# Are novels ever remade? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 11, 2017, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253 "2017-04-11T17:51:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Tim\_R.Mortiss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim_r.mortiss/32/142_2.png) [@Tim\_R.Mortiss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_R.Mortiss)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2017, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/41 "2017-04-11T23:34:10Z")
I think the only novels that can count as remakes are those where the first novel was based on older source material. Then the remake novel can be based on the same original source material, just like the first one was, and not be considered a ripoff of the first novel. The original source material would have to be something even more basic, most likely a legend or oral tradition. Therefor we get multiple “remakes” of stories about King Arthur by Malory, T.H. White, Marion Zimmer Bradley, etc. And we get multiple remakes of stories about Beowulf by Michael Crichton, John Gardner, Neil Gaiman, etc. And we get multiple remakes of stories about Gilgamesh by authors like Robert Silverberg, Stephan Grundy, and Gian Franco Gianfilippi. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2017, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/42 "2017-04-11T23:48:57Z")
> [@Daddypants](#): > > I would consider this a remake more than some of the other examples. Yes - the Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys examples are the most analogous to movie remakes: they take the same basic characters and plots but update them for a more current culture. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2017, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/43 "2017-04-11T23:50:14Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > The biter bit. Missed your post. 🙂 > Um, “If This Goes On–” was considerably rewritten and expanded from the 1940 serial to the 1953 book collection. “Methuselah’s Children” is notably changed between original serial and book collection as well. > > A considerable number of the prewar stories were significantly rewritten for later book collection as well, although I realize we’re talking about novels here. > > I’d have to review my notes to list more, but this is hardly obscure information. I knew that “If This Goes On–” was rewritten, but I hadn’t realized that it expanded from 33,000 words to 57,300 words. That certainly qualifies as expanding a novella to a novel. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2017, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/44 "2017-04-11T23:50:48Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **CalMeacham** : > > Incidentally, if you compare T.H. White’s original version of the free-standing novel The Sword in the Stone with the first “book” of his novel The Once and Future King, you’ll see that, while basically the same novel, the one incorporated into the larger novel has been substantially altered, with much of the wit, asides, and entire sections and characters removed. He also later wrote a couple of new Merlin-turns-Arthur-into-an-animal adventures. Originally, he published them as a separate volume titled _The Book of Merlin_, where they really didn’t fit (they’re shoehorned in at the end of Arthur’s life, instead of the beginning), but later printings of _The Sword in the Stone_ have them in line with the rest of young Arthur’s adventures. And on another note, Asimov once wrote the same short story twice purely by accident (when you’ve written as much as him, apparently you can forget what you’ve already written). I don’t remember the titles, but the gist of it was that dinosaurs were much more intelligent than we think, and actually technological, and caused their own extinction through warfare. The story (in both cases) was told through a framing story of two guys talking in a restaurant and exploring the implications, with one of them pointing out that we’re on the verge of the same fate. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/45 "2017-04-12T00:03:11Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > And on another note, Asimov once wrote the same short story twice purely by accident (when you’ve written as much as him, apparently you can forget what you’ve already written). I don’t remember the titles, but the gist of it was that dinosaurs were much more intelligent than we think, and actually technological, and caused their own extinction through warfare. The story (in both cases) was told through a framing story of two guys talking in a restaurant and exploring the implications, with one of them pointing out that we’re on the verge of the same fate. Not by accident - Asimov took the plot of a story that had never sold, and which he thought had been completely lost (“Big Game” [Big Game (short story) - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Game_(short_story)) ) and rewrote it (based on his memory of the original, and with more skill, I assume) as “Night of the Hunter” - only to discover sometime later that a copy of “Big Game” did exist (in papers he had donated to a college). Asimov did accidentally write two very similar nonfiction pieces several years apart (I don’t remember which ones). ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/46 "2017-04-12T00:03:33Z")
Does the bible count as a novel? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/47 "2017-04-12T00:19:46Z")
Piers Anthony wrote a novel _But What of Earth?_ in 1976. Roger Elwood bought the publication rights but wasn’t very happy with the book. He had Robert Coulson step in and heavily revise the original (to the point where Anthony and Coulson were listed as co-authors). Anthony was very unhappy with the final product. He sued Elwood and eventually won back the publication rights, which he used to release his original version in 1989 (along with a bitter denunciation of Elwood). ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/48 "2017-04-12T00:23:48Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > I think sf/f as genre is going to dominate this question, because so many novellas were rewritten into books and books revised at later, more fruitful dates. Another example is _Flowers for Algernon_, that was expanded from a 1959 short story to a 1966 novel. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/49 "2017-04-12T00:29:29Z")
A Russian writer, Alexander Volkov, essentially rewrote L. Frank Baum’s _The Wizard of Oz_ in 1939. Volkov’s version was titled _The Wizard of the Emerald City_. Volkov’s book uses parts of the plot and most of the characters from Baum’s original but the changes are significant enough that it doesn’t work as just a translation. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/50 "2017-04-12T00:40:33Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Piers Anthony wrote a novel _But What of Earth?_ in 1976. Roger Elwood bought the publication rights but wasn’t very happy with the book. He had Robert Coulson step in and heavily revise the original (to the point where Anthony and Coulson were listed as co-authors). > > Anthony was very unhappy with the final product. He sued Elwood and eventually won back the publication rights, which he used to release his original version in 1989 (along with a bitter denunciation of Elwood). Kinda surreal to think of Anthony denouncing _anybody’s_ writing/publishing decisions… ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/51 "2017-04-12T01:07:15Z")
