Rewrite The Classics Game

[Mini Mia]

Take a paragraph or two, or three or more, from any of the classics and rewrite it in your own words & style to see if others can guess where you got it from. (Can be books, plays, short stories, poems, fairy tales, science fiction, etc.)

The first member to get it right takes the next turn.

-OR-

Take a classic tale and turn it into a Flash. (50 to 1,000 words.) Rewrite it in your own words & style to see if others can guess where you got it from. (Can be books, plays, short stories, poems, fairy tales, science fiction, etc.)


The first member to get it right takes the next turn.

Flash fiction is fiction of extreme brevity. While there is no universally-accepted word limit, generally flash fiction is a short story of fewer than 2,000 words. Most flash-fiction pieces run between 250 and 1,000 words.

[moonglum]

I think I might like this game.

Here's a starter.


My friend, who usually slept late in the mornings, except on the rare occasions when he was up all night, was sitting at the table enjoying his breakfast. I stood by the hearth and picked up the walking-stick which our visitor had left behind. Just below the handle was a small silver plate, which read. “To James Mortimer, from his friends at the C.C.H."

[Phalon]

<wishing I was better read in the classics>

Do we get clues? Not that they would help, but do we get them?

[moonglum]

I don't know about clues.

Point of order madam chairperson, could we have a ruling on this please?

[Mini Mia]

Fine with me.

[moonglum]

The author was born in Scotland in the mid nineteenth century. This excerpt is from one of only three novels featuring this character.

[Phalon]

Ah-ha!!! The Hounds of Baskerville by Sir Arthur Canon Doyle

(You'd never believe how I came to this conclusion after having drilled just about everything I could think to drill)

[moonglum]

Absolutely right, Lady P.

I'm intrigued now to hear your deductive train of thought.

[Phalon]

Ah, Moonglum....my train of thought has been derailed long ago, and even before then it was on the wrong track.

I wasn't kidding when I said I wish I was better read; I'm pretty much ignorant when it comes to classic literature. And I've never read The Hounds of Baskerville, a Sherlock Holmes novel, or even seen a Sherlock Holmes movie.

I did learn some interesting tidbits along the way though.

Canon Doyle's name didn't come up on a drill of "nineteenth century Scottish authors", but there is a rare collection of Robert Burns' works in the University of South Carolina - to include a volume of John Moore's novel Zeluco annotated by Burns, and a copy of The World with over sixty ascriptions and comments in Burns' hand. I have concluded these comments, probably made in the margins of the book, are where the term "sideburns" originated.

I discovered "James Mortimer" is quite a popular guy; there are over a million websites devoted to him. While I found no mention of a character named James Mortimer in a book by an unknown Scottish author, there is a famous chess player by the same name, who, while not very good at winning chess matches, apparently penned a few books on the subject.

Did you know that in a museum devoted to JFK is housed a sword on which "Just below the handle was a small silver plate"?

CCH is a global provider of tax and business law information.

I had absolutely no idea where the paragraph might have come, and didn't know how you rewrote it, (humorously rewritten, rewritten using your own experiences in place of what the author wrote, etc).

But ah-ha! I finally found this: I stood upon the hearth-rug and picked up the stick which our visitor had left behind him the night before.

And there you have it. Elementary, my dear Moonglum.....a phrase which, btw, Holmes never uttered in any novel.

[Phalon]

Here's one from a classic I did read in American Lit class many, many years ago.

So she said, and sadly glanced down at the letter. Many, many years later, a new grave was dug near an old and sunken one in the old cemetary next to the newer King's Chapel. Though the new grave was next to that old and sunken grave, there was a space between, because no, no, no - the dust of the two sleepers had no right to mingle. Yet one tombstone served for both. All around, there were monuments carved with the bearings of family insignias. But on this simple slab of slate--as the curious investigator may still see and be perplexed with its purpose--there appeared the semblance of an engraved coat of arms. It bore a warning which might serve as a moral and brief description of our now concluded legend; so somber is it, and relieved only by one ever-glowing point of light gloomier than the past:

"On a black shield, the character foreshadows red."

The End

[vox]

Also wishing I was better read Phalon, I must admit to googleing to find the answer to this one!

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne (1850)

I have found the book on line and intend to read it!

[vox]

Right, here's an easy one for all of you out there!



"....It was eleven minutes before twelve midnight on Saturday 10th day of February 1908 when I saw the strange sight off the headland known as the Spear of Imran on the coast of the Land of the Black Mountains. It was a fine night, and I stood right on the deck of the ship where there was nothing to obstruct my view. We were some distance from the Spear, passing from southern to northern point of the wide bay into which it projects. Captain Maloney, the Master, is a very careful man, gives wide berth to the bay which is tabooed by Lloyd's. But when he saw in the faint moonlight, a tiny white figure on some strange current in a small boat, on the prow of which rested a faint light, he thought it might be some person in distress, and began to cautiously edge towards it. Two of his officers were with him on the bridge. All three, as well as myself, saw it. The rest of the crew and passengers were below. As we got close the true inwardness of it became apparent.

[Phalon]

Easy, Vox? Nope - I haven't read this one either, and had to do a search on it. Kinda fun though, where these things lead....I got sidetracked on this one by "The Black Mountains: The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Somewhere", (I can't remember where).

The paragraph is from "The Lady of the Shroud" by Bram Stoker, I believe.

If so, it's my turn, I suppose. It'll have to wait though.

I've gotta hurry; no time right now; I'm gonna be late for my brunch date.

Unless, of course, you want to use that sentence as a very condensed version of part of a classic children's novel.

[vox]

You got it right Phalon!

[Mini Mia]

NOTE: There are now two options to this game. Pick whichever of the two options you wish.