Hello, this is Mr. Sato. I'm going to show you how to compare
a work of literature with its source.
Some people say that nothing is original anymore, that it's all been done,
and every new story is really an old story
dressed up in new clothes. And I can see why people say that
Every story borrows elements from earlier stories
-- but there are always differences,
and those differences can tell you a lot.
Shakespeare, for example, openly took most of his plots from pre-existing sources.
Romeo & Juliet was based mainly on a poem by Arthur Brooke called The Tragicall History
of Romeus and Juliet, but we don't read Brooke's poem anymore. Why?
Because Shakespeare's play is way, way better.
Shakespeare took an original source and improved it. If we made a list
of the differences and evaluated how those differences made the two
literary works different in important ways,
you'd probably see that not only is Shakespeare's play more interesting
in terms of conflict and more beautiful in terms of language, but that it has
a different meaning as well.
If a teacher asks you to compare a work of literature with its source material,
don't sweat it. It's like comparing two of anything else: two cars,
two hamburgers, two people.
Look at how they're similar, look at how they're different, then draw a conclusion
from what you find. It's basically just comparing and contrasting,
and if you think back, maybe you've done that before, for another class.
So, let's look at a short example and I'll do an analysis. You can watch and learn
before you try it yourself.
Follow these two links and read these two poems. Start with "Casey
at the Bat" by Ernest Lawrence Thayer and follow it with "Casey at the Bat (Road Game)"
by Garrison Keillor. A little warning, though: Keillor's poem contains mild profanity.
Keillor does have a sanitized version that can be found online as well,
but I think this one is better. OK, read them now.
You're back? Did you read them? If not, go read them before continuing.
You'll be glad you did.
All right, there are similarities, for sure. They tell essentially the same story because
Keillor's poem is a parody of its source. It's the bottom of the ninth inning
and Mudville is losing to the visiting baseball team.
is losing to the visiting baseball team. Casey comes up to bat hoping to save the game
for Mudville but blows it on the third pitch. Both are trying to be funny, both are
rhymed narrative poems, and both have the same rhyme scheme and rhythm.
But now let's look at the differences. 1888 vs. 1994.
Mudville's perspective vs. Dustville's.
Thayer's language is charmingly old-fashioned and wry.
In Keillor's poem, the language is more profane and abusive.
The tone is wry and quaint in Thayer's vs. exaggeratedly malicious in Keillor's,
13 stanzas, 18 stanzas
Thayer's pretty much ends with the game but
Keillor's also includes the events that take place immediately after the game.
And although both are meant to amuse, their purposes are different:
Thayer's is a morality tale meant to teach a lesson
about overconfidence and idol worship, while Keillor's is a gleeful
satire on the savagery lying just below the surface of competition.
That's where your analysis really starts.
You make a list of the similarities and differences.
Then, closely examine the differences. How do they make
the overall effect of the later work different from its source?
How do the differences show how the author transformed
the original into something different?
So, comparing these poems, I will focus on three of these differences: the perspective,
the language,
and the author's purpose.
The perspective is the most obvious difference. Thayer's tells the story
from Mudville's POV (point-of-view),
while Keillor's tells it from Dustville's. This is the difference
between the loser's perspective and the winner's.
The citizens of Mudville, Thayer suggests, feeling "no joy,"
must see what we see, that Casey wasn't "mighty" after all, that he was
an arrogant phony, and that the fans were fools to have idolized him.
The losers are sadder but wiser.
Dustville's fans, on the other hand, are enjoying victory in the most
malicious way possible.
Through humor, the reader is invited to share in the pleasure of their
taunting, pranking, and vandalism,
their unrestrained cruelty to the Mudville team. In doing so, the reader has to
admit to him or herself that there is something of the barbarian in everyone's
heart, and that competitive sports is a place where that barbarian comes out,
even if it's only in one's feelings and private thoughts.
Next, as you no doubt noticed, the language in Keillor's poem is
much more profane and abusive than Thayer's
and this is partly because Keillor's was written more than 100 years later
in a much more impolite society than in 1888, in print anyway.
Thayer's calling Flynn a "hoodoo" and Blake "a cake,"
is a lot milder than just about anything in Keillor's.
(By the way, a different version of the original poem calls Flynn
a "pud'n" and Blake a fake.)
In Thayer's, the Mudville fans do call out, "Kill the umpire!" but the insult is
not personal and it's directed at a neutral party in the game. Keillor's Dustville fans,
in contrast, insult their opponent and attack him very personally.
They describe him as "bully and a braggart, a cretin and a swine."
They attack his manhood.
And that's because the insults are not a detail in Keillor's story, they are the story.
His story is about the primitive electric charge contained in this kind of language.
It's awful, but it's also fun.
Lastly, the two poems have very different purposes. Thayer's poem is a gentle and
wry 19th century narrative about how overconfidence and misplaced awe
are foolish and likely to lead you to a bad end.
If you really think about it, Keillor's doesn't really focus on Casey at all;
his 20th century poem focuses on the fans.
His poem celebrates the creative mischief and malice that underpins competition,
the sheer joy of crushing your opponent, driving them before you, and hearing
the lamentation of their loved ones, as Conan the Barbarian might say.
It may be unsportsmanlike, but hey --
it's a very human impulse. This is one theme you could take away from
Keillor's nasty little poem. And that's very different from
the gentle and humorous moralizing that Thayer gives us.
So, at this point, we've compared two poems, briefly touched on similarities,
then analyzed a few important differences.
If you wanted to write an essay, you already have
everything you need for the body of the essay. You just need an introduction,
and a conclusion that talks about how Keillor
took Thayer's story and transformed it into something significantly
different, maybe even better.
If you're looking for more examples of
literature based on another source work of literature,
here's a short list. Just pause it if it's flying by too fast.
The ability to compare two things well is nothing less than the ability to
understand the world. It's critical thinking. In your life, you may need to compare
everything from two brands of soap --
to different career paths, colleges, political candidates,
even potential spouses.
Every day of your life you will use the tool of critical thinking
to make the right choice. Use this assignment to sharpen that tool.
Good luck.