Adapting War Horse: Cognition, the Spectator, and a Sense of Play by Toby Malone and Christopher J. Jackman (review)

In Adapting War Horse authors Toby Malone and Christopher Jackman explore from multiple angles the phenomenon that is War Horse: novel, radio play, stage production, filmed stage production, and feature film. With a particular focus on the puppetry of the National Theatre's stage production, the authors use this narrative as a case study for understanding the relationship among audience, text, and image. The case study highlights some key pieces of performance that many spectators take for granted: the imagination essential to create a living thing and environment out of nonliving materials; the process of adapting a piece of literature (which was itself a free adaption of historical events) twice over; and the emotional dimensions of a story centered on an animal in the midst of human tragedy.

As the world approaches the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day commemorating the end of World War I, the War Horse project as a whole strikes a nostalgic chord for me. Pairing a talking animal's narrative journey with serious commentary brings me back to stories of my youth, such as Watership Down and Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH. In these tales the animals were used as metaphors for humans at the mercy of larger forces. It was easy for children to identify with anthropomorphized animals, perhaps because they were smaller then children and thus nonthreatening or because they resembled stuffed animals with which children often sleep at night. As an adult, horses share that childlike fantastical quality. Horses are a collection of contradictions: strong and vulnerable, tame and wild, independent and bound to service. "Remembering" the Great War (of which most readers/audience members have no direct communal knowledge) seems to me of a piece with these animal stories from so long ago—stories viewed through a lens of nostalgia and safe distance.

The book is structured as a series of interrelated chapters, each examining one aspect of the War Horse narrative (which focuses on the thoroughbred Joey) in its various incarnations. First, the authors circumscribe the specific Handspring Puppet Company/National Theatre production, with a focus on the playfulness of the puppet artistry. In this section they define and describe the puppet construction and manipulation strategies, focusing on the process of bringing life to the character of Joey. I appreciated the detail in this section and the way in which the authors wove in various approaches to the understanding of "horse" (down to the micro-level of the puppets' eyes and the effect of lighting design on their sheen).

Next, they branch out to the other incarnations of the story—book, film, radio play—exploring the unique ways that each of these forms conceptualizes both the emotional center of the story and the audience's experience. The authors then dig deeper into the theory behind the process of imagination and the end goal of emotional connection, bolstering their arguments with theory from (among others) Peter Brook and Bruce McConachie. In this section they ask compelling questions about how we form emotional attachments with characters—both human and nonhuman—and how play functions within this intellectual/emotional exercise. There is much to appreciate in this section, especially as it explores the role of fantasy and imagination on audience understanding and investment.

Finally, the authors explore other fine points of the National's production, including marketing and translation into multiple languages. This section contextualizes the work done within the production and tackles the question of how did a book for young people become a worldwide phenomenon? Where did the multiple adaptations "go right"? What can we learn as scholars and practitioners from the long journeys of War Horse?

As a study, War Horse hits several high notes: it articulates the grand experiment that the National and Handspring undertook, with its reliance upon audience buy-in for its central character/characterization; and it situates this production within a frame of contemporary work, as well as...