The Mummy eBook

Released in 1932,The Mummy moved Universal horror away from the Gothic Europe ofDraculaandFrankensteinand into a land of deserts, pyramids, and long-lost tombs. In doing so the film continued a tradition of horror fiction that is almost as old as the Western pursuit of Egyptology, as numerous European and American authors from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries had portrayed Egypt as a place of mystery and magic. This book examines the roots ofThe Mummy. It shows how the film shares many of its motifs with the work of writers such as Bram Stoker, Arthur Conan Doyle, and H. Rider Haggard, whose tales of living mummies, immortal sorcerers, and Egyptian mysticism bear strong resemblances to Universals movie. In addition, the book discusses howThe Mummy drew upon a contemporary vogue for all things ancient Egyptian: the tomb of Tutankhamun was discovered the decade before the film was released, prompting sensationalistic rumors of a curse. This is the story of what happened when Hollywood horror went to Egypt.