Background
Following motifs of faith, religion, war and friendship, John Irving discussed the backstory of A Prayer for Owen Meany before an assembly of drama students at Yale University. [6] Irving revealed the "effects of the morbid Vietnam generation" on the plot of his novel. He tried to communicate, "a victim of the war, but not the victim you see coming from Vietnam." [6] He also mentioned a small boy from his New Hampshire hometown, a boy named Russell, who inspired the character, Owen Meany. This protagonist with a "rock-dust falsetto" became the kid from the granite quarry who later dies in the Vietnam War. [6] Critics also mentioned the similarities in plot between Irving's novels. Shostak recalled repetitive New Hampshire-based stories involving themes such as faith and determination. [3] Irving has also added that his "accumulated churchgoing" has influenced his writing process. [4]
John Irving's mother, Frances Winslow, was not married at the time of his conception. Irving never met his biological father. As a child, he was told nothing about his father, and he told his mother that unless she gave him some information about his biological father, in his writing he would invent the father and the circumstances of how she got pregnant. Winslow would reply, "Go ahead, dear." This theme was also used in The World According to Garp .
Reception
A Prayer for Owen Meany has been both widely praised and criticized. Alfred Kazin described John Wheelwright as a "conscious and unapologetic wimp" and referred to Owen Meany as a "little squirt". [9] However, J. Denny Weaver commented on Owen's "heroic death", and remarked on the book's continuing theme that life is miraculous. [10] Overall, critics found the novel to be a different but successful addition to Irving's works. The book was on the New York Times Bestseller List . [11]
According to publisher Simon & Schuster, A Prayer for Owen Meany is Irving's "all-time bestselling novel, in every language". [12]
Novelist Frederick Buechner, a former teacher of Irving at the Phillips Exeter Academy whom Irving quoted in an epigraph to A Prayer for Owen Meany, called it simply "a really good book". [13]
Film, television and theatrical adaptations
In 1997, Book-It Repertory Theatre of Seattle, created a narrative-style theatrical adaptation of the novel's fourth chapter, "The Little Lord Jesus". The adaptation is titled "Owen Meany's Christmas Pageant" and has been produced seven times. [14]
The 1998 feature-length film Simon Birch , written and directed by Mark Steven Johnson, was loosely based on the novel. The film starred Ian Michael Smith, Joseph Mazzello, Ashley Judd, Oliver Platt and Jim Carrey. It omitted much of the latter half of the novel and altered the ending. The movie does not share the same title as the book or the character names at Irving's request; he felt that it would "mislead the novel's readers to see a film of that same title which was so different from the book." [15]
In 2002, the Royal National Theatre staged Simon Bent's adaptation A Prayer for Owen Meany: On Faith starring Aidan McArdle as the title character and Richard Hope as John Wheelwright. [16]
In 2009, the BBC aired Linda Marshall Griffiths' adaptation of A Prayer for Owen Meany starring Henry Goodman, Toby Jones, Charlotte Emmerson and Max Baldry as a five-part Afternoon Play on BBC Radio Four. [17]
In 2009, Audible.com produced an audio version of A Prayer for Owen Meany, narrated by Joe Barrett, as part of its Modern Vanguard line of audiobooks.
There have also been numerous theatrical adaptations, including Yale University's Dramatic Association's Freshman Show. [4] [6]
John Winslow Irving is an American-Canadian novelist, short story writer, and screenwriter.
The Thirty-Nine Steps is a 1915 adventure novel by the Scottish author John Buchan, first published by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh. It was serialized in All-Story Weekly issues of 5 and 12 June 1915, and in Blackwood's Magazine between July and September 1915, before being published in book form in October of that year. It is the first of five novels featuring Richard Hannay, an all-action hero with a stiff upper lip and a knack for getting himself out of tricky situations.
The Tin Drum is a 1959 novel by Günter Grass, the first book of his Danzig Trilogy. It was adapted into a 1979 film, which won both the 1979 Palme d'Or and the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1980.
Simon Birch is a 1998 American comedy-drama film loosely based on the 1989 novel A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving and written for the screen and directed by Mark Steven Johnson in his directorial debut. The film stars Ian Michael Smith, Joseph Mazzello, Jim Carrey, Ashley Judd, and Oliver Platt. It omitted much of the latter half of the novel and altered the ending.
Aidan McArdle is an Irish actor.
