IN MEDIA RES: NARRATIVE DEVELOPMENT STRATEGIES IN THE FILM ADAPTATION OF MARY LAVIN’S “THE CUCKOO SPIT”

However complex critics might have regarded the relationship between literature and film, both media can find ways of converging in their respective art forms. In contrast to comparisons that seek to put them in mutual opposition, critics such as André Bazin have acknowledged that adaptation is an “established feature in the history of art”. Likewise, Linda Hutcheon criticizes the so-called “fidelity discourse” and the Manichaean reasoning that arises from such a polarized view. In this work, we establish a dialogue between the film The Cuckoo Spit (1974), directed by Deirdre Friel, and the short story of the same title from which it was adapted, written by Irish writer Mary Lavin and first published in 1964. We aim to investigate how Lavin’s modernist techniques were approached in the film, mainly in terms of how the stream-of-consciousness treatment given to the main character was conveyed in the adaptation. In the film structure, we focus on the construction of the narrative, with some reference to the elements discussed by David Bordwell in Film Art: openings, closings and patterns of development. Bearing these elements in mind, this paper examines whether the film adaptation of “The Cuckoo Spit” represents the non-spoken ideas which explicitly impact the development of the plot in the short story.   Key-words: Film Adaptation. Irish Short Story. Mary Lavin.