# What author has had the most works/stories/books made into shows/movies? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 29, 2005, 9:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448 "2005-10-29T09:09:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 9:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/1 "2005-10-29T09:09:06Z")
Note: Not plays. Plays don’t count. The question is what author has had the most works that have only turned into movies or regular shows or mini-dramas? William Shakespeare? I honestly can’t think of anyone who’s had more than him, however, I’m not talking about variations of each work. Just as long as one exists, then that accounts for that story/book. So which author has had the most? After running through my mind Stephen King and Ronald Dahl, I finally remember good old Willy. I’m actually embarassed he didn’t come to my mind first off. Or is there anyone else I’m forgetting about who might have had their works on TV? And if Shakespeare is the winner, who would be second? ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 9:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/2 "2005-10-29T09:24:44Z")
[Charles Dickens](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002042/) has 210 writing credits on IMDB, his first in 1897. ---
**Author:** ![delphica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9a140/32.png) [@delphica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/delphica)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 10:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/3 "2005-10-29T10:43:21Z")
Agatha Christie is the first author who came to mind. She has 104 writing credits on the IMDB, although I’m not sure what that boils down to in terms of single books that became movies or TV dramas, and a very small number of her works were stage plays originally. ---
**Author:** ![A\_qui\_profite\_le\_crime](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ebca7d/32.png) [@A\_qui\_profite\_le\_crime](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_qui_profite_le_crime)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 11:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/4 "2005-10-29T11:53:34Z")
Well, the **Brothers Grimm** have seen (not themselves personally) a lot of their works made into movies. IMDB gives them in excess of 100 writing credits. They must certainly be in the top 10. Oh, and the same goes for **Hans Christian Andersen**. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/5 "2005-10-29T13:38:21Z")
Stephen Fucking King. Most suck, but there were a couple I liked (The Shining being my favorite of all). ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/6 "2005-10-29T13:59:37Z")
L. Frank Baum has 124 writing credits. Shakespeare does have over 600 writing credits for works based on his plays. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/7 "2005-10-29T14:07:53Z")
Poe has 156 credits. Arthur Conan Doyle is probably right behind Dickens with 172. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/8 "2005-10-29T14:31:45Z")
Alexandre Dumas comes in at 168. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/9 "2005-10-29T14:32:13Z")
Hans Christian Andersen has 140+ credits, slightly more than the Brothers Grimm. Mark Twain has a not too shabby 92 credits, but I’d have thought it was higher. Philip K. Dick only has 12 (and counting), but when you consider how recently he lived and how much less he wrote than Dickens and Shakespeare, that’s impressive. Ditto with Tennessee Williams’s 50+ credits. If characters count, Bob Kane has 50 major projects and hundreds of episodes of TV based on his work. ---
**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:** [October 29, 2005, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/10 "2005-10-29T14:57:45Z")
Edgar Rice Burroughs? ---
**Author:** ![Cuckoorex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ad7895/32.png) [@Cuckoorex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cuckoorex)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/11 "2005-10-29T16:05:59Z")
From the OP: > [@](#): > > I’m not talking about variations of each work. Just as long as one exists, then that accounts for that story/book. To me, that means that you can’t just take the easy way out and do a writing credits search on IMDB, because then you’d get, for example, 172 writing credits for Arthur Conan Doyle, but at least 19 of them are adaptations of “The Hound of the Baskervilles.” ---
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/12 "2005-10-29T16:15:55Z")
> [@Kalhoun](#): > > Stephen Fucking King. Any relation to Stephen King? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Scrivener](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@The\_Scrivener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Scrivener)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/13 "2005-10-29T17:03:07Z")
