American Zombie Gothic
The Rise and Fall (and Rise) of the Walking Dead in Popular Culture
Kyle William
Bishop
Foreword by Jerrold E. Hogle ISBN
978-0-7864-4806-7
33 photos, filmography, notes, bibliography, index
247pp.
softcover
2010
Book Launch May 2010
Description
Zombie stories are peculiarly American, as the creature was born in the New World and functions as a reminder of the atrocities of colonialism and slavery. The voodoo-based zombie films of the 1930s and ’40s reveal deep-seated racist attitudes and imperialist paranoia, but the contagious, cannibalistic zombie horde invasion narrative established by George A. Romero has even greater singularity.
This book provides a cultural and critical analysis of the cinematic zombie tradition, starting with its origins in Haitian folklore and tracking the development of the subgenre into the twenty-first century. Closely examining such influential works as Victor Halperin’s White Zombie, Jacques Tourneur’s I Walked with a Zombie, Lucio Fulci’s Zombi 2, Dan O’Bannon’s The Return of the Living Dead, Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later, and, of course, Romero’s entire “Dead” series, it establishes the place of zombies in the Gothic tradition.
About the Author
Kyle William Bishop is an assistant professor at Southern Utah University, where he teaches American literature and culture, film studies, fantasy literature, and English composition. He has presented and published a variety of papers on popular culture and cinematic adaptation.
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