Frankly, Scarlett, I Do Give a Damn!: And Other Classic Romances Retold

Here's a case where a good idea, James F. Garner's Politically Correct Bedtime Stories, has actually bred another that is equally inspired. West and Peske have the requisite light touch, witty irreverence, sharp eye for the ridiculous-and the literary smarts-to retell these 12 classic love stories as wickedly funny parodies. Inquiring in their introduction why the ``great romances of literature always seem to end tragically.. at least for the women,'' they rewrite such familiar tales as Wuthering Heights and The Great Gatsby in the jargon of feminist self-help manuals. Trying in each case to approximate the prose of the original version (biblical cadences in the story of Samson and Delilah, iambic pentameter in the revisionist ``Romeo and Juliet''), they interject trendy contemporary vernacular, with hilarious results. Juliet says: ``What satisfaction canst thou have tonight?/ I don't put out on the first date./ The ring first,/ buddy.'' The hard-as-nails heroine of ``Jane Eyre (Or, Listening to Prozac)'' takes no guff from Mr. Rochester and in short order gets him to treat ``the babe in the belfry'' with wonder drugs. With Daisy's help, Jay Gatsby finally relieves his ``prodigious trouser bulge''; Meggie convinces Father Ralph of ``The Thorn Birds'' to forsake celibacy (``I've got needs here, pal''); Hester finally allows a sheepishly repentant Arthur Dimmesdale to be her ``partner.'' A mishmash of parody and camp, these revisionist romances would turn even Cupid into a politically correct wimp. (Feb.)