My name is Raven. I design and market visual advocacy tools for an NPO start-up in Chicago, IL.
Yellow is my favorite color.Good inspiration comes from reinvention – whether it’s of mind, body or spirit. Therfore, if you can reinvent your life, why can’t you reinvent your own inspiration? And, to start – I want to give you some great reads that take reimagination to a whole new level.
First things first – here are the rules:
Leave a comment below telling me how (or why) you’d reinvent or reimagine your favorite fiction (or nonfiction) character. That’s all – pretty easy, huh? Winners will be chosen randomly.
Oh, did I say winners? Yes I did. Two lucky folks will receive the following:
1st Prize: The Deluxe Edition of Bill Willingham’s Fables (Vertigo)
Even if you’re not a true comic fan – you’ll have to appreciate Willingham’s reimagination of die hard fairy tales. Read about Prince Charming as a serial philanderer with 3 ex-wives, Little Boy Blue crooning as a soulful jazz musician and Goldilocks as a psychotic, bear-molesting bitch. (Eh, you have to read the book)
And, does anyone notice the rabbit with double pistols on the cover? You have to read a book about a rabbit with pistols. Fables is the winner of 12 Eisner awards and was the 2009 Hugo Award nominee for best graphic story. It’s an over sized hardcover for mature readers . Then again, I’m assuming you are a mature reader if you are reading this blog.
2nd prize: Twitterature (Penguin)
Calling all literature lovers. This humorous book reimagines (and sums up) all your favorite literary classics in the famous 140-character tweets. Aciman and Rensin create a delightful twitstream for reads such as Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice to Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight.
How can you not laugh when Shakespeare’s Macbeth (Twitter handle @BigMAC) says,
Shit. ‘C-section is not ‘of woman born’? What kind of king dies on a goddamn technicality?
Winners have until at midnight Saturday (3/13/10) to submit their entries. Have fun (re)imagining and good luck!
Update: Congratulations to Susan and Jerry – hope you enjoy your books guys!
Hooray! Glad to see you decided to go with the giveaways, Raven — they’re a great idea!
I’ve been wanting to read Fables ever since you first told me about it…About a year ago? It’s been a very long time.
And I follow minilit on Twitter, which is similar, I believe, to Twitterature. Absolutely brilliant. Who needs CliffsNotes when you can sum up these classics in 140 characters?
Who would I love to reimagine? Tough choice, as I’ve fallen in love with the characters of my favorite books because of how well they’re written and what they stand for. I’ll say Ophelia from Hamlet. Just to keep her alive. =P
I was thinking of this….
By the way, I was in my History class, not helping students, but here it goes…
I was thinking of William Samuel Johnson, Alexander Hamiliton, Gouverneur Morris, James Madison and Rufus King as the first Monster Opposition Defense Squadron (MODS). When Washington got elected, it fell upon the shoulders of him, Thomas Jefferson, Henry Knox, Hamiliton (again) and Edmund Randolph to pick up the torch. I’ll write more after I get this one posted….
I’d like to read Fables all in ONE setting and in one book. Should be fun instead of the single issues that I got…
Did you know that your clock is set to Eastern Standard Time?
Anyway, my idea fleshed out (I just wanted to follow your rules.)
Ever since the days of the Revolutionary War, there has been a group of five people who have put their lives on the line to protect America and her citizens from threats undead or demonic. When the first President was elected and choose his first cabinet, the responsibility passed to them.
It all began when Alexander Hamilton and James Madison were asking then General George Washington how the Revolutionary War was going. He told them it was going good, but there were reports of “strange noises” South of their camp. Hamilton and Madison went to talk to the other writers of the Constitution, William Samuel Johnson, Gouverneur Morris and Rufus King to create the Monster Opposition Defense Squadron (MODS) and investigate it. They did and it turned out to be a werewolf. With the assistance of notes from Benjamin Franklin (who spent years in London, where there were numerous werewolf sightings) they successfully were able to free the man from his curse.
After Washington becomes President, Hamilton went to him and suggested they keep the MODS going. Washington agrees and appoints his cabinet to the MODS. Thomas Jefferson, Henry Knox, Edmund Randolph, along with Hamilton, and Washington himself. To keep the tradition alive and America safe, every President since and his top four cabinet members (Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, Secretary of Treasury, and Attorney General) have been members of the MODS
I would re-imagine C.S. Forester’s ‘Horatio Hornblower’ as a modern day family
restaurant manager. Working for a big chain, he would fight for his underpaid,
overworked employees; his community and his employers. Making scant wages,
barely surviving, wearing second-hand dress shirts and living on Ramen. Earning
promotions based on his ability to turn-around money losing restaurants he would
find more work and longer hours well before he found his fortune. Oh, and he’d
fall in love with the daughter of the CEO, though he was himself married and she
as well. Not until his wife died of complications from her foot surgery and his
True Love’s husband died of injuries sustained moving a piano, would they be
together.
He would eventually take over the company, earn a hefty fortune, take his
retirement and they would retire to a sunny locale where they could be happy.
And he could finally get some rest.