Jacob Two-Two, too
From The Globe and Mail:
Jacob Two-Two, one of the late Mordecai Richler’s most famous characters, could be forgiven if he felt uncomfortable with being immortalized in a trilogy. After all, he’s two plus two plus two years old, has two brothers and two sisters, and has to say everything twice just to be heard – odd numbers aren’t his thing. So perhaps it’s fitting that a fourth book will soon be added to the series.
The Globe and Mail has learned that Tundra Books, the children’s book arm of Canadian publisher McClelland & Stewart, has contracted Toronto-based author Cary Fagan (The Fortress of Kaspar Snit) to write a new installment that sees the precocious and imaginative Jacob take to the turbulent seas for a new adventure.
The book will be illustrated by 2007 Governor-General’s award finalist Dusan Petricic and will be the crown jewel in a larger project that will see Richler’s three books re-released, all with new illustrations and covers by Petricic, with Fagan’s new work in the fall of 2009.
With all due respect to Fagan and the good folks at Tundra, continuing a series by a late author is usually just a cash-grab, usually just a cash-grab.
We show no respect for the dead. We root in their graves, extolling their virtues and leave a plastic lily behind as a sign of our gratitude. Cary I’m a big fan of yours but ……
Cary Fagan is a very talented writer, and Petricic an amazingly talented illustrator. Were it anyone else but these two, I would be first in line to gripe. I say hold off on the criticism until the book is released.
I’m not questioning whether Cary Fagan or Petricic have the talent to do a good book. I’m questioning whether authors should abet publishers in their penchant for grave robbing. It won’t take long, if it hasn’t happened already, where publishers start demanding a rewrite of novels where, for example, Anna Karenina does not kill herself. James Bond, L.M. Montgomery, and now Mordecai Richler–we are witnessing the rise of the writer as imposter.
this is a long established practice, even if you just noticed it. It doesn’t harm the original books.
Besides, writers have always been imposters.
Because it is a long established practice–by publishers–does not make it valid. As to the platitude that writers are imposters anyway– well, that ‘makes it alright then, especially among those who have never written anything of value. Why Idoes M&S not hire Yann Martel to rewrite Ondaatje’s latest novel to make it better. Or if Atwood isn’t up to it why not hire someone to write a sequel to A Handmaid’s Tale. Because they’re alive and the living can act, take up arms, marshal lawyers and agents, and publish elsewhere in the future. But the dead, well they’ll understand—being former members of the fraternity of imposters. While Ondaatje is alive the publisher will make a show of honouring his work. Come death and sober reflection sets in then it’s time to send out a call for the rewrite man.
jeez, relax. Nobody is erasing the original works.
Authors family’s have a right to make as much as they can during the short period that copyright is in force. If you don’t like this practice, don’t buy the books.
Taking over material from another writer has been part of literature from the beggining. It’s how things grow. Nobody is being ripped off here.