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鈥淪hakespeare, Rembrandt, Beethoven will make films...all legends, all mythologies and all myths, all founders of religion, and the very religions... await their exposed resurrection, and the heroes crowd each other at the gate.鈥�

鈥� Abel Gance 1

Anticipating Barthes鈥檚 giddy proclamation of 鈥渢he Death of the Author鈥� by two decades, Andre Bazin argued in 1948 that 鈥渋t is possible to imagine that we are moving toward a reign of the adaptation in which the notion of the unity of the work of art, if not the very notion of the author himself, will be destroyed鈥� (49). Seeking to eliminate the role of chronological precedence and, to a certain extent, medium specificity, Bazin envisions a time鈥攖he year 2050鈥攚herein critics 鈥渨ould find not a novel out of which a play and a film had been 鈥榤ade,鈥� but rather a single work reflected through three art forms, an artistic pyramid with three sides, all equal in the eyes of the critic鈥� (50). Although Bazin鈥檚 claim about aesthetic 鈥渆quality鈥� is still subject to debate, there can be little doubt that, in the digital age, the sanctified boundaries of medium, space, and time have all but disappeared. Hence, in her widely quoted book, A Theory of Adaptation, Linda Hutcheon refers to the adaptation process as 鈥減alimpsestuous鈥濃�攁 word with deliberately erotic overtones, to characterize adaptation as something of a fortuitous aberration, or, in Hutcheon鈥檚 phrasing: 鈥渁 derivation that is not derivative鈥攁 work that is second without being secondary. It is its own palimpsestic thing鈥� (9).2

There is a troubling relativism that inheres in this assertion, as is the case with other recent theories of adaptation. Mark Fortier, in his essay 鈥淏eyond Adaptation,鈥� adopts a similarly open-ended definition, observing that there is no 鈥渃ompelling reason not to understand adaptation, at least in one of its meanings, in this unlimited sense鈥� (374). 鈥淪uffice it to say,鈥� he adds, that 鈥渃hange鈥� is the only certainty, 鈥渨ith origin and constancy adrift and always at risk on a sea of primal variation鈥� (375). Given the ascendancy of intermedial art, this desultory, primordial soup approach to theorizing adaptation has gained currency鈥攁 development that is concerning because it tends to occlude the political dimensions of this process. Although Hutcheon gives some consideration to the politics of 鈥渋ndigenization鈥� (an anthropological term she borrows from Susan Stanford Friedman), noting that 鈥淸a]dapters across cultures probably cannot avoid thinking about power鈥� (152), her subsequent conclusion is surprisingly na茂ve: 鈥渢he advantage of the more general anthropological usage in thinking about adaptation is that it implies agency: people pick and choose what they want to transplant to their own soil鈥� (150).

鈥淎 director must sway his actors just as an orator sways his audience. There have been a few great women orators. There will be a few women directors.鈥�

鈥� Cecil B. DeMille 3

Rather than thinking about adaptation as a semi-random, semi-autonomous act of repetition without replication, I prefer to think of it as a mechanism of reclamation and recovery. Quite unlike 鈥減ick[ing] and choos[ing]鈥� what to 鈥渢ransplant鈥� to 鈥渋ndigenous soil鈥� (Hutcheon 150), the adaptation process鈥攁t least for women directors of Shakespeare films鈥攊nvolves the experience of internal exile, of non-indigeneity, in an industry that has always been more disposed to validate women who remain in front of the camera. In this respect, the adaptation process is more akin to the harrowing ontological journey that Adrienne Rich undertakes in 鈥淒iving into the Wreck.鈥� In this poem, Rich descends to the ocean floor in search of an originary feminist discourse, imagining a shipwreck as a primal scene of historical trauma and epistemic violence:

I came to explore the wreck.
The words are purposes.
The words are maps. I came to see the damage that was done
and the treasures that prevail. (52-56)

Sifting through the ruins in search of her own voice鈥斺�渢he thing itself and not the myth鈥� 鈥擱ich encounters, in the final stanza, only the specter of her own erasure in 鈥渁 book of myths in which our names do not appear鈥� (62-63). Women directors experience similar alienation when adapting Shakespeare, whose 鈥渨ords are maps鈥� (Rich 54) that lead to an origin story from which they find themselves missing in action. Eclipsed by auteurs such as Olivier, Welles, Kurosawa, Kozintsev, Zeffirelli, and Branagh, women filmmakers from Lois Weber to Julie Taymor have been subject to heightened critical scrutiny, admonished for their hubris in approaching Shakespeare from a uniquely female perspective, as well as for contesting the exclusively male domain of the Shakespeare film.4 It is little wonder that Jane Smiley, in rewriting King Lear as the novel A Thousand Acres, identifies the process of adapting Shakespeare with nothing less than the 鈥渃ourage鈥� to 鈥渇all at last into total darkness鈥� (171).

