Neil Jordan’s 1999 adaptation of Graham Greene’s novel The End of the Affair can most simply be seen, and has been examined by critics, as an example of what Andrew calls the “borrowing” mode of adaptation. In this familiar mode, the adapter draws on, with varying degrees of specificity, the “material, idea, or form of an earlier, generally successful text” (Ibid 264). The adapter chooses a text that has a pre-established audience, as well as a perceived ‘legitimacy’ as a text. A borrowed adaptation depends on universal myths and themes to sustain itself. This model, though, is subject-oriented. It considers the elements of the text, but not those of the adapter, whose own intentions and thematic concerns may converge or diverge from the source. Jordan’s adaptation of Greene’s work is more than simply a
filmmaker’s treatment of an appealing text and goes beyond “borrowing”; it is an interesting study in convergence and divergence. George Bluestone’s alternate model of adaptation may be applied here. Bluestone uses the example of two intersecting lines, book and film. Where the two intersect, they are virtually indistinguishable, but as the lines continue, the two get further and further apart (Bluestone 200). In the case of Jordan and Greene, one can imagine their paths not as straight perpendicular lines with a single intersection, but as lines that converge and diverge. Where Jordan’s film converges with Greene’s novel, it illuminates Greene’s take on faith and the limits of human reason. Where the film diverges from Greene’s novel, an entirely different understanding of the narrative emerges. In a way, this pairing offers a ‘case study’ of adaptation.