Georges Simenon, the prolific detective-story author, has 176 IMDB citations. Leo Tolstoy has 116. Fyodor Dostoyevsky has 114. Miguel de Cervantes y Saavedra has 71. H.G. Welles has 70. Ray Bradbury and Graham Greene each have 50. Ian Fleming has 41… but \*James Bond will return \* again! Ernest Hemingway has 39. Nathaniel Hawthorne has a very respectable 36. Herman Melville has 30. Yukio Mishima, who was an extremely prolific Japanese novelist/playwright/critic/pundit/right-wing nutcase, has 25 – as do **Gustave Flaubert** and **Thomas Mann**. Dashiell Hammett and Isaac Asimov clock in with 25 cites. Jane Austen and Raymond Chandler have 24. Charlotte Bronte has 23 cites, 22 of which are for various adaptations of “Jane Eyre”. Not bad! James Michener has 18, as does \*\*James Clavell \*\* (although a few of his cites were for screenplays). Mickey Spillane has 17. George Sand has 14, not including a movie about her, _Impromptu_. OTOH, we have: John O’Hara: 12 cites. John LeCarre and **Saki** (H.H. Munro): 11 cites. Ayn Rand: 10 cites. Ken Follett: 6 cites. Barbara Cartland: 5 cites. ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/14 "2005-10-29T19:36:40Z")
Michael Crichton was the one that first popped into my mind when I saw the thread title, but he’s probably not in the running. ---
**Author:** ![NicePete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ee7513/32.png) [@NicePete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NicePete)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/15 "2005-10-29T19:42:25Z")
Limiting it to modern, popular writers, I think Donald Westlake would have to be in the running with 35 IMDB writing credits. ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/16 "2005-10-29T22:32:34Z")
> [@don't ask](#): > > [Charles Dickens](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002042/) has 210 writing credits on IMDB, his first in 1897. Yeah, but I’m wondering how many of those are variations of the same story. I have no doubt that there’s probably been about 10 renditions of “A Christmas Carol”. But “A Christmas Carol” only gets counted once as long as at least one movie or show was made about it…and not again. So really, out of all his novels, I’d think the number is a lot lower than that. I mean, I don’t even think he wrote 210 separate novels or short stories that were actually published, did he? On thread preview though, I see that **Cuckoorex** also point my point out. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![jacksprat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/77aa72/32.png) [@jacksprat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jacksprat)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2005, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/17 "2005-10-29T23:37:57Z")
So, Shakespeare has 37 credits at most (if one considers the excellent BBC films, which include excellent productions of Timon of Athens, Troilus and Cressida, and a few other major plays otherwise unavailable). Proust – despite the half-dozen or so films made from various episodes in his novel – only has one credit. However, since plays are excluded by the OP, Shakespeare is out. ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2005, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/18 "2005-10-30T00:16:44Z")
I dunno…I’d think that Shakespeare would still be a front runner even though plays are discluded and if you just count each work/story/book once. I know there’s a whole lot of movies that have been done on his work… Whether he’s the author, though, who’s had the most movies made of his stuff is the question. And if not, then who? I didn’t even think of the Grimm Brothers, either. _smacks forhead_ They’d be up there too. ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2005, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/19 "2005-10-30T00:22:43Z")
Sorry for the double post, but my roomate (who seems to be too lazy to use his own account that I made for him) is talking to me about it right now, and he mentioned Ian Fleming, the author of all the James Bond books. Since most of his seperate books had it’s own movie, that would count too, but would they make him the most? I dunno. How many were made into movies? ---
**Author:** ![jacksprat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/77aa72/32.png) [@jacksprat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jacksprat)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2005, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448/20 "2005-10-30T00:24:25Z")
> [@Idle Thoughts](#): > > I dunno…I’d think that Shakespeare would still be a front runner even though plays are discluded and if you just count each work/story/book once. Yes – he does seem to be the front runner at 37 plays made into films, if one includes the BBC straight-to-VHS versions, which I believe extended to all of the plays. I suppose it’s possible some indie type produced a flick of one of his lesser poems, but I wouldn’t know. Many of O’Neill’s plays have also been produced as films, for example, but not nearly as great in number as Shakespeare’s plays. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-author-has-had-the-most-works-stories-books-made-into-shows-movies/328448.md?page=2)