William Goldman was motivated to write the screenplay and abridge the book version of The Princess Bride due to his fond childhood memories of his father reading it to him while sick. As an adult, he struggled to find a copy of the book for his son and realized his father had only read him the best parts, so he decided to publish his own abridged version focusing on just the highlights. The introduction provides background on the challenges of adapting the book into a film and Goldman's personal history with the story.

1. How to: Book Mark
{
Princess Bride Unit

2.  Don’t cheat. Copying is cheating. You
will receive a zero. Further action will
be taken if it continues.
Write in complete sentences.
 Be detailed. Give me more information
than just “yes” or “no”.
Answer one Bookmark per assigned
reading even if it’s more than one
section.
General Things

3. William Goldman describes his love of The Princess Bride
to the reader. In the introduction, he explains how the
movie came to be, detailing the issues with getting the
film off the ground and his intense desire to do so. In the
following section (in between the introduction and the
first chapter), Goldman writes about his childhood,
specifically about how his dad read him The Princess
Bride. He then flashes forward to current times where he
attempts to find a copy of the book for his son. When he
finally does and his son struggles to read it, he realizes
the book is not how he remembers it. Therefore, he
decides to abridge it, leaving in only the good parts.
What has happened so far?

4. Goldman was motivated to write the
screenplay for The Princess Bride
and to abridge the original book due
to his love of it as a child. In
particular, I believe his main love of
the book has to do with his affection
for his father or the memory of time
spent reading the book with his
father.
Why did it happen?

5. Goldman sells The Princess Bride (book) to Fox. There are
issues making the movie. Goldman buys back his book so Fox
can’t hire someone else to write the screenplay. After countless
issues, the movie is on track and the cast is hired. The movie is
made.
Goldman doesn’t like reading as a child. He gets sick. His dad
reads him The Princess Bride while he’s sick. He falls in love
with the book and, consequentially reading. When he gets
older, he tries to give the book to his son, but realizes his father
only read him the important parts. He decides to abridge the
book.
What are the important
events in this episode?

6. The events in the introduction take place
during the making of the film in early 1973,
but Goldman is speaking from 1998 about
the making of the film then.
The events in the second part take place in
Goldman’s childhood and shortly before he
wrote the abridgment which was published
in 1973. One might assume this is the very
late 1960s or the very early 1970s.
When do the events take place?

7. Next, Goldman will jump into
his abridgment of The Princess
Bride and the reader will get to
experience what he deems to be
the best book ever written.
What might happen next?

8. In this section, Goldman does not offer a lot of
details other than the descriptions of people. I
can easily visualize the part where Andre the
Giant squeezes into the chair that is to small
for him. I can also imagine what Sandy
Sterling (rocking hot, tanned body in a tiny
bikini) and Goldman’s dad (older, hunched
over, squinting at an old book) look like.
Can I visualize what’s be
described?

9. Goldman is purely motivated by this
obsession with The Princess Bride.
His love of the book motivates his
abridgment as well as his screenplay.
It also motivates his selection of his
son’s birthday gift. Goldman is
motivated to consider an affair with
Sandy Sterling by his unhappiness
with his marriage.
What is my evaluation of the
character’s decisions and actions?

10. In my own life, I have become so enthralled with a
book that it consumed my thoughts for weeks on end
and continues to influence me to this day. The first
book that ever captured me this way was Harry
Potter followed by The True Adventures of Charlotte
Doyle. When I was in high school, I read The Catcher
in the Rye over and over until the words were
permanently fixed in my brain.
What connections can I
make between what I’ve
read and my own life?