| Summary: | 碩士 === 東海大學 === 中國文學系碩士在職專班 === 107 === Abstract
Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Water Margin, and Journey to the West are commonly lauded as the quintessential legacy of time-honored classic Chinese literature. These three novels have been adapted or rewritten countless times, albeit to varying levels of success. This begs the question of whether common adaptation approaches are suitable for child readers; parent, teacher, and child readers’ reception and expectations of adapted classic works; characteristics of high-quality adaptations, and also whether children are truly able to appreciate these approaches.
In response to these questions, this study investigated the text of Wang Wuh-Hua’s nine adaptation works.Textual analysis was applied to assess plot changes, character remodeling, theme fusion, narrative styles, and artistic expressions in these works and to compare the works with similar works available on the market. In this manner, Wang’s writing strategies and characteristics of children’s stories were examined to determine the author’s messages and feedback to his readers in order to gain insight into the nature of excellent adaptations of classic works.
Wang’s adapted works contain innovative and educational themes written with creative literary skills. Therefore, his prose is full of artistic charm and his plots are sincere and contain many unexpected twists and turns. These works inherit the rich cultural ethos of classic literature; the stories are imbued with new meaning and value through adaptation. Thus, these works can serve as a suitable introduction to the world of classic literature for children, and they are suitable for readers who are already familiar with the original works to savor the purport and allure of literature.
This study systematically summarized the characteristics of Wang’s adapted works and presented questions and suggestions. The insight provided herein is expected to help teachers, students, and parents select ideal reading material for children and expand our understanding of practices and strategies for adapting classic literary works.
Key Words: Wang Wuh-Hua, adaptation, classic novel, children’s literature, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Water Margin, Journey to the West
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