Monday 1 January 2024

Poor Things - My first Hollywood movie (kind of...)



I've just heard that next week will see the release of a movie version of Alasdair Gray's 1992 novel - Poor Things

I have always had a kind of proprietorial interest in this work, because I was teaching in the Glasgow University Anatomy Department, and living nearby Alasdair at the time this was written - and went through the whole thing in draft, to correct the medical aspects (the story is about a doctor). 

Indeed, my recollection is that several whole sentences of my suggestions found their way into the final book; although I now have no clear idea which or where these were!

In my copy, Alasdair wrote a dedication:

14 August 1992. To Bruce who helped me get the medicine and surgery right, from a grateful Gray (Alasdair)

I haven't re-read Poor Things since around that time, and my memory of it is hazy; but I recall it was a lively and witty story; and it seems the movie is supposed to be very good. 

Remote, minuscule, and indirect though my contribution is; this is probably the closest I shall ever get to "Hollywood" - thank heavens!


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