All my life I’ve seen versions of classic stories in popular media. There’s Disney’s version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, a stage production of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and cartoon presentations of Gulliver’s Travels on TV. Over the years, how many ways has Frankenstein been portrayed? If I say Don Quixote, what mental image comes to mind?

So a few years ago, I decided it was time to dig out and read the originals of these classic tales. I suspected they have been changed, modified, warped, eviscerated (pick your verb) by more contemporary tastes, sometimes obliterating the intent of the original author.

And in most cases, I was right. Here are a few examples.

Victor Hugo (full name Victor-Marie Hugo) was a French writer, human-rights activist and politician who lived from 1802 to 1885. His most famous works were the novels The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Les Misérables. Not to give too much away, but I discovered Hunchback to be a tragedy and I had to give up on Les Mis because I found it too depressing. I realize it’s unfair to judge a life’s work from only two novels (as critically acclaimed as they are), but I found myself thinking “This guy is famous, why?” For balance, a good place to start your own research is https://www.biography.com/authors-writers/victor-hugo

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde appeared in 1886 as a novella by Robert Louis Stevenson. As originally written, the fact that both personas was the same man was the surprise ending. Of course the surprise has long since been spoiled, especially by TV and stage adaptations. Perhaps the modern allure is how well the ending is disguised in the original. If you don’t want to wade through Stevenson’s work, here is a summary: https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Strange-Case-of-Dr-Jekyll-and-Mr-Hyde.

Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift appeared in 1726 as Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships. It was intended as a satire on both politics and human nature. There were actually four adventures, but attention spans being what they are these days, I have only seen the first adventure portrayed: Gulliver as a giant among the Lilliputians. For more detail, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulliver%27s_Travels.

If you want a real shock, try Frankenstein. I have never seen the complete story presented on stage or screen, but a quick search of “Frankenstein Movies” revealed a series of eight from Universal from 1931 to 1948, including Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankenstein). Then I found another database that listed 66! (https://www.imdb.com/list/ls547773444/). And have you heard of Frankenweenie? (https://movies.disney.com/frankenweenie-2012) Enough! Mary Shelly, aka Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, published  Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, on 1 January 1818. Her life and how she concocted the plotline are stories in themselves which are beyond the scope of this essay, but can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Shelley.

So enjoy your popular culture, but don’t be afraid to hunt down and explore the originals. You might be very surprised.