A01=Patrick C. Fleming
Age Group_Uncategorized
Age Group_Uncategorized
Alice in Wonderland
Author_Patrick C. Fleming
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British
Category1=Non-Fiction
Category=APFN
Category=ATFV
Category=DSBF
Category=DSRC
Category=DSY
Category=JBCC1
Category=JFCA
Category=JFD
Charles Dickens
COP=United States
copyright
Delivery_Pre-order
eq_art-fashion-photography
eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
franchise
Frozen Snow Queen
Hans Christian Anderson
Language_English
Lewis Carroll
Little Mermaid
melodrama
Oliver and Company Twist
PA=Not yet available
pirate
Price_€100 and above
princess
PS=Forthcoming
softlaunch
theme parks
Ugly Duckling
Product details
- ISBN 9781496855374
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 26 Feb 2025
- Publisher: University Press of Mississippi
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
- Language: English
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Many Disney films adapt works from the Victorian period, which is often called the Golden Age of children’s literature. Animating the Victorians: Disney’s Literary History explores Disney’s adaptations of Victorian texts like Alice in Wonderland, Oliver Twist, Treasure Island, Peter Pan, and the tales of Hans Christian Andersen. Author Patrick C. Fleming traces those adaptations from initial concept to theatrical release and beyond to the sequels, consumer products, and theme park attractions that make up a Disney franchise. During the production process, which often extended over decades, Disney’s writers engaged not just with the texts themselves but with the contexts in which they were written, their authors’ biographies, and intervening adaptations. To reveal that process, Fleming draws on preproduction reports, press releases, and unfinished drafts, including materials in the Walt Disney Company Archives, some of which have not yet been discussed in print.
But the relationship between Disney and the Victorians goes beyond adaptations. Walt Disney himself had a similar career to the Victorian author-entrepreneur Charles Dickens. Linking the Disney Princess franchise to Victorian ideologies shows how gender and sexuality are constantly being renegotiated. Disney’s animated musicals, theme parks, copyright practices, and even marketing campaigns depend on cultural assumptions, legal frameworks, and media technologies that emerged in nineteenth-century England. Moreover, Disney’s adaptations influence modern students and scholars of the Victorian period. By applying scholarship in Victorian studies to a global company, Fleming shows how institutions mediate our understanding of the past and demonstrates the continued relevance of literary studies in a corporate media age.
But the relationship between Disney and the Victorians goes beyond adaptations. Walt Disney himself had a similar career to the Victorian author-entrepreneur Charles Dickens. Linking the Disney Princess franchise to Victorian ideologies shows how gender and sexuality are constantly being renegotiated. Disney’s animated musicals, theme parks, copyright practices, and even marketing campaigns depend on cultural assumptions, legal frameworks, and media technologies that emerged in nineteenth-century England. Moreover, Disney’s adaptations influence modern students and scholars of the Victorian period. By applying scholarship in Victorian studies to a global company, Fleming shows how institutions mediate our understanding of the past and demonstrates the continued relevance of literary studies in a corporate media age.
Patrick C. Fleming is a scholar of Victorian studies and children’s literature. He is author of The Legacy of the Moral Tale: Children’s Literature and the English Novel, 1744-1859 and of articles in journals including Victorian Periodicals Review, Pedagogy, and the Children’s Literature Association Quarterly.
