The art of the politically correct literary adaptation

Never paraphrasing the classics was a given until woke sensibilities became a must. This was brought to mind by the BBC’s adaptation of Great Expectations, in which the convict Magwitch knocks the Empire and Miss Havisham takes opium on the side. What they should have done is have Pip hustling coke for a fellow convict of Magwitch named Escobarian, bringing it daily to the addicted old lady, and Estella sniffing – no pun intended – out the plot and giving young Pip hell.

Never mind. Woke rules supreme, and because of that the scope for future reworkings of the classics seems unlimited. Let’s start at the beginning, with Homer’s Trojan War. No more tired old Menelaus and Helen, and Paris and stuffy chief Agamemnon. The real reason for the war is that Paris has run off with Patroclus, Achilles’s so-called best friend and lover. Achilles is raging against Agamemnon because of a homophobic remark the King of Mycenae makes after the Greeks spend ten years stuck on the beach facing the Trojan gates while Paris and Patroclus are having a rave inside.