Monday, October 05, 2009

Emmaline Grangerford

I'm preparing my play HUCK FINN for publication and I've been thinking about all the things that I had to leave out of my adaptation of Twain's novel. I didn't mind leaving the Tom Sawyer bits out, except for the argument between Tom and Huck on the subject of genies, but I'm really sorry I couldn't get the poetry of Emmaline Grangerford in. Emmaline was the morbid daughter of the Grangerfords, a family who was feuding with the Shepherdsons. The feud section of "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" ends tragically but the Emmaline part is really funny.

I added my own original bits too, when I felt it was absolutely necessary - I hate it when people mess with a classic for no good reason - and was suprised, if gratified to discover that some of my bits got as many laughs as Twain's funny bits, like this one:



BOB: You reckon they’ll catch that runaway slave that killed that boy, what’s his name?

JOE: Whose name? The slave?

BOB: The boy. Crazy old Finn’s boy.

JOE: I don’t remember. Except it was a strange kind of name. It was some kind of fruit.

BOB: Some kind of fruit? Who would name a child after some kind of fruit?

JOE: I’m pretty sure it was some kind of fruit. Like “Crabapple.” Yeah, that sounds right. Crabapple Finn. His pappy’s a terrible drunk – maybe he was drunk when he named him. And now that old drunk’s gonna get all Crabapple’s money. Some people have all the luck.



While I was preparing to adapt the novel I recorded myself reading the entire novel (I was unemployed at the time.) here is my recording of the Emmaline section below: