I have a confession to make. Actually, no. I have several confessions to make.
- I have not read The Fault in Our Stars. The ebook is currently on my Kindle but I’ve not even taken a peek.
- I own the German copy of If I Stay but have not read it.
- I pre-ordered Allegiant last year but then left it untouched in my shelf. I have yet to read it.
- I own the shiniest edition of The Hunger Games, which is a Scholastic UK Foil Luxe edition. It is all gold, screaming for attention on my shelf but I’ve not read that either.
- I have no idea what The Perks of Being a Wallflower is about because, you guessed it, I have not read it.
- I have not made an effort to read The Maze Runner.
I say all this with neither pride nor shame. (Shame would be in admitting I read and watched the Twilight series, even though I thought the books were ridiculous and the movies sent me into laughing fits. I had to stuff my mouth, so I wouldn’t annoy other movie-goers. Hey, I didn’t choose to watch. My friends did.) I say these all as matters of fact. I have not read those books but have every intention to read them sometime… in the future…
My Aversion towards Books Turned Movies
What these books have in common is that not only are they hugely popular but they have been or will be filmed for the big screen.
Whenever I think of these titles, I feel overwhelmed. It seems silly, since I read and watched the entire Harry Potter series just fine. I read Divergent and Insurgent last year and enjoyed them tremendously but I think that’s partly because I lived under a rock and didn’t know they were popular books and the Divergent movie was already in development. I read The Book Thief last year as well but that too was before I emerged from that rock to learn about its movie release.
When it comes to books to movies, I generally feel like I should read the books before I watch the movies. Then again, I watched Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist before I read the book. I also watched The Golden Compass, Stardust, and all three movies so far from The Chronicles of Narnia , without reading any books beforehand. For those cases, I had no desire to read (The Golden Compass), didn’t care one way or another (The Chronicles of Narnia), or had no idea the movie was based on a book (Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist).
The Pressure of Reading Books that Are Filmed
Knowing there are books involved makes things different. I like to imagine characters and scenes without external influences. When it comes to Harry Potter, I have lost all semblance of personal imagination. Hogwarts itself fits pretty well but that’s as far as castles go. The characters I imagined before the movies have completely eluded me. Even as I’m in the mids of rereading the series, I can’t shake the faces of Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson. It’s beyond me. This is why I avoided Divergent trailers. I wanted to preserve that last window of personal imagination for Allegiant before watching the movie. In the end I watched the movie without reading Allegiant. Now I’m waiting for the time between the movie and the book to stretch out, so my memory becomes fuzzy because I can’t cast the movie into oblivion.
Movie releases give rise to a load of reading pressure. They set a deadline before which a book must be read, in order to be able to watch the movie on the big screen. Failing to read the book before that means entirely forgoing the movie and waiting for the DVDs or for Netflix to stream it, or watching the movie before reading the book. I hate that pressure. I don’t like that kind of obligation when it comes to reading. I want to read books leisurely as and when in my own time. But I also want to watch the movies. Yet I treasure the reading experiences more.
Evidently, I am in a huge fix.
At this rate I won’t be watching The Fault in Our Stars. I don’t even know when I’ll read the book. A part of me feels repulsed by the massive hype because if not for the hype, I might’ve never even considered reading the book. But who knows? Maybe I would actually come to love the book, if only I gave it a chance. I really don’t know.
How do movie releases of books affect you?
Confab ˈkän-ˌfab, kən-ˈ noun an informal discussion, often about a particular topic
Discussion posts are some of my favourite posts to read. New ideas get shared that way, or old ideas are revisited and given a new spin. And of course, I get to be my opinionated self as I hoist my views upon others, while pretending to be objective. Or maybe not. I do welcome alternate views and I’d love to hear from you in the comments!
I actually like book-to-movie adaptations. But there have definitely been a few times where I’ve been disappointed. I always try to make an effort to read the book first, though. Although — like with Silver Linings Playbook — there are a few that I had to do the other way around, because I wasn’t aware that it was originally a book.
I feel like, if somebody hasn’t read The Fault in Our Stars by now, then maybe they just shouldn’t read it haha. The hype has gotten OUT OF CONTROL, and I totally wouldn’t blame you if you just decided to give up on that one. I hate reading books when they’re super hyped up — I feel like I almost aways get disappointed.
I’m mostly neutral about them, provided I have read a book beforehand, if I ever intended to read it. Hahaha. But then there are movies too, where I wish there had been a book behind it. Like Letters to Juliet. Loved the movie! Wish there was a book.
Lol. Yes, about the out of control hype! On the other hand, I like to keep up with pop culture, or at least have an idea of what’s going on, so maybe that sociologist in me will disregard whatever literary merits TFiOS may or may not have and just dive into the book anyway. Hah. Oh well. We’ll see how things go.
I feel that pressure too but really haven’t read very many books that are movies. I always cringe when I tell someone I like to read and they only ask me about the books that have become movies. I’m like…errr no to like every book they ask about D:
I just have a specific book preference and those books aren’t always made into movies. I’m not going to read a book just because it’s popular or because it was made into a movie.
For every book people mention you’ve not read, why not mention a book that you have? You’re bound to outlist them eventually. That’s prove that you do like to read ;) If you care to prove it, that is. Haha.
And I think it’s a good principle to live and read by. Pick up books you want to, not the books others tell you to :)
I read The Maze Runner because I had it on my bookshelf for a ridiculous amount of time and thought “Hey, the movie is coming out! Better read it now, before the trailers ruin everything”. I really dislike book to movie adaptation trailers. They usually end up spoiling most of the book, and paint a really bad picture in my head of the characters. I’d rather imagine them myself. I haven’t read Allegiant, either, but in my case it’s because I’ve gotten so many spoilers I don’t care to read it anymore. Great post! :)
Yes yes yes! Trailers are so difficult to ignore! Sigh. Movies of books we haven’t read aren’t in our faces, so it’s easier to ignore them and read the book first. But railers. Ugh. My is so saturated with images from the TFiOS snippets, I don’t think I can ever erase them, even when I do read the book. Awww man. Spoilers suck so much :( At least there are hundred of other books out there, waiting to be read, if that’s any consolation for you ;)
I think it really depends on the book/movie for me. With the Maze Runner, I only read it because I knew Dylan O’Brian (mmmm) would be in the movie, and I wanted to see where the movie was based off of. But I disliked the book, so I didn’t continue the series. I didn’t even know about Perks until I saw the movie trailer, and now it’s one of my favorite books!
For the Fault In Our Stars, I didn’t know when I bought it that it would be a movie. But despite it being a movie now, I still really recommend the book! It deserves the hype, I think. I mean, not the crazy sauce hype it’s been getting (I wouldn’t say BEST BOOK EVER), but it’s very touching :)
Actually, I didn’t even know about Maze Runner until all the buzz about the movie surfaced, so maybe I really shouldn’t bother. Ooh. I plan to order a copy of Perks sometime in the coming months. Hype has pretty much died down by now anyway, so I can read it very leisurely. Hahaha.
I think I will read TFiOS but when I do, I might have to lock myself into my room and cut myself off from the world. Forget about all that has been said, erase every movie poster I’ve seen, somehow conjure up a fresh pair of eyes and a squeaky-clean mind, then sit down and read ;)