What Thurber seems to say is that imagination can be the highest form of grace, the stuff of story that makes life resonate with meaning. Mitty is not just a dawdler he’s a creative genius. The alternate universe that Mitty constructs is every bit as real to him-and to the reader-as the blander one where Mitty keeps a physical address. Thurber seemed quite deliberate in referring to the secret life of Walter Mitty. His daydreams are works of art in themselves-self-contained worlds that become, in their vivid detail and gripping dialog, miniature masterpieces of the mind. The movie treatments really miss the magic of the original, which hints that Mitty is up to something more than mere escapism in his fantasies. What we get is an overblown homily on the virtues of self-actualization-James Thurber by way of Dale Carnegie. Ben Stiller’s 2013 portrayal of Walter Mitty veers from Thurber even more, as the repressed hero decides to give up daydreaming to search out adventures worthy of Indiana Jones. The 1947 version starring Danny Kaye includes a subplot in which the real-life Mitty tangles with jewel thieves-a revision that, in juicing up Walter’s humdrum existence, destroys the interior logic of Thurber’s source material. Hollywood has adapted the story twice, getting it wrong each time. First published in 1939, “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” follows the title character, a henpecked husband, as he daydreams more dramatic versions of himself, either as a military pilot, star surgeon, or defendant in a murder trial.
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