{"title":"Making Peace or Piecemeal? Arnold Wesker's Screenplay and Wolfgang Storch's TV Adaptation of Arthur Koestler's Thieves in the Night","authors":"A. Stähler","doi":"10.13110/JEWIFILMNEWMEDI.6.1.0028","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT:From 1983 to 1985 the British Jewish playwright Arnold Wesker worked on a film script for a German-Israeli TV adaptation of Arthur Koestler's propagandistic novel Thieves in the Night (1946), which chronicles a decisive phase in the triangular conflict among Arabs, Jews, and the British during the British Mandate for Palestine. Ultimately, Wesker's script was rejected, but in 1986 the dramatist published an excerpt in the Jewish Chronicle. Drawing on Wesker's original drafts and his correspondence relating to the project, this article contextualizes the publication of the so-called \"Peace Making Ceremony\" with the playwright's approach to his adaptation of the novel as a whole. It is argued that Wesker's main objectives were to preserve the integrity of the novel and to produce a \"script of substance\" that was to offer a historical argument rather than the \"cowboys and Indian version\" expected of him.","PeriodicalId":40351,"journal":{"name":"Jewish Film & New Media-An International Journal","volume":"29 1","pages":"28 - 66"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1000,"publicationDate":"2019-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"2","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Jewish Film & New Media-An International Journal","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.13110/JEWIFILMNEWMEDI.6.1.0028","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"FILM, RADIO, TELEVISION","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 2
Abstract
ABSTRACT:From 1983 to 1985 the British Jewish playwright Arnold Wesker worked on a film script for a German-Israeli TV adaptation of Arthur Koestler's propagandistic novel Thieves in the Night (1946), which chronicles a decisive phase in the triangular conflict among Arabs, Jews, and the British during the British Mandate for Palestine. Ultimately, Wesker's script was rejected, but in 1986 the dramatist published an excerpt in the Jewish Chronicle. Drawing on Wesker's original drafts and his correspondence relating to the project, this article contextualizes the publication of the so-called "Peace Making Ceremony" with the playwright's approach to his adaptation of the novel as a whole. It is argued that Wesker's main objectives were to preserve the integrity of the novel and to produce a "script of substance" that was to offer a historical argument rather than the "cowboys and Indian version" expected of him.
期刊介绍:
Jewish Film & New Media provides an outlet for research into any aspect of Jewish film, television, and new media and is unique in its interdisciplinary nature, exploring the rich and diverse cultural heritage across the globe. The journal is distinctive in bringing together a range of cinemas, televisions, films, programs, and other digital material in one volume and in its positioning of the discussions within a range of contexts—the cultural, historical, textual, and many others.