[Ads-l] another non-fiction novel

[Ben Zimmer]

When Mel Gibson first optioned Winchester's book in '98, he was just a few
years removed from playing William Wallace in "Braveheart." I guess he was
ready to move on to the next Scottish hero.


On Tue, Aug 2, 2016 at 2:26 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
wrote:

> > On Aug 2, 2016, at 1:31 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> wrote:
> >
> > I first heard of Mel Gibson in the mid '80s too....
> >
> > JL
>
> Past his prime ("The Year of Living Dangerously", 1982).  When he was
> still novel (as an actor) and non-fiction (as a human).
>
> LH
>
>
> >
> > On Tue, Aug 2, 2016 at 1:21 PM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:
> >> Yeah, it's not the use of "novel" that I was stunned by... more the
> idea of
> >> Mel Gibson as the beloved James Murray. (Mel's had the rights to
> >> Winchester's book for years now, but I don't think anyone guessed he was
> >> going to cast himself as Murray.) Or is that what you meant by "weird
> and
> >> disgusting"?
> >>
> >>
> >> On Tue, Aug 2, 2016 at 12:52 PM, Jonathan Lighter <
> wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >>>> stunned by this news
> >>>
> >>> Remember, I first noticed this usage in the mid '80s.
> >>>
> >>> Still weird and disgusting though.
> >>>
> >>> JL
> >>>
> >>> On Tue, Aug 2, 2016 at 11:47 AM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>
> https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/aug/02/mel-gibson-sean-penn-oed-creators-professor-madman
> >>>> Mel Gibson and Sean Penn to play creators of Oxford English Dictionary
> >>>> Based on the bestselling novel, Professor and the Madman will star the
> >>>> Oscar-winners as two obsessive men who worked together in the 19th
> >>> century.
> >>>>
> >>>> ---
> >>>>
> >>>> (I'm too stunned by this news to comment on anything other than the
> use of
> >>>> the word "novel" for Simon Winchester's non-fiction book "The
> Professor and
> >>>> the Madman," published in the UK as "The Surgeon of Crowthorne.")
> >>>>
> >>>> --bgz
>
>

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