(Extract of an interview with Godfrey Chin, Georgetown, Guyana, July 2011. Born in 1937, Chin worked in the Civil Service and at the Guyana Chronicle before migrating to the USA in 1982. In 2007, he published his monumental book, ‘Nostalgias, Golden Memories of Guyana, 1940 to 1980’. He died in Guyana in January 2012.)
PP: My formative years were filled with books and films. There were times when one source fed off the other; what I mean is that sometimes I would read a book and hanker to see the film adaptation or vice versa; see the film and hanker to read the book. But more often, it was the movie first, then the book. I was intrigued by how the masters worked; the master writer, the master filmmaker and how one artist treats the work of another.
Godfrey, when I called you this morning, you said you were up since early reading; one of your great loves. The other love of your life is film. Let’s talk literature and film.

GC: Actually, Petamber, your first preamble is correct: Which came first? Reading about the great literature books or seeing the movies, and then becoming interested.
Let me start at the beginning of the 40s when Classics Illustrated was very popular. What they did there on a 52-page colour, they started to give us the Great Classics. I can remember ‘The Three Musketeers’, then the ‘Adventures of Robin Hood’, ‘Treasure Island’, ‘Westward Ho’. So what that meant in the days when there was no television, just radio, we were just at public school; so here you could buy a comic book for twelve cents and have in pictorial form the story of The Classics. It was not only the story done specially for us, but at the back was the story of the authors: Dumas, Stevenson… And there you could read how they were inspired to write these stories.

PP: Interesting that you should mention that, because it brings to mind another art form: On the labels of vinyl 33 1/3 records was information and titbits about the writer of the song, and the performer and the band, and loads of other related things.

GC: That’s a good point, because in later years, on the 331/3 vinyl, there was the history of that particular music and the artistes. And I remember spending days in Radio Demerara …

PP: All of these things make up our literature…

GC: Yes! Reading about the music and the artistes… So I was reading everything in Radio Demerara, that one day, the General Manager welcomed me as an employee; he thought I worked there.

PP: Let’s get back to Hollywood.

GC: Hollywood was the creative school looking for good literature to make into movies. Even from silent days, they had started to make ‘Moby Dick’ by Herman Melville; Rafael Sabatini’s ‘Scaramouch’ and ‘Prisoner of Zenda’ with Rex Ingram. So, coming through the 30s, when people like David O. Selznick recognised the possibilities of bringing The Classics to the screen… One I can remember was Mark Twain’s ‘Adventure of Tom Sawyer’; ‘Prisoner of Zenda’, Ronald Colman… All eagerly awaited by movie fans.

PP: What you are saying, then, is that many of the screen scripts came from books.

GC: Yes!

PP: Even from the silent days…

GC: Yes! Actually, what happened, when they realised the potential of producing movies from The Classics books, they started to buy them.

PP: The rights?

GC: Yes! They were already printed: ‘A Tale of Two Cities’, Ronald Colman…

PP: Written by Dickens.

GC: That came in the 40s, and coincided with our studies in my days.

PP: In your days!

GC: Yes. But let’s go back to the 30s; 1939, one of the greatest movies ever made, written by Margaret Mitchell. She wrote that in ‘36, ‘37, and even before it was published, David O. Selznick had already paid over $50,000 for the movie rights. When it came out, it was a runaway bestseller; it sold a million copies in the first six months. And he announced he was going to make ‘Gone With the Wind’. It was sensational, in that everyone all over the world started to say we wanted to have Clarke Gable play Rhett Butler. And the search for Vivien Leigh was on; there were over 500 starlets vying to play opposite Clarke Gable.
Eventually, ‘Gone With the Wind’, the literary masterpiece and bestseller, became one of the three top movies of 1939.

PP: Godfrey, let’s pause for a while and look at this through the eyes of the younger generation. I know many young people who do not get the same impact that you acquired from watching ‘Gone With the Wind’. Why?

GC: Because of the dearth of movie houses today, they can buy a copy and look at it on their television. But the interaction; and seeing these movies…

PP: On the big-screen was a total different experience…

GC: Yes. The people of my time learnt creativity. I have a two-hour film on the making of ‘Gone With the Wind’, and I am hoping and longing one day to show it, even at the Theatre Guild, so people can see all aspects… I mean, just studying the craziness of David O. Selznick is a history by itself. He fired four directors, twenty screenwriters. I am talking about filming, production, costume, the burning of the set of King Kong… Fascinating!

PP: When I raised the point of connectivity to the younger generation, another thought crossed my mind: The younger generation may not be reading as much and perhaps have not gone to The Classics.

GC: Before I answer that, let me move you to the 40s. All these literature books were being made into films: I am talking about ‘Great Expectations’, which was shown every three months at the Astor Cinema; private viewing. So, we knew the story of Mrs Haversham and  David Copperfield; so, our exposure into literary classics continued.
The Academy Award film for 1948 was Lawrence Oliver…‘Hamlet’. At eleven years, that was introduction to tragedies and comedies of Shakespeare. By the time I went to Central [High School], we had Shakespeare in prose, so we read the stories in prose form, and the next thing you knew, you wanted to read the plays: Julius Caesar, Hamlet. Julius Caesar eventually became a big hit in the 60s. Eventually, you migrated to Theatre Guild, where you wanted to be part of the actual production. I can see myself saying: “Friends, Romans, Countrymen, let me your ears…’

PP: Wow! One thing led to another in our overall education!

GC: Yes. We moved from pre-school, public school, into The Classics; High School; learning about the novels; into Shakespeare; into theatre…

PP: How are you able to retain all these things are all these many years?

GC: Actually, I have a remarkable memory, in that anything I read (and write a note on), I would remember.

PP: So, Godfrey, this note writing of yours was an aid to memorising things?

GC: Yes. Reading and writing.

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