Richard Hope is a British actor who gained recognition from Brideshead Revisited as the doltish junior officer, Hooper, under Jeremy Irons charge. He is best known for playing Harris Pascoe in the UK TV drama Poldark. His theatre career includes portraying Pierre Bezukhov in War and Peace at the Royal National Theatre and having starred in another Tolstoy adaptation by Helen Edmundson, playing Levin in Anna Karenina. In 2015, he played Hector in The History Boys. In 2018–2019, he starred in the West End production The Woman in Black as Arthur Kipps.
Ian Michael Smith is an American actor, known for his starring role in Simon Birch.
David Hammond is an American director and acting teacher. He trained for the theatre at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts and received his M.F.A. from the Carnegie Mellon University Drama Department. He did his undergraduate studies at Harvard University and graduated magna cum laude with a concentration in Elizabethan literature. He taught at the Juilliard School, the American Conservatory Theater, and the Yale School of Drama and later became the artistic director of the PlayMakers Repertory Company.
The Tin Drum is a 1979 film adaptation of Günter Grass' novel of the same title, directed by Volker Schlöndorff from a screenplay co-written with Jean-Claude Carrière and Franz Seitz. It stars Mario Adorf, Angela Winkler, Daniel Olbrychski, Katharina Thalbach, Charles Aznavour, and David Bennent in the lead role of Oskar Matzerath, a young boy who willfully arrests his own physical development and remains in the body of a child even as he enters adulthood.
The World According to Garp is a 1982 American comedy-drama film produced and directed by George Roy Hill and starring Robin Williams in the title role. Written by Steve Tesich, it is based on the 1978 novel The World According to Garp by John Irving. For their roles, John Lithgow and Glenn Close were respectively nominated for Best Actor in a Supporting Role and Best Actress in a Supporting Role at the 55th Academy Awards.
A Christmas Carol, the 1843 novella by Charles Dickens (1812–1870), is one of the English author's best-known works. It is the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, a greedy miser who hates Christmas, but is transformed into a caring, kindly person through the visitations of four ghosts. The classic work has been dramatised and adapted countless times for virtually every medium and performance genre, and new versions appear regularly.
And Then There Were None is a mystery novel by the English writer Agatha Christie, who described it as the most difficult of her books to write. It was first published in the United Kingdom by the Collins Crime Club on 6 November 1939, as Ten Little Niggers, after an 1869 minstrel song that serves as a major plot element. The US edition was released in January 1940 with the title And Then There Were None, taken from the last five words of the song. Successive American reprints and adaptations use that title, though American Pocket Books paperbacks used the title Ten Little Indians between 1964 and 1986. UK editions continued to use the original title until 1985.
Dwarfism has been showcased across many types of media. As popular media has become more prevalent, a greater number of works depicting dwarfism have popularized the condition.
Last Night in Twisted River is a 2009 novel by American writer John Irving, his 12th since 1968. It was first published in the Netherlands by De Bezige Bij on September 1, 2009, in Canada by Knopf Canada on October 20, 2009, and in the United States by Random House on October 27, 2009. The novel spans five decades and is about a boy and his father who flee the logging community of Twisted River on the Androscoggin River in northern New Hampshire after a tragic accident. While on the run, the boy grows up to become a famous writer, writing eight semi-autobiographical novels. The book was included in Time's 2009 list of "the fall's most anticipated movies, books, TV shows, albums and exhibits".
Simon Bent is a British screenwriter and playwright, notable for work including BBC TV drama Beau Brummell: This Charming Man (2006), the screenplay for the feature film Christie Malry's Own Double-Entry (2000), and the Joe Orton biographical play Prick Up Your Ears based on John Lahr's book.
Book-It Repertory Theatre is a regional theatre located in Seattle, Washington. It is a 501-c(3) registered nonprofit corporation, and is devoted to "transforming great literature into great theatre through simple and sensitive production and to inspiring its audiences to read". Founded in 1987, it is now led by Co-Artistic Directors Jane Jones and Myra Platt, and is a 2012 Governor's Arts Award winner and 2010 Mayor's Arts Award winner. It is a member of Theatre Puget Sound and a part of The Kennedy Center's Partners in Education Program.
Avenue of Mysteries is a 2015 novel by American author John Irving, his 14th novel. The book was published in November 2015 by Simon & Schuster.
The Congregational Church in Exeter is a parish of the United Church of Christ located on Front Street in Exeter, New Hampshire.
Theatre-fiction refers to novels and stories that focus on theatre - its people, practices and industries. Characters often include actors, playwrights, directors, prompters, understudies, set designers, critics, or casting agents. Common settings may include theatre auditoriums, dressing rooms, rehearsal spaces, or other places in which theatre is created and performed. Theatre-fiction may engage with and represent many different varieties of theatre, from performances of Shakespearean tragedy to Kabuki theatre to pantomime.
