1 Allamistakeo awakes
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Jasmine Day
Abstract
This chapter focuses on a British illustration for Edgar Allan Poe’s satirical short story ‘Some Words with a Mummy’ (1845), which was published posthumously in an anthology of his works in 1852. This illustration is the earliest known visual depiction of a revived Egyptian mummy, a character that later became an archetypal figure in Victorian literature. This chapter situates the unknown artist’s vision of the fictional mummy Allamistakeo within the history of visual and literary depictions of mummies and the sociopolitical discourses they articulated, comparing the illustrator’s engagement within contemporary debates with those suggested by Poe’s text. While Poe does not assign a racial identity to Allamistakeo, the illustrator gives the mummy an African appearance, evoking scientific disputes about the racial origins of the ancient Egyptians. In bringing to light this illustration and analysing it as part of the wider corpus of mummy literature as well as the racial debates that this body of literature responded to and furthered, this chapter demonstrates that both Poe and his illustrator invited contemporary readers to question commonly held racial stereotypes and European imperialist ideology.
Abstract
This chapter focuses on a British illustration for Edgar Allan Poe’s satirical short story ‘Some Words with a Mummy’ (1845), which was published posthumously in an anthology of his works in 1852. This illustration is the earliest known visual depiction of a revived Egyptian mummy, a character that later became an archetypal figure in Victorian literature. This chapter situates the unknown artist’s vision of the fictional mummy Allamistakeo within the history of visual and literary depictions of mummies and the sociopolitical discourses they articulated, comparing the illustrator’s engagement within contemporary debates with those suggested by Poe’s text. While Poe does not assign a racial identity to Allamistakeo, the illustrator gives the mummy an African appearance, evoking scientific disputes about the racial origins of the ancient Egyptians. In bringing to light this illustration and analysing it as part of the wider corpus of mummy literature as well as the racial debates that this body of literature responded to and furthered, this chapter demonstrates that both Poe and his illustrator invited contemporary readers to question commonly held racial stereotypes and European imperialist ideology.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front matter i
- Dedication v
- Contents vii
- List of figures ix
- List of contributors xi
- Acknowledgements xiv
- Introduction 1
- 1 Allamistakeo awakes 20
- 2 Adam Bede 43
- 3 Remembering Mrs Potiphar 68
- 4 Prefiguring the cross 90
- 5 ‘The culminating flower of cat-worship in Egypt’ 114
- 6 ‘A Memnon waiting for the day’ 139
- 7 Perfume, cigarettes and gilded boards 162
- 8 The intelligibility of the past in Bram Stoker’s The Jewel of Seven Stars 185
- Select bibliography 207
- Index 222
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front matter i
- Dedication v
- Contents vii
- List of figures ix
- List of contributors xi
- Acknowledgements xiv
- Introduction 1
- 1 Allamistakeo awakes 20
- 2 Adam Bede 43
- 3 Remembering Mrs Potiphar 68
- 4 Prefiguring the cross 90
- 5 ‘The culminating flower of cat-worship in Egypt’ 114
- 6 ‘A Memnon waiting for the day’ 139
- 7 Perfume, cigarettes and gilded boards 162
- 8 The intelligibility of the past in Bram Stoker’s The Jewel of Seven Stars 185
- Select bibliography 207
- Index 222
