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arqueeteI have just finished Susan Kay's infamous Phantom of the Opera adaption, Phantom. What a read. I have heard so much praise for this book and it's held in nearly as much esteem (But of course, not quite as much!) as Leroux's beloved original by the Phantom Phan community, despite complaints I hear of some irksome elements of her story. It deserves it.
In the special features of the 2004 movie DVD set, Joel Schumacher says something on the order of, "Once an audience understands why a character is the way they are, they understand who they are." I never really entirely got his purpose for that comment, but I think it really explains the allure of the Kay novel.
Erik is a man who has committed some horrific crimes. When we meet him in the Leroux novel, he's, well, not entirely in his right mind from most people's perspectives. He kills and harasses without remorse. We feel sympathy for him because of the cruel society that has driven him to his state of mind, mostly because Leroux encourages us to look at Erik beyond a cardboard villian, but that sympathy only goes so far. Once we know his modivation, the story of his life which Susan Kay so elegantly and passionately tells him, somehow we can understand him better. Somehow we can forgive him more. Once we understand why he has become how he has, we can better understand him as he is.
Up until Christine comes into the picture, which I will get to in a moment, Kay continually blew me away again and again, and her foreshadowing and fierce loyalty to the little details of Erik's past we are given in the Leroux are admirable. What I thought was the real test for her was the section of the book from Nadir's Point of View. Nadir (The name Kay gave to our beloved Persian form the Leroux and which has now become a detail used in fanfiction as unquestionably as if it were canon) passes, wonderfully sticking in personality, just in his character's voice, to the sections of the Leroux which are also from his first person. Everything just seems to fall into place, an amazing prequel to the famous tale as told by Leroux, all the details seem to fit leading up to Erik's time as the Palais Garnier's Phantom.
But then Erik arrives at the Opera House and the famous story begins to be retold, and I'm found quite disappointed. I don't know what I expected Kay to do here, she can't feasibly just re-write the Leroux novel, dialogue and all, from a different Point of View. But it seems her wonderful sections leading up to the end seem to almost fit better with the Leroux novel than they do Kay's own rendition of the tale. And Kay's Christine is frusteratingly lacking a backbone, or any personality really. she's just... yuck. I can't say I'm not surprised that Kay seemed to do such a bad job with her after having done so well up 'til then. But Kay wrote this book before the Leonard Wolf translation was avaliable, and it sounds like she was going off a translation where the subject of Christine was not well elaborated on.
Charles. How can I not say something on the subject of Charles? I'm not too fond of another story giving Erik an illegitimate son, and though I have some distaste about Kay's timing, at least she's adapting the story an therefore has a bit more right to be inserting sex scenes than Mr. Forsyth does. I think, with the rest of the novel, she can be excused.
And the cat kinda annoyed me too.
And I can't believe Kay said Christine had dark hair. Any real Phan knows in the Leroux Christine was blonde. That annoyed me.
But overall I applaud it, it's definately worth the read.
In the special features of the 2004 movie DVD set, Joel Schumacher says something on the order of, "Once an audience understands why a character is the way they are, they understand who they are." I never really entirely got his purpose for that comment, but I think it really explains the allure of the Kay novel.
Erik is a man who has committed some horrific crimes. When we meet him in the Leroux novel, he's, well, not entirely in his right mind from most people's perspectives. He kills and harasses without remorse. We feel sympathy for him because of the cruel society that has driven him to his state of mind, mostly because Leroux encourages us to look at Erik beyond a cardboard villian, but that sympathy only goes so far. Once we know his modivation, the story of his life which Susan Kay so elegantly and passionately tells him, somehow we can understand him better. Somehow we can forgive him more. Once we understand why he has become how he has, we can better understand him as he is.
Up until Christine comes into the picture, which I will get to in a moment, Kay continually blew me away again and again, and her foreshadowing and fierce loyalty to the little details of Erik's past we are given in the Leroux are admirable. What I thought was the real test for her was the section of the book from Nadir's Point of View. Nadir (The name Kay gave to our beloved Persian form the Leroux and which has now become a detail used in fanfiction as unquestionably as if it were canon) passes, wonderfully sticking in personality, just in his character's voice, to the sections of the Leroux which are also from his first person. Everything just seems to fall into place, an amazing prequel to the famous tale as told by Leroux, all the details seem to fit leading up to Erik's time as the Palais Garnier's Phantom.
But then Erik arrives at the Opera House and the famous story begins to be retold, and I'm found quite disappointed. I don't know what I expected Kay to do here, she can't feasibly just re-write the Leroux novel, dialogue and all, from a different Point of View. But it seems her wonderful sections leading up to the end seem to almost fit better with the Leroux novel than they do Kay's own rendition of the tale. And Kay's Christine is frusteratingly lacking a backbone, or any personality really. she's just... yuck. I can't say I'm not surprised that Kay seemed to do such a bad job with her after having done so well up 'til then. But Kay wrote this book before the Leonard Wolf translation was avaliable, and it sounds like she was going off a translation where the subject of Christine was not well elaborated on.
Charles. How can I not say something on the subject of Charles? I'm not too fond of another story giving Erik an illegitimate son, and though I have some distaste about Kay's timing, at least she's adapting the story an therefore has a bit more right to be inserting sex scenes than Mr. Forsyth does. I think, with the rest of the novel, she can be excused.
And the cat kinda annoyed me too.
And I can't believe Kay said Christine had dark hair. Any real Phan knows in the Leroux Christine was blonde. That annoyed me.
But overall I applaud it, it's definately worth the read.
