Not Necessarily Original

I wish to clarify the statement in Kenneth Turan’s review of “Shakespeare in Love” that Marc Norman “came up with the deft original idea of having Shakespeare’s play and life influence each other” (“A Welcome Winter’s Tale,” Dec. 11). This is not to disparage the contributions of Norman and co-writer Tom Stoppard, but the idea has been around a good while.

Faye Kellerman, a famed local mystery author, dramatized Shakespeare’s love life in her 1989 novel, “The Quality of Mercy--A Novel of Intrigue in Elizabethan England.” Her main plot bears uncanny resemblances to “Shakespeare in Love,” though the treatments are very different.

I have adapted my unproduced 1976 screenplay “Young Will Shakespeare,” which focused on the adventures of the boy Shakespeare, as a young adult novel.

BRIAN G. MacDONALD

Los Angeles