We already have a Christmas Carol parody thread and a LOTR parody thread. How would the other most-filmed Dickens novel turn out if other people wrote it? Nearly everyone knows the basic story; orphan in workhouse asks for more food, is apprenticed to undertaker, mistreated, joins street gang, and is finally discovered to be from well-off family.
EDIT: Spinoff from Christmas Carol thread. I always seem to make mistakes in my OPs!
I really can’t believe I’m doing this but…
bump
It would be a lot shorter.
Sure about that?
Isn’t the Wheel of Time series supposed to be really long?
And what about LOTR?
From one of the Molesworth books:
o. twist get his chips
Other long books exist. I didn’t realise when you said “other people” that you meant *specific *other people. I was referring to the intolerable paid-by-the-word way Dickens padded things out.
In fact that reminds me of a bit of an Icelandic family saga. A medieval Dickens might have written something like:
The Saga of Oliver Agnesarson, by Anonymous
“There was a man called Edwin Leeford, who lived somewhere in England. Edwin was the son of a merchant and he was married to Elizabeth*. They had a son called Edward who was called Monks later in life…”
name borrowed from the Bleasdale adaptation.
Also, this was meant to be along the lines of the LOTR parody thread.
Surprisingly I didn’t know that. Thanks.
Anyone else have a parody for this thread?
A la Dr Seuss:
“I’d like some more gruel,
Yes, I’d like it a lot,”
Said Oliver Twist
As he looked in the pot.
“More?! He wants More?”
Mr Bumble did scream,
“I do not want him here,
He is like a bad dream.”
“I will run off to London,
Thought Oliver, “Fock it.
“I’ll work for old Fagin
Pickin’ some pockets.”
That is awesome. You just won the Internet!
What Dr. Seuss is that in the style of? Or is it just generic Dr. Seuss? I thought of How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
Wish I could be so talented…sigh:)
Yes, I should have made it clear that I was short-handing what I couldn’t be bothered to write about installments. The way it comes across, clearly or the myth wouldn’t be so pervasive, is that he was being paid to write as many words as he possibly could. Being paid by the installment, he still had the incentive to make things as long as possible, which makes him excruciatingly dull.
Dull?? DULL??? Are we talking about the same Dickens??
I grant you that 1800s writing style (and even early 1900s) was more relaxed and descriptive than today’s action-only-six-sex-scenes-per-page-and-no-description-all-dialog style, but I can’t imagine Dickens as dull. (Well, OK, some stuff, but then so’s everyone.)
Maybe they’re talking about the way the writing style itself can seem wordy compared to today’s writing style.
I haven’t the genius to do it; can anyone come up with Oliver Twist as written by Ayn Rand? 
Not gonna spend much time on this, but:
Oliver is first seen taking his gruel and throwing it in Mr Bumble’s face, then delivering a speech about how the orphanage is socialisticm, and how it’s immoral for these orphans to be taking gruel from the public. In London, he organizes Fagin’s group of pick-pocketing youth into a massive military-industrial organization…
Whoa. That’s surreal.
I’ll see if I have time.