Anàlisi i comparació de Malcom de James Purdy i l'adaptació teatral d'Edward Albee

Abstract

James Purdy was an American author of novels, short stories and plays, who started his literary career in the second half of the 20th century. His work has been widely ignored, mostly due to his dark themes, disturbing characters and surrealist writing, which did not tie in with the “American dream” mentality of Post-war America. Edward Albee, absurdist playwright, brought Purdy’s first novel, Malcolm, to life on the stage in 1966 and it proved to be a theatrical failure with the critics. This dissertation analyses the novel in depth, through its structure, characters and themes, and later studies how Albee portrays these in his written version of the play, and how this affects the whole concept of the adaptation. This is accomplished through extensive research into the author’s style and literary work and a through a thorough comparison of both versions of Malcolm. The results of this showed that Albee creates a slightly more sentimental and reflective main character, despite his understanding of Purdy’s passive and indifferent antihero, while he also introduces new information which resolves some of the mystery and confusion Malcolm faces and, therefore, takes away part of the surrealist effect Purdy’s novel has on the reader.