The Classic Books Behind Audrey Hepburn Movies

Celebrated actress, style icon, WWII survivor, and philanthropist (the list goes on), there are few women celebrated as much for their inner self as their outward appearance as Audrey Hepburn. She starred in movies spanning four decades, and, following her acting career, dedicated her time to being a UNICEF ambassador.

It’s no wonder everyone loves Audrey Hepburn, so to celebrate this wonderful woman, we’re going to take a look at the books behind some of her most famous movies.

The Nun’s Story

This classic 1959 film sees Hepburn donning a nun’s habit and dealing with the many compromises that come from joining the religious order. The movie was a smash hit in its day, and continues to be one of the mid-20th Century’s most beloved films, but it was not an organic creation, as the screenplay was based on a book of the same name from 1956. Written by Katherine Hulme, the book itself was a bestseller, and was inspired in part by the author’s friend Marie Louise Habets.

Breakfast At Tiffany’s

Probably Hepburn’s most iconic movie is Breakfast At Tiffany’s, which tells the story of glamorous Holly Golightly as she attempts to navigate the social scene of 1940s New York, and takes a fancy to the handsome young man who has just moved into her building. The movie is based on a novella of the same name by Truman Capote, who created the unmistakable country girl-turned New York socialite character that we know and love today.

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Interesting Stories Surrounding Some of the Classics

There’s no shortage of interesting and intriguing stories from the literary world, here are three interesting stories about some of our best loved books and authors.

Could you point it out on a map? Bram Stoker’s Dracula set the standard when it comes to the interpretation of the modern vampire. Although partially set in Transylvania, a mountainous region in central Romania, Stoker, an Irish author, had never in fact visited Romania or any other part of Eastern Europe.

An interesting interpretation. Written by French novelist Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve, the original version of Beauty and the Beast was published 1740 in La Jeune Américaine et les contes marins (The Young American and Marine Tales). While Disney may have turned it into a magical tale of finding beauty and true love in the most unexpected of places, it was in fact written in order to encourage girls to accept arranged marriages, or as children’s literature academic Maria Tatar puts it, to accept “an alliance that required effacing their own desires and submitting to the will of a monster.”

Dahl, Roald Dahl. Before his career as the author of such beloved children’s books as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and James and the Giant Peach, Roald Dahl served as a spy for the British Security Coordination during World War II. Somewhat of a James Bond-esque agent, Dahl gathered intelligence for the British while using his charm to seduce society ladies, possibly for his own leisure.

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