Literary Mash-Ups: What do You Think?

Last year Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound) by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith hit the shelves and became an instant success. Due to the copyright being long expired and other legal complexities that basically don’t apply to a work of fiction so old, the text to Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound) is essentially open to whatever use someone dreams up now. So, the original text is intermingled with new text from Grahame-Smith to change a classic Victorian Romance into a zombie apocalypse.

Part of me rejoices – I mean it just sounds so fun. Another part of me wonders if it’s really just an unoriginal hack job on a literary masterpiece. Is this something new and equally creative as any wholly original work? Is this a next evolution of literature? Is it a gimmick? Is this the new tie-fiction ghetto? Is this a way to get more people reading? Did that absurd high-school reading assignment just get a bit cooler? A clever idea taken way, way too far? I haven’t made up my mind on this and in all honesty, I haven’t yet read any of these new mash-ups. But I want to hear what others think on this. And should I start reading one?

Of course the success of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies has bread faster than rabbits on Viagra. The prequel, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls by Steve Hockensmith (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound) is out now and there other springing up like those listed below. Heck, we’ve even got one coming where a vampire Jane Austen is a bit pissed off by what people have done with her fiction and get revenge – no joke, for real – in Jane Bites Back by Michael Thomas Ford (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound).

Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters by Jane Austen and Ben H. Winters (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

Android Karenina by Leo Tolstoy and Ben H. Winters (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Slayer by Seth Graham-Smith (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

Mr. Darcy, Vampyre by Amanda Grange (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

Vampire Darcy’s Hunger by Regina Jeffers (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

Jane Slayre by Sherri Browning Erwin and Charlotte Brontë (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

Queen Victoria: Demon Slayer by A.E. Moorat (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

Mansfield Park and Mummies by Jane Austen and Vera Nazarian (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

Emma and the Werewolves by Jane Austen and Adam Rann (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

The Undead World of Oz by L. Frank Baum and Ryan C. Thomas (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

Adventures of Huckleberry Flinn and Zombie Jim by Mark Twain and W. Bill Czolgosz (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

Alice in Zombieland by Lewis Carroll and Nickolas Cook (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

Robin Hood and Friar Tuck: Zombie Killers by Paul A. Freeman (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

War of the Worlds: Plus Blood, Guts, and Zombies by H.G. Wells and Eric S. Brown (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound)

and many more.

Thoughts?

Oh no, not again…

Hell, by my reckoning, it’s been almost exactly 1 year since a zombie uprising nearly ended to the world. And now I wake up to find that there’s another uprising. Apparently all the zombie deaths and attempts at political reconciliation and acceptance of ‘the living-challenged’ haven’t worked. I’m positive that this is the work of zombie Dick Cheney – that guy is just evil.

We moved to the mountains, so we think that the smaller town and high-altitude air should be a good defense to hold out against this uprising. Though we’ll miss the advantage that Phoenix had of spontaneous zombie combustion when temps hit the 110 degree mark. I anticipate that some zombies will come to the mountains to escape that heat.

Last year friends and I brewed beer to pass the time while barricaded in a friend’s house, I think I’ll try that again since zombie ale was a big success.

Well, the house is barricaded now and things still seem quite – so I’m confident we’ll hold out. I just turned on the TV – I’m almost positive that John McCain is a zombie, just look at him. It seems that they aren’t satisfied with Cheney’s rein as VP and now they are trying for legitimate election to the President. Of course they are now reporting that Obama’s Kenyan relatives come from a long line of zombie killers and he was recently seen watching re-runs of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. There appears to be hope.

BLITEOTW

Zombie Log – Day 1

6:40 am – I decided to bike to work today in spite of the extreme heat. Lots of helicopters in the air, must be a bad traffic day – yeah me for biking.

7:00 am – NPR is telling me that there is a plague of zombies taking over the world (checks, no it’s not April 1). This sucks, but at least I won’t have to finish that damn report that’s due next week. Of course I chose to bike today – getting out of town is going to be a bitch.

8:00 am – Home now, it looks like some zombies trashed the car, damn! Reports are that the university was overrun…sounds like my wife is a zombie now. The cell phone isn’t working – maybe the first good news today.

8:30 am – I biked to Wal-Mart, I may hate the store, but there isn’t an easier place get a shotgun that I know of. On the way I saw the weirdest thing – a young (and apparently enterprising) zombie was selling water and other supplies on the side of the street. He offered me lemonade, I passed.

8:45 am – I stole a truck and bunch of gas – Wal-Mart was pretty well trashed, but I got what I needed. Zombies are everywhere, but I think they don’t like the heat…first time in my adult life I could truly say I wish I had a flame thrower.

9:30 am – Went to university anyway, it seems that the geology department put a hell of fight. Wife not a zombie – but she is in a terrible mood. I checked my blog – yes I’m addicted. The guys over in Australia are holding out well, and following all the happenings.

10:00 am – Zombie speed bumps!

11:00 am – Fortify Josh’s house since it’s pretty nice and where we keep the homebrew (we sacked Trader Joes on the way).

2:00 pm – Apparently when it gets over 105 degrees zombies tend to spontaneously combust. Summer in Phoenix is good for something.

4:00 pm – Burning zombie flesh smells really bad – maybe spontaneous zombie combustion isn’t as cool as we first thought.

4:30 pm – Heard a report that zombie Dick Cheney has taken over the military and is invading countries to corner the market in brains…typical.

6:00 pm – Homebrew is running low, we are considering suicide run to empty out the brew supply store.

8:00 pm – We emptied the homebrew store and found more guns – tonight’s going to be a hell of brew party. It’s cooler now – zombies are back out. Zombie speed bump is just as fun now as it was this morning. NPR is off the air, but conservative talk shows still going strong – typical (one has zombie Cheney lined up for an interview at 9:00…I’ll pass). It seems that there’s a call for a new organization intent on keeping Mexican zombies out of the country – unbelievable.

9:30 pm – Bruce Campbell movies are funnier than ever!

10:30 pm – Josh prefers the Belgian Abbey while shooting zombies, I stand by my British IPA. Mike and Chris are adding the aroma hops to Zombie Ale (no fooling around with this one – it’s an Imperial Stout). The wife doesn’t think much of our conversations.

11:45 pm – It turns out that zombie plagues aren’t so bad, I haven’t had this much fun in ages. Later we’re going out for drunken zombie speed bumps – Chris gets to drive first. I’m riding shotgun.

Blog Like It's the End of the World

This Wednesday, June 13, zombies are taking over the world - or at least there's a bunch of bloggers who are pretending this to be the case. It sounds like fun and I worry that I may not get much work done. Oh well - look for my post.

Oh and kudos to Steve over at My Elves are Different for releasing the plague.