> [@TCMF-2L](#): > > **Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot** is a blatant remake of **Bram Stoker’s Dracula** albeit setting it in America and the present day (as of when it was written.) > > TCMF-2L If we’re doing this, we’d have to list a _lot_ of High Fantasy novels as “remakes” of The Lord of the Rings. > [@CalMeacham](#): > > **Total Recall** by Piers Anthony vs. Philip K. Dick’s **We Can Remember it for you Wholesale** I’m not going to comment on the others, but _Total Recall_ was only very, very loosely inspired by “We Can Remember It for You Wholesale” (which isn’t a novel, as my quotes indicate) and so the novelization of the film is, like, two continents removed from any ideas Dick had. ---
**Author:** ![Quimby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/22d042/32.png) [@Quimby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quimby)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/52 "2017-04-12T01:08:36Z")
Stephen King re released The Stand with additional material the original editor cut out including a new prologue and epilogue and characters that had been completely excised from the original. It also updated a few references to dates and products to make them more timely. ---
**Author:** ![installLSC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/54ee81/32.png) [@installLSC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/installLSC)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/53 "2017-04-12T01:14:47Z")
Legal question: if a writer publishes a reworked version of a novel or similar work, can they force the publisher of the original version to withdraw the original work? And do copyright protections carry over from the original work, or do they start all over again? ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/54 "2017-04-12T03:25:19Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > If we’re doing this, we’d have to list a _lot_ of High Fantasy novels as “remakes” of The Lord of the Rings. > > I’m not going to comment on the others, but _Total Recall_ was only very, very loosely inspired by “We Can Remember It for You Wholesale” (which isn’t a novel, as my quotes indicate) and so the novelization of the film is, like, two continents removed from any ideas Dick had. I agree. I’ve long argued that the bulk of the original film was lifted from Robert Sheckley’s novel _The Status Civilization_. As usual, Sheckley got no credit. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/55 "2017-04-12T05:20:12Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > Kinda surreal to think of Anthony denouncing _anybody’s_ writing/publishing decisions… Anthony did not come off well in his own account of the controversy. He has far too high a regard for his status as an author. His basic attitude was how dare a mere editor think he could touch the words that an author had created. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/56 "2017-04-12T05:46:19Z")
This is something I wondered. Can an author publish the same book twice, without violating his own copyright? College professors get to re-publish “New and Revised” editions of their textbooks all the time, so why couldn’t, say, Tom Clancy have re-published his _Hunt For Red October_ a second time, with some tweaks, a decade later after the first publishing, if he didn’t like his first one? ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/57 "2017-04-12T05:56:37Z")
There is no reason they couldn’t. It’s done frequently. ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/58 "2017-04-12T07:14:20Z")
**Frankenstein** was rewritten at least twice, with substantial revisions. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 12:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/59 "2017-04-12T12:20:28Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > This is something I wondered. Can an author publish the same book twice, without violating his own copyright? > > College professors get to re-publish “New and Revised” editions of their textbooks all the time, so why couldn’t, say, Tom Clancy have re-published his _Hunt For Red October_ a second time, with some tweaks, a decade later after the first publishing, if he didn’t like his first one? > [@Kamino\_Neko](#): > > There is no reason they couldn’t. It’s done frequently. Yes. Thomas Hardy (for example) made lots of little revisions to his novels whenever a new edition came out, sometimes just correcting typos, but sometimes altering more significant things. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2017, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253/60 "2017-04-12T12:34:00Z")
> [@Horatio\_Hellpop](#): > > **Frankenstein** was rewritten at least twice, with substantial revisions. A year ago I read an edition of Frankenstein that printed only Mary Wollestonecraft’s (soon to be Shelley) original writing, without Percy Shelley’s changes and additions. Call it the _Ur_-Frankenstein. [https://www.rc.umd.edu/reviews-blog/charles-e-robinson-ed-frankenstein-notebooks-facsimile-edition-mary-shelleys-novel-1816](https://www.rc.umd.edu/reviews-blog/charles-e-robinson-ed-frankenstein-notebooks-facsimile-edition-mary-shelleys-novel-1816) > **[The Original Frankenstein (Vintage Classics): Mary Shelley, Charles E. Robinson,...](https://www.amazon.com/Original-Frankenstein-Vintage-Classics/dp/0307474429)** > > The Original Frankenstein (Vintage Classics) \[Mary Shelley, Charles E. Robinson, Percy Bysshe Shelley\] on Amazon.com. \*FREE\* shipping on qualifying offers. The Original Frankenstein (Vintage Classics) I really don’t think Shelley’s changes made a big difference to the final work. I prefer the 1818 edition, myself, either Mary or Mary + Percy. Here’s an interesting piece comparing the versions: [http://www.dantealighierithedivinecomedy.com/2012/10/frankenstein-1818-or-1831-edition-by.html](http://www.dantealighierithedivinecomedy.com/2012/10/frankenstein-1818-or-1831-edition-by.html) > **[Frankenstein The 1818 And 1831 Editions | Course Hero](https://www.coursehero.com/lit/Frankenstein/the-1818-and-1831-editions/)** > > Literary Devices for Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Use these unique study guides and Frankenstein reference materials to help you master the book. Here’s a list of changes to the 1823 edition: [http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/Articles/murray.html](http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/Articles/murray.html) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-novels-ever-remade/784253.md?page=4)