Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hi, my name is Robert Lambin. This is the Monster Fact,
Speaker 2: a short form series from Stuff to Blow Your Mind,
Speaker 2: focusing in non mythical creatures, ideas and monsters in time.
Speaker 2: In this episode, I like to discuss one of the
Speaker 2: classic monster icons of twentieth century horror cinema, the Undead Mummy.
Speaker 2: You've all encountered some variation on this monster before, if
Speaker 2: not in the original six part Universal Pictures Mummy franchised,
Speaker 2: then perhaps in nineteen eighty seven's The Monster Squad or
Speaker 2: nineteen nineties Tales from the Dark Side, the movie which
Speaker 2: has a very memorable adaptation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's
Speaker 2: Lot two forty nine, which I'll touch on again in
Speaker 2: a bit. For my own part, I fondly remember reading
Speaker 2: a pair of kids books from the late eighties and
Speaker 2: nineties when I was a child, by Alita E. Young,
Speaker 2: Terror in the Tomb of Death and Returned to the
Speaker 2: Tomb of Death, both of which featured undead mummies and
Speaker 2: ancient Egyptian curses. Now, to properly understand mummy horror fiction
Speaker 2: in general, we have to recognize its place within the
Speaker 2: larger world of Egyptomania. The term Egyptomania is more often
Speaker 2: used to refer specifically to nineteenth century European fascination with
Speaker 2: all things Egypt in the wake of Napoleon's Egyptian campaign,
Speaker 2: but it can also generally be leveled at different points
Speaker 2: in time when various cultures have pursued an interest in
Speaker 2: ancient Egyptian civilization and culture. In the excellent book Egyptomania,
Speaker 2: author Ronald H. Fritz discusses various forms of Egyptomania over
Speaker 2: the ages, from the ancient Hebrews, Greeks, and Romans to
Speaker 2: Europeans and afrocentrist movements. He also devotes a chapter to
Speaker 2: Hollywood movies and literature. He writes that Egyptian themed fiction
Speaker 2: in its current forms emerged during the nineteenth century, again
Speaker 2: after Napoleon's campaign in Egypt inspired a new surge in
Speaker 2: European Egyptomania, surplanting Egypt's smaller place in the European culture
Speaker 2: of the time period, where it was mostly relegated to
Speaker 2: its role in Shakespearean theater, freemasonry, and sporadic fictional treatments.
Speaker 2: Fritz writes that Egyptian themed fiction basically falls into a
Speaker 2: number of subgenres. There's historical fiction, biblical fiction, mysteries and thrillers,
Speaker 2: occult fiction, and yes, there is the mummy fiction. But
Speaker 2: where does the idea of undead mummified ancient Egyptians come
Speaker 2: from in all of this? Well, the nineteen thirty two
Speaker 2: universal horror movie The Mummy might seem like a good
Speaker 2: place to start, after all, it kicked off a rather
Speaker 2: influential franchise, but Fritz shares that early versions of the
Speaker 2: script didn't feature an undead mummy at all. This settlement
Speaker 2: was only added later in subsequent rewrites. Unlike Dracula and Frankenstein,
Speaker 2: the Mummy frame was not rooted in a particular work
Speaker 2: of literature, Though there are clear literary forbears, nineteen thirty
Speaker 2: two is The Mummy wasn't even the first mummy motion picture.
Speaker 2: Consider instead that the likes of nineteen eleven's The Mummy,
Speaker 2: in which a scientist revives an Egyptian mummy with electricity
Speaker 2: and then falls in love with her sadly lost, is
Speaker 2: just one of a flurry of silent mummy movies from
Speaker 2: the nineteen tens. As for literary sources, Sir Arthur Conan
Speaker 2: Doyle's short stories The Ring of Thoth eighteen ninety and
Speaker 2: Lot Number two forty nine eighteen ninety two are important
Speaker 2: to note, as is Brahm Stoker's The Jewel of the
Speaker 2: Seven Stars from nineteen oh three. Fritz singles out The
Speaker 2: Mummy or a Tale of the twenty second Century by
Speaker 2: Jane C. Loudon from eighteen twenty seven as the earliest
Speaker 2: long work concerning a reanimated mummy. Other early examples of
Speaker 2: reanimated mummy story include Theophile Gottner's The Mummy's Foot and
Speaker 2: Edgar Allen Poe's eighteen forty five story Some Words with
Speaker 2: a Mummy. These stories, according to Fritz, arise in general
Speaker 2: again out of nineteenth century Egyptomania, but also out of
Speaker 2: European and American fascination with mummies and mummy unwrapping parties.
Speaker 2: In particular. He also writes that we can't underestimate Victorian
Speaker 2: colonial guilt and misgivings about the desecration of Egyptian tombs
Speaker 2: and artifacts as a strong motivation for summoning so many
Speaker 2: tales in which over eager American and European archaeologists on
Speaker 2: Earth ancient tombs ancient curses and invoked the wrath of
Speaker 2: the untead. In fact, he points out that initially mummy
Speaker 2: stories cast archaeologists firmly in the role of villains, but
Speaker 2: then the needle moved in the opposite direction quote after
Speaker 2: the discovery of Tutenkammen's tomb nineteen twenty two. Thanks to
Speaker 2: the film industry, archaeologists were portrayed as heroic, scholarly adventures,
Speaker 2: while angry mummies were not avengers but the revived, corporeal
Speaker 2: forms of a mindless ancient evil. This shift is in
Speaker 2: effect an affirmation or vindication of imperialism and colonialism. On
Speaker 2: top of all of this, there's, of course the influence
Speaker 2: of pre existing tales of cursed objects and the unsettled dead,
Speaker 2: which would have found new life in Egyptomania fuel creations.
Speaker 2: These various elements all would seem to have contributed to
Speaker 2: the undead mummy's place in our horror fiction. Tune in
Speaker 2: for additional episodes of The Monster Fact or The Artifact
Speaker 2: each week. As always, you can email us at contact
Speaker 2: at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.
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