We might think of 鈥淒iving into the Wreck鈥� as a conceptual framework for a feminist politics of adaptation that embraces the arduous task of counter-memory鈥攁 project that rejects patriarchal genealogies as well as the very idea of fixed or stable origins. Counter-memory, Foucault writes, 鈥渋s not the erecting of foundations: on the contrary, it disturbs what was previously considered immobile; it fragments what was thought unified; it shows the heterogeneity of what was imagined consistent with itself鈥� (147). With respect to Shakespeare, as Peter Widdowson contends, canonical texts can 鈥渂e revised and re-visioned as part of the process of restoring a voice, a history and an identity to those hitherto exploited, marginalized and silenced by dominant interests and ideologies鈥� (505-506). This is the point at which adaptation ceases to become a negotiation with the past and instead becomes a broker of possible futures鈥攁s 鈥渢he articulation,鈥� in Derrida鈥檚 terms, of 鈥渨hat is no longer and what is not yet鈥� (24-25).

鈥淸G]ive name to the nameless so it can be thought.鈥�

鈥� Audre Lorde 5

Nominated in 2007 for the Oscar for Best Foreign Film, Deepa Mehta鈥檚 Water (2006) is a perilous act of counter-memory with a Shakespearean twist. 奥补迟别谤鈥檚 main plot revolves around the struggles of Chuyia, an eight year-old child-bride who is sent to an ashram, or widows鈥� home, where she is doomed to a life of near-total deprivation. The film鈥檚 subplot features a Romeo and Juliet-style love story between Narayan, a member of the elite Brahmin caste, and Kalyani, the beautiful young widow forced into prostitution to support the ashram. Though Kalyani eventually escapes her confines to elope with Narayan, she ultimately returns to the ashram, where she wades into the Ganges until the water folds over her, drowning herself in shame. Using Shakespeare to critique the ideology of romantic love, Mehta highlights the horrific paternalism鈥攁nd exploitation鈥攖o which India鈥檚 substantial widow population is still subject. In the process, she gives expression to the repressed histories of a female underclass that has been silenced for more than two thousand years by religious fundamentalism, State-sanctioned gender oppression, catastrophic neglect and rampant sexual abuse.

Perhaps not surprisingly, when shooting began in 1999, Water was sabotaged only two takes into the film by supporters of the BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party), India鈥檚 ruling party, who advocate a return to a Hindu theocracy (Hinduvta) that condones aggression against Muslims, restores scriptural law, and replaces scientific education with Hindu mythology. When the enraged mob destroyed the sets and burned Mehta in effigy, death threats ensued and the government withdrew its protection, forcing her to leave India, where she was accused of 鈥減olluting the Ganges鈥� with her alternative history of India鈥檚 widows. It was not until five years later that Mehta mustered the resources to move the production to Sri Lanka, where Water was shot under the false title Full Moon and finally released in 2006.

According to Hindu scripture, widows can achieve moksha, or freedom from the karmic cycle of suffering they inherit, in three ways: they can burn to death on the husband鈥檚 funeral pyre in a ritual called sati (the Sanskrit word for 鈥済ood wife鈥�), they can marry the husband鈥檚 younger brother, or they can live as pariahs in an ashram. Subverting audience expectations, Water associates the achievement of moksha not with the glory of martyrdom, or 鈥渢he intoxicating ideology of self-sacrifice鈥� (Spivak 98), but with the further mortification of the female body, as the widows become victims of neglect, suicide, sex trafficking鈥攁nd, in the case of Chuyia鈥攃hild rape. Indeed, women directors often localize the adaptation process in brutal representations of the female body-in-pain, the privileged site for ongoing battles over agency, East and West. The film鈥檚 closing title card etches its politics in bold relief:

There are over 34 million widows in India according to the 2001 census. Many continue to live in conditions of social, economic and cultural deprivation as prescribed 2000 years ago by the Sacred Texts of Manu.

Counter-memory is, ultimately, a mechanism for intervening in the present and a methodology of the oppressed鈥攁 practice that reflects Mehta鈥檚 insistence that 鈥淎rt is political and should be political.鈥� 6

鈥淲e should bear in mind that the opposite of existence is not nonexistence, but insistence.鈥�

鈥擲lavoj Zizek

When the actors John Heminge and Henry Condell wrote their preface to Shakespeare鈥檚 First Folio in 1623, they bequeathed to 鈥渢he great Variety of Readers鈥� neither Shakespeare鈥檚 book nor his body but, rather, his 鈥渞emaines.鈥� For Derrida, the collective work of mourning鈥攁s a mode of political redress鈥斺�渃onsists always in attempting to ontologize remains, to make them present鈥� (9). Adaptation is, on some level, always an act of mourning: a quest to ontologize what is not there, what is no longer there, or what never was in the first place. This desire to materialize absence invokes a politics of adaptation that revolves around 鈥渄iving into the wreck鈥� (Rich) of the dominant interests of history to expose 鈥渁 body totally imprinted by history and the process of history鈥檚 destruction of the body鈥� (Foucault 148). By challenging sedimented mythologies and inserting itself in the gap between a contested past and a provisional future, counter-memory induces a crisis of legibility. But Derrida reminds us that 鈥淸a]n inheritance is never gathered together, it is never one with itself. . . . If the readability of a legacy were given, natural, transparent, univocal, if it did not call for and at the same time defy interpretation, we would never have anything to inherit from it鈥� (16). Adaptation is about inheriting鈥攁nd inhabiting鈥攖he 鈥渞emaines鈥� of history with a difference; an act of insistence in the face of non-existence, it is, finally, the very condition of justice.