Time may change me, But I can’t trace time…
Regular readers of these pages will know that I am a collector of all things related to The Man Who Fell To Earth…The novel of which is among those things. (03.17.2009 NEWS: PENGUIN MODERN CLASSICS VERSION OF TMWFTE DUE & 03.25.2009 NEWS: TWO MORE TMWFTE PAPERBACKS WITH BOWIE COVERS)
Above are the first and most recent published versions of the Walter Tevis story. On the left is the original US Gold Medal paperback from 1963 (it wasn’t released in hardback form till much later) and on the right is the Penguin Modern Classic version published last week.
Understandably, since the film’s release in 1976 the majority of the published books have David Bowie on the cover. The Pan edition (above) is the best known version to Bowie fans in the UK with it’s beautiful George Underwood painting adorning the cover.
If memory serves, I read the book before I saw the film because I can remember being struck by the differences…apart from the obvious physical differences between Bowie’s TJ Newton and the Tevis version, there was lots of sex in the film…but none in the book.
I have to admit that I saw the sex in the film as an unnecessary diversion at the time, as I felt that the lack of sex in the novel just added to Newton’s other-worldliness. I’ve since realised that as much as I love Roeg‘s work he does seem to find it difficult to make a film without gratuitous sex scenes. I’m not complaining though, Amanda Donohoe in Castaway made me realise that this process was completely necessary…not to mention Oliver Reed!
Like many other UK Bowie fans, I read the Pan paperback, which was set in the near future with the first part entitled: Icarus Descending 1985. I can remember being left slightly confused by the timeline in that Pan edition and it wasn’t until much later that I found out that it was in fact a revised-by-Tevis version.
By 1976, the original Tevis setting of 1972 had passed, so 1985 was chosen to reset the story into the future. That may have worked if the revision had been consistent with the same thirteen year jump throughout the book…but it wasn’t.
If it takes your fancy, you can read much more on these inconsistencies in a review headed:
Finally, American Bowie fans have never had to endure this confusion as the first version available at the time of the film’s release was the above paperback. This Avon Books edition was published in August 1976 and it retained the original manuscript.
Sadly, the Penguin Modern Classic edition published last week is also the revised version, which, having now passed 1985 too, seems pretty pointless.