Archive for January 2020

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[Commlist] New book: The Mummy on Screen: Orientalism and Monstrosity in Horror Cinema

Wed Jan 08 14:44:01 GMT 2020





*/The Mummy on Screen: Orientalism and Monstrosity in Horror Cinema/***(Bloomsbury)

Basil Glynn (Middlesex University)

https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/the-mummy-on-screen-9781788314084/

The Mummy is one of the most recognizable figures on screen and is as established in the popular imagination as virtually any other monster, yet the Mummy has until now remained a largely overlooked figure in critical analysis of the cinema. In this new study, Basil Glynn explores the history of the Mummy film, uncovering lost and half-forgotten movies along the way, revealing the cinematic Mummy to be an astonishingly diverse and protean figure with a myriad of on-screen incarnations. In the course of investigating the enduring appeal of this most 'Oriental' of monsters, Glynn traces the Mummy's development on screen from its roots in popular culture and silent cinema, through Universal Studios' Mummy movies of the 1930s and 40s, to Hammer Horror's re-imagining of the figure in the 1950s, and beyond.

**

“The mummy has long been neglected in horror criticism as a stiff and lifeless movie monster. But /The Mummy on Screen/ finds a beating heart beneath the bandages. With exhaustive research and deft analysis, Basil Glynn lifts the shroud on the mummy and finds a fascinating and malleable monster whose mute body nonetheless speaks volumes about the Orientalist imagination.” – *Andrew Scahill, Assistant Professor of English, University of Colorado Denver, USA,*

“If the Mummy has enjoyed considerably less critical attention or regard than its fellow movie undead, Basil Glynn rectifies that neglect in this persuasive reappraisal, tracing the beat of the cloth-wrapped feet in an authoritative and illuminating study of an enduring and deceptively versatile movie monster.” –*Leon Hunt, Senior Lecturer in Film and TV Studies, Brunel University, UK,*

“Glynn not only shows us the origins of the shambling terror … he takes us on an intellectually thrilling tour of the orientalist assumptions western audiences bring to the fictional mummy. Glynn will make you wonder why you ever cared so much about zombies and vampires in this accessible and brilliant examination of a truly terrifying monster that, until now, has never been given its due. Beware the mummy's curse! But read this book anyway.” – *W. Scott Poole, Professor of History, College of Charleston, USA *and author of *Monsters in America *and* Wasteland: The Great War and the Origins of Modern Horror,*

“Glynn's observation that the Mummy has 'stalked . . . its way through the movies, largely unappreciated by critics, academics and cultural commentators' is an astute, if unfortunate one. Just as the Mummy is often without voice in the cinema, the same may largely be said of its presence in academic literature. Glynn's book isn't just welcome: it's essential. The Mummy, as Glynn points out, is perhaps the cinema's most lucrative yet (paradoxically) unappreciated teratological figure. /The Mummy on Screen's/ legibility and wealth of research will make it indispensably useful. Undergraduate students will love it-graduate students will appreciate its accessibility; professors will wish they had written it.” – *John Edgar Browning, Georgia Institute of Technology, *author and editor of* Zombie Talk: Culture, History, Politics, The Forgotten Writings of Bram Stoker*, and *Dracula in Visual Media,*

“The time has come to understand and embrace the Mummy's ongoing cultural relevance. Glynn unwraps the archetypal Mummy's relentless trajectory from ancient artefact to modern attraction!” –*Victoria McCollum, Lecturer in Cinematic Arts, Ulster University, Northern Ireland.*

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