Who's Got Game?

Who's Got Game? The Ant or the Grasshopper?

by Toni & Slade Morrison (2003)

         Who's Got Game offers a very contemporary take on Aesop's Fables, while also offering a more complex view of the one dimensional moral from the original story. The ant is involved in summer fun with the grasshopper in this version of the story, and recognizes the importance of the art that they create together -- but still decides to turn the grasshopper out in the end. But the grasshopper himself is not looking for simple handouts, but respect. The Morrisons use colorful slang and a rhyming hip-hop style to pose their questions and illustrator Pascal Lemaitre uses an inexact cartoon style to convey the somewhat ambiguous message, giving the entire text a very modern feel.
        I believe this text could be used in a literature or writing unit that focuses on adaptations of classic texts. This book completely changes the emotion of the original fable and complicates the moral, but maintains major plot elements that make it clear that it is a reworking of another text. Modern versions of fairy tales, fables, and classic stories offer a variety of perspectives that can be examined and analyzed. I personally am interested in how songs are changed when they are covered by different artists, and this could be another element of the exploration. What do authors and artists choose to keep the same? What do they change? How does this affect the story? How can you tell it is still based on the original? All of these are questions that can be raised for any format of adaptation.