characters as they have been more fully examined in the graphic novel. Surely surprises await those who have never read the poem when they do so, and I’ll bet that when those readers get to certain spots often read as victorious, they’ll have a deeper reaction than most readers who see certain de-limbings and dragon-slaying as par for the course for the epic form.
However, the new beast that’s emerging is the integrating of a classic text with things like vampires, zombies, and other action-inducing fiends. There is much debate as to whether this new trend is an entertaining way to spread the classics, or is simply killing the once masterful and revered literature of the past. Gardner and Maguire’s technique allows for thoughtful reflection on the many dimensions of a character, while Seth Grahame-Smith’s zombie-inserting technique is for sheer, unadulterated entertainment, a way to spice up what many consider to be an insipid old novel.
Really, both are true. Tacking on monsters to classic literature unquestionably debases and makes a mockery of it. Although you can’t help but to delight in the wicked amusement that such debasement provides. And it allows for, much like the graphic novel versions of classics, a wider audience to be reached, which may inspire people to pick up the original. Either way, there will always be someone to make a buffoonery of a solemn and thoughtful piece of art; the question is whether to use it to your advantage or let it pass as a punch line.
Classic literature started working its way into comics in the 1940s with the Classics Illustrated series, and has really begun to bubble up in mainstream comics in order to appeal to younger generations. Masterpieces like The Count of Monte Cristo, Last of the Mohicans, and Shakespeare are available as less intimidating graphic novels; they can range from genuine text comics that quote the original novel verbatim, to plain text comics that summarize the original, much like an illustrated Cliffs Notes. Some comics, like our own 
