Exact: Krevolin’s Adaptation

When thinking about how “exactitude” relates to adaptation and while constructing my Exact Blox, I uncovered an exciting connection! Exactitude is a lot like the notion of faithfulness in adaptation. In his book “How to Adapt Anything into a Screenplay,” Richard Krevolin devotes an entire chapter/case study of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (also sometimes referred to as Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone—alchemy reference!) to the discussion of faithfulness in adaptation. Krevolin raises and answers questions such as: How faithful does an adaptation need to be to its original work, can something be too faithful, and what can be cut/added?

To begin, Krevolin says that, the “key to successful adaptation really is—not to do a verbatim and faithful transcription, which in many ways is impossible anyway, but to capture the truth of the original work and convey that onscreen.”

Krevolin also explains that it’s actually okay to create a new story that is simply inspired by source material. We can add, combine, or completely eliminate elements of the original work if it helps to improve our adaptation. Since a screenplay isn’t a literary form, it relies more heavily on images. Thus, sometimes we need to incorporate clarifying visuals that may not have originally been present in the written story.

In creating my Exact Blox, I definitely took this to heart. One major feature of my Blox is the image of “Alchemical Symbols” within a circle. Such symbols were absolutely never mentioned in The Alchemist, but they are an important visual representation of alchemy. They are the most commonly recognized indication of alchemy’s essence. I also incorporated images of an alchemic “chemistry set”—again never mentioned in the original novel. However, these stand as recognized symbols and signifiers that an average, mass audience would understand. Despite these fabricated inclusions, I think that my Blox still retains the spirit of the novel and exemplifies the presence of “exactitude” in The Alchemist.